Before his set at the Revealed Night during ADE Dannic had some time to sit down with us. One of the first artist who released on Revealed Recording but nowadays he also has his own label Fonk Recordings. We talked with him about music and how he deals with the pressure.

Can you describe what ADE means to you in three words?
First word that comes to mind is business, secondly meeting people in real life, and finally it’s also a lot of fun.

We are at the Revealed night now, last year you didn’t play here. Does it mean you’re going to release on Revealed again?
Of course, tonight’s going to be really fun. Hardwell and I are going to play our new collab together for the first time. I have my own label and I release on Spinnin’ sometimes, but I’ve always said that I’ll never leave Revealed. I had to spread my wings for a while and do my own thing, but I never forgot where I came from. Revealed has been important for my career. I have a collab with Hardwell and a new progressive track that’s also going to be released on Revealed. That progressive track has that real old-school Dannic sound, I think it’ll be cool for the fans.

You release on different labels, if you’re working on a track do you already decide for which label you’re going to make the track?
To be honest I stopped doing that. If you think like that when you start a new track, you block your own creativity. What I’m doing now with is if I have a more commercial track with vocals and it’s less hard. It’s still a club track but for example my mother would like those tracks, then it’s one that’s right for Spinnin’. I like making that kind of tracks. Everything I make right now is music that I love.

Every year you have a different genre that’s popular, do you get inspired/use that genre in your tracks?
Of course, but the groove in a track is most important for me. You can do that in different ways. Fonk always stays my Dannic ‘club’ side, Revealed is more my melodic/euphoric side and Spinnin’ is more my commercial side with vocals. For me that’s the perfect mix.

What are you plans for the future with your own label Fonk Recordings?
We’re still growing. We keep releasing on a monthly basis. Now with ADE we give it a big push by releasing an EP with six tracks on it. There is so much talent that nobody has heard of. That’s the main reason why I started Fonk Recordings. Of course, it’s also to focus more on developing my own sound. But, it’s mainly to support young talent both in front and behind the scenes, because not everything will be released but I give them advice how they can do some things better. If a track is 70% great, I help him/her to get to the 100%. I wait till we have the track that will do good on the label and then release it. Hardwell helped me the same way in the beginning om my career, and now I want to give the same back to everyone.

Earlier this ADE you had your own label night,do you want to do more of those label nights?
People ask me sometimes what is your ultimate goal? I’m jealous, I don’t know if jealous is the right word. But what Revealed is doing with shows worldwide that would me amazing. My name is attached to the Fonk Recordings, but the talents are the ones who making a label. I believe in the groovy club sound and I would like to make it more popular. I would love to see that promotors worldwide also believe in that sound and book all of us worldwide.

Is that also the reason to ask people to vote for you for the DJ MAG Poll, to make your sound more popular?
Yes and no, at a festival the line-up is determined by which place you’re at the DJ MAG list. Unfortunately, in Asia it’s still really important, that’s the only reason. In Europe and the USA, it isn’t that important anymore.

More artists are talking about the pressure of work, which is getting too high. How do you deal with that?
At the end of last year I almost had a burn-out. The stereo type of the DJ -lifestyle is that we only stand with our hand up in the sky and have the best job of the world. Basically, we can’t complain, because we travel around the world. People forget that we have a business to run. If we don’t make music anymore your whole business stops, your product is your music. You have a lot of people that depend on you, that gives a lot of pressure. Don’t forget the social pressure, you can’t be at birthday parties you don’t see your family often. You constantly must deal with jet-lags and stuff. But also, the pressure of releasing new music, If I release a track this Monday, next Monday people already ask for another new track. It can be hard if you’re not made for this, especially the touring life. I think that what happened to Avicii and now Hardwell, people are more open to talk about it. I’m happy about that.

What do you do now to deal with the pressure now?
I literally looked for help. I started talking with a coach to gives me mirror to see what I can do better. It’s a 24/7 job. You get emails everyday that people want something from you. If I don’t respond is it the end of the world? no it’s not. With that kind of stuff, a coach learns you how do deal with it. But also, with the musical pressure, is it a bad thing that one record is doing better then another one? In the end I have to be happy with it. Everybody has a different taste of music and I had to learn that. A simple lesson: don’t read all the comments! Even if 99% is positive, and only 1 is negative, that’s the one you take home with you.

For the people who can’t see you this ADE, where can we find you next?
I’m gonna keep touring like an animal all over the world, it’s going really well. Keep an eye on my website wwww.djdannic.com to see where you can find me next.