Review: Sonny Moore/Skrillex Albums from 2009-2011

Album: Recess 14/03/2014

Music has always been looked to as both a cure for and pathogen of cultural strife. The
massacre at Columbine High School in Colorado on April 20, 1999 saw American media,
politicians, and parents looking toward hardcore and heavy metal artists such as Marilyn
Manson, whose violent lyrics and music were seen as catalysts for the violence perpetrated by
Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold that day. Yet, instead of moderating themselves out of deference,
artists like Manson dug in with music like that found in the 2000 album Holy Wood (In the
Shadow of the Valley of Death) and the controversial “Guns, God and Government Tour,” which
included an infamous stop in Denver, Colorado. Manson’s argument, it seemed, was that the
American cultural establishment was to blame for the actions of these two, and perhaps that his
music could serve as a safe playground where dark thoughts could be taken out without harm to
others.
Perhaps this escalation of violent themes as a protest of the establishment influenced
front man Sonny moore and his emo/post-hardcore band From First Two Last, who titled their
second album released in 2004 Dear Diary, My Teen Angst Has a Body Count. This violence
manifests itself both rhetorically and musically in the future projects of Sonny Moore, who
would go on to be known as Skrillex, in songs like “F---ing Die 1,” “F--ing Die 2,” and “Kill
EVERYBODY,” and in the metal and hardcore elements he has brought to the Dubstep genre.
The poppy “Bangarang” and the reggae and hip hop infused “Kyoto” found on the 2011
Bangarang EP may seem worlds away from angsty From First to Last tracks such as “Note to
Self” and “Ride the Wings of Pestilence” from Dear Diary…

in Sonny Moore’s first solo album released in 2009, Gypsyhook EP, which employs pulsing
midrange electronics in the place guitars, yet maintain Moore’s falsetto vocals on every track.
The vocal style in the titular single “Gypsyhook” is reminiscent to the rap/metal hybrid sound of
Linkin Park, while “Copaface2” features a bass “drop” thirty seconds into the song, similar to
those found in Dubstep, especially in many of the songs Moore would go on to make as Skrillex.
Yet, the remixes by other artists found on the EP feature more of the shared elements found in
the Venn Diagram of Techno/House and Dubstep, such as pounding bass and spliced vocal
samples.
The 2010 EP My Name is Skrillex, was a literally rebranding of the emo/hardcore rocker
Sonny Moore into the Dubstep producer Skrillex. With singles such as “My Name is Skrillex”
and “WEEKENDS!!!”, Moore substituted is own emo-style vocals with spliced ones like
samples from the disco hit “Shadow Dancing” by Andy Gibb1 and underground female rapper
Sirah, respectively. Yet, Skrillex’s style varies greatly than that of the more Drum and Bass
influence of early UK Dubstep producers such as Skream and Benga, some of whose tracks only
feature a “wobble” bass, a synthesized bass sound altered with vibrato created by a lowfrequency oscillator (LFO), and a drum beat. This sparse texture was often filled in by MC’s at
live club events in venues such as the Forward>> club in London.2 Skrillex’s style inserts
midrange distorted sounds, not too distant from those an electric guitar with pedals and filters are
capable of producing. Hardcore elements of screaming and threats for violence are also present,
obviously so in the tracks.