Steve Angello stands as a luminary in the global electronic music scene, tracing his roots from a passionate kid in Sweden to co-founding the iconic Swedish House Mafia alongside Sebastian Ingrosso and Axwell. With anthems like “Save the World” and “Don’t You Worry Child” they soared to global success. Angello’s influence extends to his own label, with the founding of SIZE in 2003, which became a breeding ground for emerging talents and a driving force for sonic innovation in electronic music.
Thriving as a solo artist, Angello’s individual journey, highlighted by his debut “Wild Youth” and collaborations with Pusha T, reveals a dynamic range, seamlessly weaving between the intensity of techno and the grandeur of mainstage performances.
As the new year unfolds, Angello’s journey continues with the release of his new single “ME” and the promise of a new solo album. A pioneer, philanthropist, and visionary artist, Steve Angello continues to shape the electronic music landscape with his enduring impact and relentless creativity.
In this insightful conversation with Angello, we explore his artistic evolution, delve into the electronic music scene, discuss philanthropic endeavours, uncover future plans, and touch upon various other facets of his journey.

Let’s talk about your journey from co-founding Swedish House Mafia to your solo career. How do you perceive your evolution as an artist over the years? 

It’s been a long, long process. I started very young, and I had a goal of just making music. There were no label plans, I didn’t have any ambition to become an artist, it was more like an expression of my craft. I started DJing when I was 14, and shows when I was 16. And then from there, it’s just been a very organic process. It was not an overnight success. Once I was 18/19, I wanted to start putting out music. So I started the label. And the reason behind starting the label was that I sent my demos to record labels, and nobody signed the music, nobody was interested because at that time, they required a lot of investment from a label to release vinyl. So I just said, “Forget it, I’m gonna start my own platform, I’m gonna start my own label. I’m just gonna put out the music myself because I don’t want to be dependent on anybody.” So I started the label when I was 19, turning 20, and the rest is history. I’ve always wanted to create a place where I could give kids the help that I didn’t get when I was growing up. So the platform has always been one for young artists, and I’ve never looked into signing big artists, it’s always been their first or fifth release. It’s always been trying to help young guys come out. Most of them, when they find success, and while we still keep working with them to some extent, start to run their own labels, or they sign to major labels.
I’ve always felt like it’s a platform for myself when I was 18. 

So you started around 2003 with the label, right? How do you see the label’s impact on the main electronic music scene and how it has evolved over time? 

At first, it was a platform for me and my friends. But then we had guys like Avicii, before the fame, and also Afrojack, everything from Tiesto releases to underground techno stuff, and we’ve also had Osbourne remixes. It’s always been very early. I feel like, going into this new year, I want to wrap up 20 years. We did remixes of old stuff, we did reworks of old records. And now we’re just looking forward and trying to come up with a way of still being the platform. But we were asking ourselves, how do we do innovative stuff? How do we not do the standard stuff? Music is kind of old school. There’s a platform, there’s a format. So you have to follow rules and do things the way people want them to be done.
It’s about just trying to do different things, to come up with creative ideas and cater to our fans, build a community, give people music in a non-traditional way. So my focus is very much on how I can disrupt, move forward, and just do things our way, rather than just following the typical steps.

Let’s circle back to your own releases. In October, you released your latest feature single “The Underground (House of God)”, a reimagined version of the 1990 UK hit in collaboration with Corey James, HIISAK, and Roland Clark. What inspired you to breathe new life into this classic track?

I used to play that record to death. I love that record, I think it’s amazing. I did some edits, I played the old version, but I redid it. Corey and HIISAK heard it, and they were like, “Oh, shit. That’s cool. Maybe we should remake it.” So we remade it.
They made a version, I redid their version. I cleared it with the original guys, I sampled it with them, they’re still the writers. It’s a great club record. You know, my balance is different. I can play the main stage, but I can also play the dark room. So for me, just to create music that I play is key. 

And do you balance these kinds of settings, for example an intimate club and huge stages with thousands of people? How do you balance that in your sets? 

“I like to have fun when I perform. I’m very non-format. So I like to bring the dark, twisted stuff to the main stage. I feel like that’s my style.”

One day I might be passionately playing seven hours with Solomon, the next day I’m at Tomorrowland headlining the main stage, but I like to mix those worlds. I like to bring the dirty stuff onto the main stage. I think that it makes total sense, that’s what I, as a consumer, would like. So I’m just basing all my shows on what I would like if I would go to a festival. 

Apart from your solo performances, you are an integral part of Swedish House Mafia. How do you balance your creative expression and pursuits individually and within the group? 

