Shackleton Stopped Second-Guessing Himself
An interview with the famously reclusive—and musically singular—artist, who talks about collaboration, creative evolution, social media, trance and the legacy of Skull Disco.
Shackleton doesn’t talk to the press very often. When I last interviewed him back in 2021, more than a decade had passed since he’d last gone on the record with a journalist, and in the nearly five years that have passed since then, he’s continued to largely keep to himself, allowing his music to do the vast majority of the talking.
Here’s the thing though: There’s been a whole lot of new music, as the Berlin-based Englishman has in recent years arguably been more prolific than ever before. And though he long ago transcended the deliciously foreboding soundworld of Skull Disco, the pioneering label he co-founded more than two decade ago, he’s pushed into genres and aesthetics that few would have predicted, trying his hand at everything from psychedelic drones to outsider pop. Much of that sonic expansion has come via a growing portfolio of collaborations; during the past few years alone, Shackleton has teamed up with the likes of Waclaw Zimpel, Scotch Rolex, Six Organs of Admittance, Holy Tongue, Marlene Ribiero, Heather Leigh and numerous others.
A number of those collaborations were examined more closely in a sprawling First Floor feature I put together back in 2024—admittedly, without any direct input from Shackleton—but with the man having just dropped a new solo album, Euphoria Bound, I figured he might be willing to step out of the shadows and chat with me once again. That intuition turned out to be correct, and what resulted is quite possibly one of the most in-depth Shackleton interviews that’s ever been published.
It helped that there was plenty to talk about. Aside from his many collaborations (and what inspired them), there’s also the fact that Euphoria Bound is easily the most dancefloor-focused Shackleton record that’s surfaced in quite some time. We dug into those topics over the course of a long call last week, and also found time to examine his relationship with contemporary dance music and nightlife. That opened a door to his thoughts on social media and its effect on the culture—Shackleton, enviably, is not on Instagram, TikTok or any other platform, which of course only adds to the sense of mystique around his work. And yes, we did touch upon the Skull Disco era, but rather than taking a nostalgic tour through his supposed glory years, he remarked on his evolution since then, and talked about what it’s like to still primarily be associated with music that in many ways is quite different from what he’s doing now.
In short, what transpired is not a “Shackleton 101” conversation, nor is it a fond look back at the golden era of dubstep and the key role he played in pushing the genre into adventurous new territory. (Despite the fact that only a handful of Shackleton interviews exist, that ground has been thoroughly covered already.) What follows is a detailed look at the artist as he exists right now, and while he’s long been a singular figure, it’s fair to say that after more than 20 years into his career, there’s still nobody else quite like him.