introduction

hello. welcome to my absurdly long yap about my favourite album. in this yap i will be discussing why this album is my favourite, what makes it so special, why it never gets boring, the lore behind it and why its a fucking masterpiece in general. ill also talk about other related projects from the artist and related artists, but keeping the main focus on the album. and its worth mentioning that this yap isnt a wikipedia article. while i will provide some backstory or lore that is historically factual, most of the stuff here will be my opinion. this also means that some info here could be wrong. im gonna try and keep it structured to some extent but this is really me just dumping all my thoughts about this work of art in my notes. buckle up sports fans

some info and lore

the album in question is “F*CK U SKRILLEX YOU THINK UR ANDY WARHOL BUT UR NOT!! <3” by Skrillex. from now on for convenience ill be referring to it as “FUS” or “fus”, which abbreviates the first 3 words of the full title.

it was released as a surprise album on april 1 2025, with people only knowing about it fully a day prior to its release when skrillex sent a short mp3 album preview to his mailing list which contained short clips and parts of songs mixed and mashed together. the album is 34 songs at 46 min long, with most songs being 30 seconds to a 1:40min in length with a few outliers sitting at over 2 minutes and no song over 3 minutes. the album is a mixtape, made to be played from beginning to end without skipping or stopping mid-play. song names are also stylised in all caps. the genre of the album is quite fluid, the majority being dubstep, with some bass music, future bass, progressive house and experimental sounds sprinkled in throughout. the project features some of Skrillex’s (who i might refer to as his real name, Sonny, throughout this ted talk) old sounds and IDs (unreleased songs) from over 13 years ago (as of writing, 2026), and newer, more modern sounds from the QFF/DTGC era (2023).

the title of the album comes from some graffiti a vandal sprayed on a wall outside one of sonny’s studios in LA (called “The Nest”). according to some random sources i found, it was sprayed on ~2020 (start of covid) and was removed around 2 weeks later, probably at the city’s discretion. thats kinda disappointing imo. like, something that iconic being sprayed on your wall and then not getting a say whether or not it gets removed. its a real bummer, ill say that. the title is basically skrillex indirectly calling himself the Andy Warhol of dubstep/edm (id have to say, he kinda is…)

the album, in a way, is a love letter to the old Skrillex (brostep era). with the project, we received many unreleased and anticipated IDs, the main one being Voltage ID; his most wanted ID ever, which he started playing at live sets in 2011. Voltage was dropped in full at the very end of this album before “AZASU”, which function as the end credits to the project.

the album also marks an end to skrillex and the Atlantic Records label, a reference actually being made to this in the song “BIGGY BAP”, which we’ll get into later.

what this album means to me

im gonna be completely honest; i had no idea that this album dropped on april 1 2025. in fact, i wasnt even listening to skrillex then. i was listening to alot of dubstep and was in the process of discovering more music which is what led me to it. i only first listened to this album in full in late september that year. what led me to find this masterpiece was a random looking song that spotify autoplayed after my queue had finished, called “WHILE YOU WERE SLEEPING VIP”, the 3rd song on FUS. i think this was probably because i was listening to Virtual Riot back then (still love his music to this day) and he’s featured on that song.

i instantly fell in love with it, and found it VERY catchy to the point that i was queueing it again and again every second song or so and got sturdy (the tiktok dance) at the drop (seriously tho, listen to it. its literally made for the sturdy). i wasnt too happy about how short it was to begin with, just 57 seconds, and it abruptly cutting at the end. this eventually led me to go down a rabbit hole a month later, but at first i didnt think much of it and just thought of it as some sort of unofficial leak as it LITERALLY mentions in the song itself. i was even more confused that there was no original “WHILE YOU WERE SLEEPING”. for context; in the edm scene, a VIP is a “variation in production”, which is basically an artists remix of their own song. so therefore, i expected there to be an original song, but there wasnt (this would be released LATER on the hit me where it hurts x EP mid november. dont ask me why sonny did this lol). when i had first found this song it played it from the single version, not the version from the album itself, which proves that promoting songs on upcoming albums with singles, even a day before release (march 31) of the full project, actually works; because look where we are now.