We work so much together, we’re in the same complex, we sit in the same studios all day, every day. The difference is that Swedish House Mafia has its own identity. And I have my own identity, it’s more stripped back, experimental and raw. I make music only for my shows. With Swedish House Mafia, we always think a lot bigger, song-wise, features etc. Personally, for my solo stuff, I don’t really have a goal with the songs – I can sample a vocal and chop it up, mess around with it and have fun with that. So it’s a different approach. But it’s not that hard to balance. When we do Swedish House Mafia stuff, we lock in for a very long time. And, let’s say we gotta finish an album, we go into the studio for a year. And then when I come home at night, after working with artists, writers and bands, I like to sit down, put my headphones on, and make, for example, a techno record, you know, something different, just playful. Because I need a balance. I have the luxury to do it all so, for me, it’s a blessing to be able to do whatever I feel like. For me, it’s all about the vibe and the emotions of what I try to express.
I don’t know if there’s a difference in playfulness. But Swedish House Mafia is more complex, we’re three guys, Three minds, You travel, you have features etc for my own stuff I just express and then if it’s 130 or 150 BPM – it is what it is, for my solo stuff, I can focus on exactly what I’m feeling right now, or an idea I had 10 years ago and run with it,  I just do it, sometimes I finish a song in an hour because it’s so raw and sometimes it takes years cause it’s been marinating. 

We were already talking about this a little bit in the beginning. You guys were touring a lot in the past weeks. How has that been for you?

It’s been great. We did a big world tour last year. And this year we ended the world tour and did festivals, clubs, and a couple of shows in Ibiza. We also did a small four-show South American tour. For us, it’s a different time. Now we can really pick and choose where we want to go. It’s insane because now I’m just doing my schedule for next year myself. And I’m like, I want to go to New York in August and play at a specific club. I can just call the club or tell my agent. We have the luxury to pick and choose.
We’re very fortunate to have reached the status where we can actually just pick the cities we want to go to or experience. And if we want to play a festival, we just hit up the festival, it’s insane for us. I always talk about how fortunate we are to have been able to get to this point. It’s been really easy touring now. It’s been like, you go and do things you really want to do. You go and meet people you really want to see. I haven’t toured really heavily because I’ve just done shows that I want to do, so yeah, it’s been amazing. 
The experience has been crazy from past years, when I used to do 200 shows a year. And now I’m down to maybe 80-90, which is still a lot, but I pick the cities. It’s like, I want to go to Japan on Saturday, I want to play in Tokyo. I want to go to Korea next but I want a week in between in Tokyo. It’s a really great thing. 
I don’t know if it’s healthy or necessary to do too much. I still want to be hungry, motivated, and inspired. I don’t want to run myself to a point where I’m like, “I hate this,” you know, now I enjoy every show.

When focusing on the different times for you now and the extreme growth that you underwent, having been consistently active in the scene and industry for so many years now, how do you perceive the changing landscape of electronic music? 

I did the hard job. I started out with vinyl, sending out promos every week, and selling to stores. I used to run my record label, have a list of 500 vinyl stores, call them and try to sell 10 at a time. So it was a whole different thing. And I feel like it was really tough back in the days. But it made me who I am today. 
The whole digital landscape is super simple. It’s super easy and fast, you get noticed pretty quickly. It was a lot of work leading up to where I am today. But for kids today, growing up making music, it’s a dream. I had to play 200 shows to get booked for a festival. Now you can have a record that’s popular and you’re booked for a festival, it’s a whole different ecosystem. But I like it. I think it’s easy, nice, and healthy.
I’d like to see some more diversity in the way people put out music. More diversity and creativity when it comes to artists being artists. I like to see people challenge themselves more. I like to see artistic integrity. I like to see people pushing the boundaries a little more. I like people not playing too safe because you’re in a digital world now. So why play it safe? You can really disrupt and do crazy shit. When I put out my last solo album, and I had big guys hitting me up, like, why didn’t you just do seven hits? I was like, what’s the point? You know, I think now is the time, if you want to be an artist, be an artist. The whole world is open and listening. And I feel like people’s music tastes are much wider than when I was a kid because if you liked techno, you were only listening to techno, but now you have kids listening to Frank Sinatra, Peggy Gou, and Boys Noize altogether. I’m happy to see that. And I think that we should just embrace it and just have fun.

Celebrate the versatility. I think, in today’s digital era, there’s such a high quantity of releases and so many new artists. It can sometimes be hard for new talents to get to the point where things are innovative. 

