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Chris Stussy is a Dutch DJ, music producer and founder of the Up The Stuss label, whose real name is Niels Steenbergen. His work is primarily associated with the contemporary house scene: Stussy’s music combines elements of deep house, minimal house, garage, tech house and classic house from the 1990s. The artist himself prefers not to limit his sound with narrower genre definitions and simply calls it house.
Stussy reached an international club audience through a consistent series of vinyl and digital releases, while one of the major stages of his career was the launch of Up The Stuss in 2020. Later, tracks such as All Night Long, Desire, Won't Stop (Don't), Breather, Pumpin’ and others gained wider recognition. In 2025, Chris Stussy entered the DJ Mag Top 100 DJs for the first time at No. 81, and in April 2026 he released his debut studio album Lost, Found & Forgotten....
Early years
Chris Stussy grew up in Leiden, a city in the province of South Holland. His first exposure to electronic music came long before the start of his club career: at home he listened to his parents’ record collection, which included jazz, trance and other genres, while as a teenager he became interested in house mixes by Dutch DJ Ben Liebrand.
Before music, football played an important role in his life. Stussy played as a midfielder and spent some time in the youth system of HFC Haarlem. After the club ceased operations, he returned to UVS Leiden while becoming increasingly involved in DJing.
At the age of 19, he had to choose between a football match and his first major festival appearance at Straf_Werk. Stussy chose music and subsequently focused on his DJ career.
Early performances and introduction to the house scene
Stussy’s first regular performances took place in bars and beach clubs in Noordwijk. Long five- and six-hour sets required him to work with more than just house: he also played hip-hop and other music, which helped him develop the technical side of mixing and the ability to structure extended DJ sets.
At the same time, Stussy began immersing himself in Amsterdam’s underground scene. Studio 80 and parties such as Slapfunk, VBX and Tomorrow Is Now, Kid! became particularly important to him, combining minimalist European electronic music with house records from the 1990s. Among the producers and DJs he cited as key references during that period were Brawther, Jeremy Underground, Fabio Monesi and Kerri Chandler.
It was this combination of minimal and classic house that later became one of the foundations of his own production style.
Early releases
Before releasing his first records, Stussy spent several years teaching himself production in FL Studio. According to the artist, he deliberately avoided rushing into releasing music, preferring first to develop his own approach to producing tracks. His first official releases appeared around 2015.
Over the following years, his music was released on Nervous Records, PIV Records, Large Music, Nite Grooves, Rutilance, Djebali, Politics Of Dancing, Eastenderz, Kaoz Theory and other house imprints.
Stussy’s early work was slower and deeper than his later material. As the artist moved from warm-up sets to later time slots, the tempo and energy of his own tracks gradually increased. At the same time, groove remained the central element — the bass and rhythmic foundation around which his arrangements were built.
PIV Records and work with Prunk
Meeting Dutch DJ Prunk played an important role in Chris Stussy’s professional development.
After they began working together, Stussy received the opportunity to handle A&R duties at PIV Records. For around five years, he was involved in the label’s operations, music selection and communication with producers. This experience later proved directly useful when he created his own imprint.
When Stussy’s musical direction and that of PIV began to diverge, he decided to launch a separate platform.
Up The Stuss
In 2020, Chris Stussy founded his own label, Up The Stuss.
The name emerged after touring in Australia, where fans began using the hashtag #UpTheStuss. Stussy decided to transfer the phrase to his new music brand.
Up The Stuss was created as both a vinyl and digital platform for Stussy’s own music and releases by producers close to his musical direction. The label’s catalogue has featured work by Fabe, East End Dubs, Janeret, Locklead, Kolter, Malin Genie, Burnski & Kepler, Paolo Rocco and other artists.
For Stussy, the label became not only a way to release music but also a continuation of his A&R work: he is directly involved in selecting tracks and shaping releases.
Get Together and Breather
Stussy’s first appearance on Up The Stuss was a collaborative project with Danish producer S.A.M.
In 2021, they released Get Together — an eight-track project created remotely during the pandemic. Among its tracks, Breather became particularly notable and later established itself as one of the most popular recordings in Stussy’s catalogue.
In 2022, the solo project Mysteries Of The Universe followed, with Stussy continuing to develop a faster and more futuristic version of his house sound.
All Night Long
One of the major turning points in his career was the track All Night Long.
Stussy began working on the track in a hotel room before a performance in Leeds. He later completed the production and recorded the vocal hook himself on his phone, processing the recording with a vocoder.
In spring 2023, he played the finished version for the first time at a FUSE event at London’s Printworks. After the track began appearing in sets and on social media, listeners actively searched for it as an unidentified ID. On 26 May 2023, All Night Long was officially released on Up The Stuss as the first release in the UTSOFF series.
The track became Stussy’s most prominent release up to that point and significantly expanded his audience beyond the underground house scene. DJ Mag described it as a career-defining record for the artist.
