By Molly Schecklman —
Every artist goes through their fair share of struggles to be as successful as they are today, so imagine this. You move across the ocean from the country you have called home for your entire life. You make a temporary stop in Canada only to await the approval of your visa in order to get into the United States. You are faced with the struggle of having to sleep on a cold, hard, basement floor during the coldest winter Canada has seen in 20 years.
This is the struggle that upcoming Electronic Dance Music (EDM) artist Jackal has faced.
“I grew up in England where drum and bass and dubstep were getting really popular back in 2007 and 2008. I think that’s when I started really paying serious attention to [EDM],” said Jackal.
EDM is typically found in high-energy environments such as parties, raves, nightclubs and music festivals. Most of EDM is done on the spot as the producer transitions from one song or mix to the next, all while in front of a live audience.
Aside from just a music production point of view, the performances are also a way to release suppressed emotions and escape what a person is feeling. “I use my shows to let out aggression. I love to see the crowd raging with me,” said Jackal.
Just because Jackal is no longer lying on the cold, hard ground doesn’t mean he isn’t still facing struggles in his career today. “Trying to speed up my creative process [is a struggle]. I like taking my time with ideas and making them as best as I can. These days everything is released so rapidly it’s hard to keep up,” said Jackal. As his career progresses, Jackal hopes to one day collaborate with Kanye West.
Jackal has never been to the Menomonie area before, and apart from experiencing new destinations such as Stout, he is also looking forward to being able to sleep in one of the many hotel rooms Menomonie has to offer seeing as he will be coming directly off of a tour bus.
Jackal will be performing at UW–Stout on February 18 at 7 p.m. in the MSC.