I always talk about these things. If you put on the radio now and listen for one hour, I promise you, you can only mention one track. Now if you go to a playlist or radio from 1996, I swear you would focus on every single song and artist, and that’s the difference because artists used to be so connected with their sound. If you listen to Daft Punk, it sounds like Daft Punk. If you listen to Pink Floyd, it’s Pink Floyd. Prince, Michael Jackson, you know what I mean? So, I think people are just trying to follow too much nowadays. Sometimes the average artist, I’m not saying the big artists, but the average artist is just trying to follow streams and trends. Then you have artists like Aphex Twin, this one artist that really does their thing, and that’s what moves things forward. It might not be the most streamed song in the world, but that’s actually pushing culture. I think that’s really, really important.

Are there any particular artists who were important to you in the beginning, or also nowadays, in terms of inspiration and creative process?

I like to look at artists as motivation. Look at the guys that we worked with, Fred again.., for example. Fred again.. has done an amazing job being very, very artistic and also super authentic while being a new face. Being authentic is hard, because when the labels are knocking on the door and say, we need a radio record, your integrity is gonna really play a game. I think he’s done it really, really well. I mean, there are a lot of great artists out there. But he, as a young new example, is really inspiring, and we work with him a lot. So it’s really nice to see people that are really authentic and artistic, actually making it, pushing their own identity. 

Apart from the musical sphere, you also pursue other philanthropic causes. How do you balance your artistic career with giving back to the community, and is there any cause that’s particularly close to your heart?

Yeah, I mean, I didn’t have the easiest upbringing. When I was a kid I grew up in the suburbs. My mom was single and raised two kids, you know, so, for me, it was just seeing all the work that she put in and how hard she worked to buy football shoes, which, for her, was a big deal. When I was making music and DJing, all my relatives were like, you have to get a real job, my mom was always the one like, no, no, no, you should pursue this. So, just seeing that made me as a grown-up man with my own kids realise how important it is for kids to just live their dream.

“Kids have always been very close to my heart when it comes to sharing.”

I work with local kids in Sweden, we build studios, we’ve really tried to motivate them to just dream. I work with small organisations, I donate money, I help build schools. I help build education systems. I just push the idea of a creative kid to just do whatever. If they want to be a firefighter, be a firefighter.
And then last Christmas, we did a thing where we helped single moms that didn’t have money. They couldn’t even give their kids presents for Christmas. They couldn’t provide food for Christmas. So I called through my network, a lot of wealthy people, and I just asked them for Christmas gifts in boxes. So we donated hundreds of thousands of Christmas gifts to kids, so they had a proper Christmas. Little things like that make me sleep better at night. If I could change the world, I would, but you gotta do it up to your capacity. So I try to do these things once, twice, three times a year, depending on what it is. I’ve done things for Cancer Research for kids, I’ve done things for heart disease for kids. I try to do things that I’m capable of. So, yeah, if there’s an opportunity for me to give Christmas gifts, I’m gonna call all the wealthy people I know, and I’m gonna ask them to send them thousands, you know what I mean? So I use my network and provide, even if it’s a fundraiser, which we did for Cancer Research for kids. We raised millions and millions of euros because we did auctions. It’s just nice to do a little bit of everything, and just whatever the urgency is, I’m gonna be there. 
I’m just always putting myself in the situation that I was in, just always thinking, if I was sick when my mom raised us, what would happen? That’s kind of easy for me because I had that upbringing. As soon as I can relate to something or can even imagine it, I try to be there and help. And I don’t really talk about it too much on social media because I do it from my heart rather than from my perspective. But I do as much as I can. And it’s the best reward when you meet the people you were able to help, it’s insane.

That’s beautiful.

Looking ahead into this new year, you will be releasing your next single ‘ME’ in January. Can you tell me a little bit about how the single came together and what the story behind it is?

There’s been a wave of remakes of old songs in the last two years. People are looking back at the ’90s dance hits and just remake them. “Me” was more like a style that I updated, it was stabby ’90s tech that I tried to take into my world. So it’s more like a play with samples and a straight club banger. It’s not too dark. But it’s also not too mainstream, it’s in between, a good balance. I can play it in a club and also at a festival.

“I’m kind of flirting with the idea of making a new solo album next year.”

I needed some good warm-up time in the studio to make some music. So now I’m kind of interested. I want to really dive into a creative pursuit and find a good art direction. Once I find an artistic world I want to be in, I’m probably gonna go in and just make an album. 
Apart from that, we have lots of music so it’s gonna be music the whole year, which is great. Then we’re going to release Size XX. It’s a five-vinyl box, which is insane. It took me almost a year to design it because I’m kind of meticulous when it comes to little things, you know? We have to custom make everything. But the box is finally finished. And it’s insane. So it’s nice to round off the 20-year celebration with a physical object.