anyways, i eventually got curious around a month later as to where the song actually came from. i decided to check out the skrillex artist profile on spotify, and realised that he was the one who remixed HUMBLE and SICKO MODE, of which remixes i had listened to briefly back in 2022-2023 when i was all about rap and hip-hop. i found the album on his discography, and let out a big “ohhhhh” in realisation of why the album cover for WHILE YOU WERE SLEEPING VIP seemed so random. it was literally part of a much bigger album, which was fus. i had a look through the tracklist and understood why the song i had been listening to on repeat for the past month was so short. all of the songs on the album were short, too. so it was a mixtape. the day i found it i decided to add it to the queue and listen to it while i was walking the dog. i actually loved it, from start to finish. i listened to it multiple times in the next few days. not as much as i am now, because i was bingeing other stuff back then, but eventually i was spinning that shit everyday. i wasnt even forcing myself to. it was only because i just loved the album and couldnt get enough.

eventually, around december of 2025, it officially became my new favourite album, and i dont think thats going to change ever, if not for a very long time. i love everything about it. sonny takes you on an amazing journey through his eras of making music, and keeps you excited and on your toes for every song. and im just saying… i HIGHLY recommend you listen to it, at least once. nowadays im listening to it on my way to or from school (or both. have i mentioned i love this album to death?), on a bike ride blasting it on my mini JBL speaker so random people in public can hear peak (no i dont gaf if this is obnoxious, smd if you dont like it :P), or when im alone in my room and its just me and my headphones and nothing and no one is bothering me. when i listen to this album while walking i put my phone on silent so i can fully enjoy it, and i get pissed when someone calls me on my phone or talks to me in the middle of me listening to it. and you already know im doing all the hand movements and beatboxing while listening to it aswell. man, i have gotten some weird looks over time but i dont care because im listening to peak.

i genuinely cannot multitask while listening to this album. i need to be fully in the zone. it isnt exactly an easy listen for me. i have a strange producer-ish way of listening to music; i have my own spotify queue playlist (outside of the built in queue) to put all the songs im listening to for the day in there. that queue is normally persistent for the day, which means, if i think of an album i havent listened to in a while, i dont have to temporarily remember to listen to it soon. i can just put it in the queue playlist. this also helps with the problem of not being able to queue albums or stuff i want to listen to right now and have them play next instead of having to wait until the queue finishes. and i can tell you, FUS is never in the queue playlist. the reason being, i always play it when the times right. i dont play it when im locked in doing schoolwork or have one headphone in my ear talking to someone. no. i need to have both in or it blasting on the speaker at full volume and me be fully in the moment. this albums demands all my attention, so it must be played at the perfect time. i literally cant ignore it.

everytime i hear the opening lines (in the song SKRILLEX IS DEAD), “he left as the world fell into chaos, and walked into the light. this. is. skrillex.” it puts a huge fat smile on my face, because I KNOW this album is just so fucking good. if im having a shit day, i could play this album and it would cheer me up 10x no joke. basically, what im tryna say here is that this album is way more of just a few songs i keep in rotation every so often. at this point, its a huge part of my life, and i cant live without it. i feel like ill actually go insane if i dont play it at least once everyday lmao. it had a huge impact on my general music taste too. as i mentioned earlier, the album features a few different edm subgenres (which in my opinion is great because you never get bored while listening, something new is always fired up less than a minute later) so listening to this album alot has made me grow more interest and love for edm as a whole. ive started listening to house quite a bit, discovering fred again.. through him being credited in AZASU (the last song on fus which is basically credits) and his collab with skrillex on Rumble. ive also come to like future bass and other softer and experimental edm subgenres (swedm etc.). even tho it seems i just did, words cannot fully describe how much impact this album has had on me.

