We’ve heard you have a very special record collection. Can you tell us about it?

Amanita: Coming from a family in which music was played on turntables most of the time, records have always been for me the most “obvious” way to listen to it – and I started collecting them way before getting into DJing.

In my collection you can find the most diverse things, going from dreamy meditative ambient arriving to very fast progressive goa-trance, passing by dub, tribal downtempo and all things in between, including lots of non-electronic music stuff like rock, post-punk or pop.

I have a passion for weird non-music records: children’s tales, language courses, movie dialogues and everything I can layer up to make my sets more trippy. 
The connection with sound that is created through the physicality of wax is something very unique that taught me a lot about the value of music and deeply shaped my approach to DJing and listening.

Can you give us a track you’ve been listening to the most this summer?

MagPipez by Lask. Absolute banger I had been binge-listening and playing around all summer.

Tell us about a gig you have recently enjoyed a lot?

Amanita: It’s very difficult to choose one, as this summer I deeply enjoyed each one of my gigs! But as we are going through my most clubby side, I would say playing at the Coquin Bassin stage of Château Perché. I was not playing my proggy-bouncy dancefloor stuff for a while and having some of my dearest friends from Italy in the crowd made it even more special. I even witnessed a marriage proposal in front of the booth while I was playing! The recording of the set will be out soon ;))

Describe your favorite DJ booth.

The DJ booth of dreams for me is the one able to cut the distance between the DJ and the crowd, giving you the feeling you are literally playing on the dancefloor. I recently had the pleasure to play on a booth of this kind during the crew party of the build-up of Waking Life (a private party for the people that build the festival that happens some weeks before). The soundsystem was a Loud Pro powered by Headroom team and the amazing self-built soundsystem of the Power R-Angels all-women-crew was used as monitors of the DJ booth. Feel so blessed to have played on such an impeccable set up!

You seem to travel a lot. What events around Europe would you recommend to someone who’d like to switch from big festivals next year?

There are so many well curated small scale festivals out there! Between the ones I had the pleasure to play and attend this year I would definitely recommend Love On Other Planets and Cyrcàdia by Oz Collective (both in France) + Nemora in Italy- which had its first edition this year.

A lot of people know you as the “listening stage” DJ. What should people expect in a clubbier and dancier context?

Listening and dance floor live inextricably in the same ecosystem – I can’t think of a world in which I am not playing and digging both things. Psychedelic scapes driven by narratives and intuition are what my sets are made of, regardless of genre or speed. If on listening stages I am focusing on creating journeys that enable the encounter of the mind and the spirit, on the dance floor I add to this equation the body as a medium for the experience. Expect nothing, just come with an open mind and heart and get ready to get through a wide range of emotions 🙂

This is not your first trip to Prague. Any memories you cherish from your previous visit?

Prague, and Ankali in particular, hold such a sweet spot in my heart! The first time I came to play at Pluto invited by Theo and Surrealita for their show Hot Topic, then I ended up spending the rest of the weekend dancing my ass off between Ankali and Planeta Za for the half weekender, which was the perfect way to discover not only the club but especially the amazing community around and behind it. Special mention to the “darkroom” of Roman, a perfect example of the small silly things I love to see in party environments.

Amanita is playing at the Amphibian x Sinestesie event on September 4.
Presale available via Resident Advisor.