Skrillex’s Outside-The-Box “Leaving” EP Celebrates Six Years

Fans like to point to Scary Monsters And Nice Sprites, Bangarang, or Recess as some of the greatest collections of Skrillex music, but one of the least mentioned and most underappreciated is his Leaving EP from 2013. It offered a more experimental (at the time) side of Skrillex that a lot of fans hadn’t been exposed to, and it persists as one of our favorite EPs in his discography.

With only three songs, it’s not a particularly long listen, but it’s eye-opening.

Leaving was released right around the end of the electro-house era and toward the peak of brostep, also around the time that trap was beginning to really rear its head. To that end, each of the tracks incorporates a blend of sounds, styles, and genres without ever pigeon-holing themselves too hard.

“The Reason” is impeccably hard to pin down with its off-kilter drum beat and melody, at times leaning toward house, possibly trap, maybe even the beginnings of future bass. The bridge is definitely more electro than anything else, but as quickly as it appears, it flows seamlessly into that beautiful melodic outro.

“Scary Bolly Dub” is the closest to brostep on the EP, obviously working off of “Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites,” but with a distinct twist. Both the “bolly” and “dub” part of the title work overtime to make this an Indian-leaning, dub-focused work of art.

The final track, “Leaving,” is probably the most left field of the bunch. With a blend of garage, downtempo, and ambient with an ethereal vocal from Skrillex, pitched down and warped, this was the first tune to really show off Skrillex’s production prowess outside of high energy productions. Yes, “With You Friends” and “All I Ask Of You” could be grouped in, as well, but neither accomplish what “Leaving” does.

With a Skrillex album expected in 2019 (though we say this every year), we look back to 2013 and celebrate the 6th anniversary of this classic. Listen again below.