Localized: fuckskin

In the middle of exfoliating his face, fuckskin’s Zachary Zane became easily angered by the regime and sensitivity his skin needed. “Fuck skin,” he said, and with that, Zane had created the name of one of Salt Lake’s most versatile bands. Full of cyber, grindcore and power violence elements, fuckskin executes these genres immaculately.  

Zane, a guitarist/vocalist in the band, and percussionist Val Brown both had intentions to create music with no pressure or rules to follow. Along the way, they picked up vocalist Gary Fairburne and Kale Morse on vocals/bass. These four best friends with a simple passion to create invigorating music started the band out of sheer boredom and with the mission to just make noise. fuckskin’s specialties come through the almost euphoric feelings and passion that can all be felt and heard through their albums, SYNC​/​RPT || codelyoko and the recently released if only. 

fuckskin released their first LP in September of 2021. The album itself has 14 tracks and is just shy of 20 minutes. Most tracks are under two minutes, making each short and bittersweet, but that’s what makes fuckskin stand out. They released two different versions of the album, one titled Codelyoko and the other titled SYNC/RPT (find them both at fuckskin.bandcamp.com) with the only difference being Codelyoko includes all band members and SYNC/RPT is mostly electronics. “The original formula inspiration-album that we released CodeLyoko was more electronic with a hardcore/shoegaze guitar,” says Zane.  

“Salt Lake makes a lot of weird music; I like weird stuff.”

fuckskin’s sound closely compares to “midwest emo”, “chronically online”, and “myspace 2007.” As mentioned, the band’s versatility and uniqueness can’t fit into one specific genre. “[fuckskin] is more of a vibe than it is a sound,” says Fairburne. “Vulner/abilities” on the Codelyoko album can give a full-blown psychedelic sound effect. Brown describes “when I was a flower I was soulless” as “exuberant” and emphasizes how Fairburne’s voice tends to shine in the song.

Making any kind of music is not easy, but the process is simple for these four best friends. Zane writes the music on his guitar; he then gets everyone together with their instruments and they jam it out. There is quite a bit that goes into the process including tonal changes, correcting imperfections and unwanted notes, then arranging it as they please. “Then, they make me name it,” says Fairburne, laughing. 

Being a part of the Salt Lake City music scene is one of fuckskin’s favorite parts of being a band. The support of many other local bands helped them branch out and opened many opportunities to play with some of their favorite out-of-state bands, including HIRS. “ We achieved our goal, we’re done”, says Zane referencing their recent show with that band, one of fuckskin’s favorites to emulate. 

“[fuckskin] is more of a vibe than it is a sound.”

Morse has been one of the prominent people running  D.I.Y. in the scene for the last eight–nine years. Morse is the tech that local venues call to set up and fix any equipment. “I feel like outside of Utah people always talk about how there’s something special in Salt Lake and I think it’s partially (due to) the stranglehold the church has on us as people growing up,” they say. “It makes counter-culture more of a priority in some places, but also, I’ve read into scientific studies about the air and the altitude of where we’re at, and Salt Lake City has some of the highest rates of depression and suicide because of the ecological factors. Because of that a lot of music and even softer bands have a lot of grip and emotion and passion behind it. Salt Lake makes a lot of weird music; I like weird stuff.”

The Beehive, Aces High Saloon, Your Mom’s House and Kilby Court are some of the many local venues that you can keep an eye out for to catch one of fuckskin’s shows, and don’t miss their Localized performance at Kilby Court on May 16.

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