Roberto Zanetti is quite frankly a dance music legend of the scene. His DWA Records has released countless tracks that would grace many peoples top dancefloor tracks of all time, and especially in the 90s they were one of the go-to labels, and one of the pioneers of both Italodisco and Eurodisco.
Now with it being 40 years since his first smash hit “Don’t Cry Tonight” and a bunch of remix packages due out to celebrate, we caught up with him to find out his thoughts on how the scene has changed, and how different it is running a label in the digital age to back then…
Hey Roberto, how are you, how has the year been so far?
Hi my friends, I’m OK, we are pretty busy with our catalogue of hits. This year started strong with big synch deals of one of our main hits “The Rhythm of the Night”.
How different is running a label now in the digital age than back in the 80s?
The main difference is that now we are less “artists” and more “business managers”. Doing songs today is so easy and everybody is doing tracks in one day or less…but the result is that all the tracks are similar and have a short life. We should dedicate more time to the “Music” than to the promotion and business.
And generally how has the scene changed for better or worse with the invention of the internet and social media?
Social media helps you to have a solid fan base but you put too much time on that, more than in the artistic world. Many things are similar, if you want to have people listening to a new product you have to create a buzz. I remember in the 80’s and 90’s when we created fake love stories of some artists to force press to write something, today is the same with socials, fake news to create interest…and fake streaming, fans…etc
Are they useful tools to promote the music and the parties or are they shallow distractions?
I think they are distractions because if you are an independent label you don’t have many employers to dedicate to that kind of promotion. You have to personally follow the things and you don’t dedicate your time to the creation of new music.
How much does being Italian influence your sound – is the country in your musical DNA, and how so?
Of course Italian influence was the field of my success! When I (together with same other producers ) created Italodisco in the 80’s we put together the Italian melody to an international electronic sound. I was one of the creators of that genre but also in the 90’s we started the Eurodisco and again we put an Italian melody with a strong pop disco beat. There was a time when all of Europe was copying DWA sound, our artists Corona, Ice Mc, Alexia, Double you where charting everywhere. I often put “Italian” words in the middle of english lyrics.
What is the sound of your label and how has it evolved over the years?
The sound is not changed at all so if you listen to the latest Savage Album “Love and Rain” the sound is still Italodisco – electro pop of the 80’s.
Then we do remixes and in that case we do in a modern electronic or house way.
When you work with famous artists you have to respect the fan base doing the original sound. Of course many DJs will say that you do “the same”…but if you do a modern actual sound you will have happy DJs but disappointed fans.
How hard is it to stay true to your own sound while evolving but not jumping on modern hype?
It is hard but you have to stay true with your roots, and you have to respect all the people that have followed you for years. This year we celebrate 40 years from the first single by Savage. There are millions of fans around the world that spent their life listening to that tune ( and the first album ) and played it to children and grandchildren. They want the same sound and you can’t change it at all.
Tell us about Savage’s “Don’t Cry” – how important a tune has this been for the label?
It was the first hit for me as producer ( artist producer name “Robyx” ) but at that time I had not my own label. I was smart to invest all my earnings in a recording studio and then in my DWA label. After that it was a long string of hits, but everything started from “Don’t Cry Tonight”. It was the first step of my career.
How did you choose who to remix it and why?
DWA will release several remixes of “Don’t Cry Tonight” during this year, this is why we call this package “Episode 1”. In this step we choose two modern remixers, FS Federico Scavo more house oriented and PAS Pasquini Matteo more electronic/melodic techno. They are friends and live here in Tuscany. Later this year we will do Episode 2 and same vinyl including the original remastered version. We were lucky that we saved the original 24 tracks in digital files so we have all the sound like they was created in the 80’s. We will have other remixers doing that and I also will do my one.
What else has the label got coming up?
We are focused on our hits catalogue so we will do new versions of many of them. We also have requests to license the original vocals in new tracks, like we did with Black Eyed Peas with “Ritmo”. DWA is still alive and have many friends all around the world.