Across Boundaries
Another direction in Stussy’s work is the collaborative project Across Boundaries with Dutch producer Locklead.
The musicians had known each other since the Amsterdam club scene of the mid-2010s, but only began fully collaborating in the studio much later. The project is built around joint production and B2B performances.
In 2023, they released Sense of Future, while the Across Boundaries catalogue later expanded with Pumpin’ and other recordings. In 2025, Stussy and Locklead released the full-length album Sakura under the project name, recorded during joint studio sessions in the Netherlands.
Desire and CSS
In February 2024, Chris Stussy released Desire — the first release on his new imprint CSS, created as an additional platform alongside Up The Stuss.
The second CSS release was a new version of the classic Moby — Go. Stussy originally made it as a special intro for his Boiler Room set, but following numerous requests from listeners, the rework received an official release on 1 November 2024.
At the end of 2024, the EP Won't Stop (Don't) was also released on Up The Stuss. Beatport categorises the title track as Deep House, and it became one of Stussy’s most notable club records of that period.
DJ Mag Top 100 DJs
In 2025, Chris Stussy entered the DJ Mag Top 100 DJs for the first time, ranking No. 81.
In its ranking profile, DJ Mag described his style simply as House and highlighted Pumpin’, Desire, All Night Long and his work with Up The Stuss among his most notable achievements.
USS
In 2025, Stussy launched his own event series USS.
The first event took place at London’s Roundhouse and sold out completely. The USS concept is built around a direct focus on music and a more restrained use of additional elements associated with contemporary club shows. The project later continued in Amsterdam and other cities.
Linger
In the same year, Chris Stussy introduced a separate audiovisual DJ show, Linger.
Unlike a conventional club set, its visual component is built around the artist’s personal memories and his own music. In 2025, the format was presented at events including Lowlands and Creamfields.
Lost, Found & Forgotten...
On 3 April 2026, Chris Stussy released Lost, Found & Forgotten... — his debut studio album. Released through Up The Stuss, it contains 19 tracks with a total running time of approximately 73 minutes.
The album is divided into three conceptual sections.
Lost brings together ideas and unfinished projects from different periods of Stussy’s career that he returned to in the studio and completed specifically for the album.
Found focuses on new music and collaborations with other artists. These include Fantasy with KUČKA and Wide Awake with Tom Did It.
Forgotten revisits archival tracks, B-sides and previously unreleased works, some of which had been appearing in Stussy’s sets for years.
The tracklist also includes Moonlight, Side to Side, Here for the Summer, Darkness, Miraflores, Believe in Yourself, If You Doubt Me, Mesmerized and other tracks.
BBC Radio 1
In April 2026, Chris Stussy received a month-long residency on BBC Radio 1. At the same time, a tour supporting Lost, Found & Forgotten... began, including special performances and album presentations.
Before this, Stussy had already recorded a BBC Radio 1 Essential Mix and regularly published extended DJ sets from festivals and club appearances.
Musical style
Although Chris Stussy’s music is often categorised as deep house or minimal/deep tech, the producer himself views his catalogue more broadly.
Its foundation is house. Across different sets and releases, he incorporates elements of minimal, UK garage, tech house, breakbeat and classic American house. Stussy has emphasised that he prefers to see these styles not as rigid separate categories, but as different sides of the same house culture.
His early releases were deeper, slower and more dub-oriented. As he moved onto larger stages and peak-time slots, his productions became faster and more energetic. At the same time, several features have remained consistent: a pronounced bass groove, syncopated drums, short vocal elements, chord parts and gradual development of the arrangement.
Clubs and festivals
As his international audience grew, Chris Stussy began performing regularly both in specialist clubs and at major electronic music festivals.
His touring history includes DC-10 Ibiza, Club Space Miami, KOKO London, The Warehouse Project, Awakenings, Time Warp, Sunwaves, Creamfields and Coachella.
Extended club performances remain an important part of his approach. Stussy has repeatedly played extended and all-night-long sets, allowing him to explore a broader range of house music than is possible in a shorter festival format.
Main discography
Key solo and collaborative releases:
- Evening Drive — 2019
- Chris Stussy & S.A.M. — Get Together — 2021
- Mysteries Of The Universe — 2022
- All Night Long — 2023
- Desire — 2024
- Chris Stussy feat. Moby — Go — 2024
- Won't Stop (Don't) — 2024
- Across Boundaries — Sakura — 2025
- Lost, Found & Forgotten... — 2026
Chris Stussy today
Chris Stussy has progressed from local residencies and warm-up house sets to his own label system, international touring and a full-length album project. Up The Stuss remains the central element of his career, bringing together his own releases, music by other producers and the Across Boundaries project.
The release of Lost, Found & Forgotten... in 2026 marked a new stage in his discography: for the first time, Stussy transferred an approach developed through numerous EPs and club singles into the format of a full studio album. At the same time, the foundation of his music remains unchanged — house centred on groove, capable of moving from deeper warm-up material to more energetic club and festival tracks.
