Marco Mazzoli: ‘Dance music is blowing up - and we’re bringing a taste of Miami to Ibiza’s airwaves!’

Few people have left a bigger mark on commercial radio than Marco Mazzoli. Best known as the creator and host of Italy's record-breaking Lo Zoo di 105 - the country's most successful and provocative radio show for more than 25 years - Marco has built a career on pushing creative boundaries, earning millions of loyal listeners and becoming one of Italy's most recognisable broadcasting personalities.

Today, as co-owner and Program Director of Miami's Revolution 93.5 FM, he has turned his attention to another passion: championing electronic music through one of the United States' leading dance radio stations.

As Revolution 93.5 FM joins forces with Ibiza Global Radio for an exciting new international collaboration, launching brand new show Connecting Miami, Las Vegas, Dubai and Ibiza, we caught up with Marco to discuss this exciting exchange, why he believes radio is entering a new era, and the rapid growth of dance music in America.

Question: Marco, thank you for your time. These are exciting times, no? 

Marco: Yes, very exciting. I was talking about Ibiza yesterday on my show and I’m really jealous because all the big DJs are there during the summer. I was bragging about the fact that we’re starting this new collaboration with the best radio station on the island, and a lot of listeners were like, “Oh, that’s cool.”

How did this collaboration come about?

I have known Ibiza Global Radio CEO, Daniele Luppino, for a very long time and we wanted to start a while ago. The Revolution 93.5 station has been expanding, so we acquired another seven radio stations across the United States and it’s been challenging.

We now have our sister station in Las Vegas, Revolution 99.7, and we also put our Deep Chill House station, which used to be digital only, onto FM in Vegas. It’s been a lot of work.

We can imagine! How many stations have you got now, in total?

We have ten frequencies in total. Some of them are simulcast. For example, we have one frequency that covers all of Las Vegas and parts of the desert, then it’s simulcast on another frequency that reaches Arizona, Bullhead City, Laughlin and other parts of the Mojave Desert.

If you ever land in Los Angeles and drive up to Las Vegas, which I love - it’s about a four-hour drive - you can start listening to our station north of Los Angeles and all the way to Las Vegas. It’s really cool.

You have an amazingly successful career in radio. What made you fall in love with this medium?

I’ve been in radio since I was 13. I was born in Italy, but my dad got hired by Walt Disney in Los Angeles, so we moved there. Later, when I went back to Italy, I didn’t really speak good Italian.

One of my neighbours worked at a local radio station and asked me to pretend to be a famous American singer because I had such a good accent. The moment I spoke into the microphone for the first time, it was love at first sight.

I started in little local stations, then bigger ones, until I finally got to nationwide stations in Italy. In 1999, I built what today is still the number one radio show in Italy. It’s been 27 years now.

I just love radio.

With the advance of streaming platforms, how do you see the future of radio?

I hear a lot of people say radio is dying. I think radio is sleeping. It’s not dying. For many years corporate companies ruined radio and hopefully they’ll get out of this. Smaller companies, like mine and yours, can acquire more stations and go back to doing radio how it’s supposed to be.

In Ibiza there is a huge comeback for listening bars and vinyl-only events. Do you think people crave the nostalgia of it?

Younger generations are actually looking for vinyl and CDs. They like analogue.

I follow a lot of young people to understand what they’re doing, and they like radio more than what people are saying in the media.

Dance music is also blowing up, especially in the U.S.

Our station has a loyal following. People come to our events. We organise community clean-ups of beaches and parks and it’s mostly 17, 18 and 20-year-olds joining us. That makes me think there’s going to be a big comeback.

Can you describe the electronic music scene in Miami?

Miami isn’t really America. It’s an extension of South America.It used to be heavily influenced by Latin music and reggaeton. They even invented a genre called “Cubaton”.

Then Ultra started here in Miami. It became huge, especially with Europeans flying in just for the festival. Local people started wondering why everyone was travelling from around the world for these DJs, and it created a lot of interest.

Now every time we get into an Uber, they’re often listening to our station. Dance music is really taking off.

Las Vegas has already had a huge dance scene for years with DJ residencies, and Miami is building bigger and better events throughout the year.

I think we’re going to see amazing things for dance music and dance radio stations across America very quickly.

What are you most excited about when it comes to this partnership?

I’m excited about connecting Ibiza, Miami and Vegas because I believe these are the three major cities that have believed in this genre for more than ten years.

Seeing dance music now blowing up around the rest of the world makes us pioneers.

Dance music was huge in the ’90s, especially in Europe. Italy was a big part of the Italo dance scene. Then it kind of died.

Now I’m seeing a return.

People are starting to look at dance music again, but these have been ten dark years for the Italian dance scene.

We have a big following in Italy through our apps and I hope this collaboration with Ibiza Global Radio will help grow the digital audience and encourage more of Europe to reconnect with the scene.

Can you give us a little teaser of what sound we can expect from part of the show?

From our side, we’re going to try to give it a little taste of Miami - but not too much. When people think of Miami they often think reggaeton. We don’t play reggaeton on our station. We’re far away from it.

It’s going to have a Miami flavour, but be very European because our Miami and Las Vegas stations already have a very European sound.

It’s simply going to reflect what our listeners like.

You’ll hear it. I don’t want to spoil anything.