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album structure

the album structure is quite interesting, which makes it so listenable. in this subyap, ill cover different sections of the album, how they impact how the user feels and how they fit the album. ill go in chronological order from start to finish then at the end ill bring it all together.

first, lets start with the tracklist. source

1. SKRILLEX IS DEAD
2. Skrillex & Hawaii Slim - SPITFIRE
3. Skrillex, Virtual Riot & Nakeesha - WHILE YOU WERE SLEEPING VIP
4. SLICKMAN
5. Skrillex, Sleepnet & Joker - TEARS LOST DROP
6. THINGS I PROMISED
7. Skrillex & Space Laces - RECOVERY
8. ANDY
9. SQUISHY CLIP
10. Skrillex & Jónsi - LOOK AT YOU
11. Skrillex & Naisha - GULAB XX
12. Skrillex, Zacari, Starrah & Ilykimchi - MOMENTUM
13. Skrillex & Team EZY - ANIMALS BEAT
14. Skrillex, Virtual Riot & Nakeesha - MIRCHI TEST
15. HOLD ON
16. Skrillex, swedm® & LOAM - SEE YOU AGAIN VIP
17. MORJA KAIJU VIP
18. Skrillex, bgirl, PARISI, Varg2™, Whitearmor, Eurohead & jamesjamesjames - KORABU
19. REDLINE DASH
20. Skrillex, Boys Noize & Dylan Brady - ZEET NOIZE
21. Skrillex & Dylan Brady - BOOSTER
22. FRICKY VIP
23. Skrillex & LH4L - ULTRA INTRO
24. JUNGUNDRA
25. Skrillex & G Jones - DRUIDS
26. Skrillex & Wuki - BIGGY BAP
27. Skrillex, NJOMZA & swedm® - SAY GOODBYE
28. MOSQUITOTOUILLE
29. Skrillex & swedm® - BABY ROYAL
30. Skrillex, swedm® & Badriia - G2G
31. Skrillex & Majestic - DNB TING
32. SAN DIEGO VIP
33. VOLTAGE
34. Skrillex & swedm® - AZASU

sound design and elements

album flow

quality

this album possesses an incredible amount of quality in terms of sound design, execution, and flow.

section-by-section analysis

track-by-track analysis

im literally still losing my mind over this album. have i mentioned i love this album to death?

anyways, its time for an in-depth track-by-track analysis. once again this isnt meant to be objective or anything. while i might put some extra info and lore about the songs that i will source, most of the analysis will be my own thoughts. 34 tracks. here we go.

SKRILLEX IS DEAD

overview

what an amazing opener to a monster of an album. ALOT is happening here. the song opens with some lines from one of Dj Smokey’s voice actors; “he left as the world fell into chaos, and walked into the light… t- t- t- t- this. is. skrillex.” theres no fade in. it just gets straight to the point. these lines are being said while some calm guitar notes are playing in the background. it honestly sounds kinda wholesome. but then, at the end of these lines, the background music cuts to nothing and a sassy female voice says, “skrillex is dead…” with the word “dead” on reverb for every beat with a short fade out. now thats our first switch up. some sassy synths slowly fade in beneath the following voice lines, and the same voice actor who opened the album now says, “d- d- d- d- d- d- d- d- d- d- dj smokey recommends you listen to this album, from start to finish.” and then in a half whisper, “thank you for not skipping.” as if winking at the listener through the speaker. a flutter bass sample plays for like 3 beats and a female voice (specifically bibi bourelly from Painting Rainbows on DGTC) says “hold up”.

immediately after this the sassy synth melody is the main focus. at the end of the bar, a short croaky voice screams “nooo!!!”. honestly i have no idea why this is here but its funny as hell. another bar of it plays and at the end, what sounds like a suppressed evil joker laugh plays, but honestly i cant tell for sure. it could be crows squawking tbh.

lyrical analysis and meaning

other info and stuff to note

transition-by-transition analysis