Goa-based musician Skulk peels back layers of emotion in her latest album Skin
Skulk doesn’t play by the rules. Goa-based producer and visual artist Skulk, also known as Katyayini Gargi is back with Skin, a 12-track Artpop album that’s as gutsy as it is tender. It’s full of synths, sharp turns, and that unmistakable voice of hers — sometimes biting, sometimes soft, always honest.
With Skin, Skulk crafts a tender yet daring Artpop journey, bridging personal chaos and the pulse of the outside world
The record unfolds like an old-school cassette: one side looking inward, the other staring right back at the world. It’s personal, messy, and real — much like life itself. Skulk is not trying to fit into anyone’s scene because she’s too busy making her own. In conversation with Indulge, Skulk talks about the obsessive beginnings of Skin, the thrill of writing from other perspectives, and the strange freedom of shouting from her “tiny rooftop” into the vast digital ether.
What was the turning point or personal experience that shaped this album’s direction?
Even though I don't release my music very often, I have been showing up at my music desk set up in my painting studio everyday. I make obsessively, and intensely. The opening song on the album, "Quagmire", was the first one (in a long series of one's) I felt I had something to expand on. Finished in itself, but longing for company. I just listened and followed along.
The album is divided into two halves — reflection and response. How did you approach structuring that duality musically and thematically?
The music always comes very quickly to me. The longest time I spend in constructing a song is on the lyrics. I've always written in first person. After I had selected about 4-5 tracks that were making sense together, I hit a bit of a wall with writing lyrics. So, as an exercise, I began to write by removing myself from the lyrics. The first song I wrote like that was "Creeper", told from the point of view of a seed that springs to life in the monsoon. That opened up my block, and from there I took on different POVs, responding to the news, the larger world around me. About 25 songs in, I saw the album order forming, and thus began the process of carving into what I'd built. The duality took shape because that's a little how I feel in the everyday - I consume the goings on outside, and my insides feel disjointed - a chasm between the two emerges. Also, this album will be released on cassette tape - and so for the first time I've given structure to an A-side and B-side (though I removed the hierarchy). It all fell into place.
What draws you to electronic soundscapes as a form of storytelling?
It's so fun! And the way I do it, I'm the sole author, I only do what's fun for me.
You describe Skin as an Artpop record. How do you interpret “Artpop” in your own language — what does it mean for your creative identity?
Well - it happens to be two words that currently and neatly sum up my practice. I've never been one to fit things into genres. Neither the creative, nor identity. That's for industries, organisations, governments etc. to do, for purposes that very much serve them.
What does “skin” symbolise to you in the context of this record?
Skin: quite literally what separates the inside and the outside. Such a delicate thing; so easy to tear up, to stitch back together. Skin as material, and as metaphor.
The Indian independent music scene has evolved a lot in the last decade. How do you see your work fitting within — or standing apart from — the current landscape?
What I love about the current is that the digital landscape is vast and there's room for all kinds of work. There are infinite rooms- and each room has at least one person in it. Yes, it might not fit neatly into how things have been defined before - but isn't that wonderful? Doesn't it make for such a colourful world?
As both a producer and visual artist, how do sound and image feed into each other in your creative process?
Quite heavily. The source of these sister rivers is the same; after all, they both sprout from within me.
What have been some of the challenges and freedoms that come with building your own artistic ecosystem?
First the goods - the freedom! - I really do make only what I want to, and I am so totally aware of the luxury that is, that I try my best to honour it- with my utmost sincerity.
Some of the challenges that come with that is that I end up saying "No" to quite a lot of things, and in doing so, a lot of doors close. (but I'm growing more okay with that).
Another is, since I'm the builder, I also have to be the loudspeaker. And for someone who is actually quite introverted and spot-light-shy, it can get overwhelming to stand on my tiny rooftop and shout into this noisy world.
What kind of emotional space do you hope listeners inhabit by the time they reach the end of Skin?
I feel like I've covered a whole gamut of emotions over the course of this album. Anger, disappointment, hope, excitement, lethargy, longing, complacency, dread, fear. Ride along with me! I made sure to end on a high with "Free", it's my version of a feel-good bop.
Releasing on November 13, 2025.