Localized: VAL/IN/TIME

Dust off the garage-find Fender, crank up the volume to 100 and brace for impact! This month’s edition of SLUG Localized is going to rock the Wasatch Front, in the most biblical of proportions. Start off the night with brass-knuckled, left paw from punk band Odd Equals. Then, get shocked back to life with the experimental duo of Lab Animals. Last (but certainly not the least), tear down the walls with a hefty dose of goth rock and DIY sound, courtesy of VAL/IN/TIME. Grab your tickets and head over to Kilby Court on Thursday, August 20 at 7 p.m. for a night so sensational, you’re going to need a blast shield.

“Originally, I would say self-expression or some bullshit like that… I think now it’s just more I’m not trying to convey a message asmuch as hopefully bring an experience.” I’m talking with solo artist VAL/IN/TIME (Val for short) in the storage room of the SLUG headquarters on a scalding July day. He’s wearing an “In Satan I Trust 666” trucker cap and a tie-dye pink Sailor Moon T-shirt: an eclectic appearance for an eclectic guy. He’s full of stories, and the time allotted for our discussion seems to fly by.

Val’s music career began in California, where he was born and raised. He cut his teeth busking on the streets up and down the Pacific coast and living in his car. It was during this time on the streets where he met his mentor, Azi Fedoui (pronounced “As I Fade Away”), who instilled in him his philosophy of performance: “He does it as a prayer… his spiritual expression toward the world, especially if the universe were to give something back to him, whether it be a place to stay, opportunity, the occasional motherfucker that comes in, harasses him. It’s kind of a roll of the dice.”

“I came up with VAL/IN/TIME with the lines, and then I kind of just looked at it for a second like, ‘that’s kind of cool.’”

Many of the performers Val met at this time went by an alias or what he calls a “train hopper name.” This is where the stage name comes from: “At the wharf in Monterey… I was just kind of doodling around with some names… I came up with VAL/IN/TIME with the lines, and then I kind of just looked at it for a second like, ‘that’s kind of cool.’”

Enter the COVID-19 lockdowns, which left Val scrambling for a place to live and a way to continue busking for his bread. He came to Utah, where he spent his childhood summers visiting the home where his parents now live. Val initially tried his hand at busking in Salt Lake City but was really able to work his way into the music scene in another way: “Through Drum Circle… I got to meet a few other different people who knew some other people, and those people knew some people, and then it just kind of kept going to where I was in a jam band playing bass.”

After a run as the bass player for a jam-band-turned-Phish-cover-band proved unsuccessful, Val was emboldened to set out on his own again with a more complete knowledge of operating within the Salt Lake City music scene. “I’m like, well, fuck, I have all these other recordings. I’ve been trying to start a band with this music that I’ve been doing… Why don’t I just play a bunch of backtracks and then hopefully a band will appear behind me one day?”

“I’m here because I enjoy myself… I think that’s the message I want to convey to people.”

I’m curious though, given his musical philosophy and deep connection to the music; which of his songs really represents who he is as an artist? He points to his early track “Acid Under The Eclipse,” a song about doing just that at a festival in Oregon. After trading a mandolin for his admission, he was asked by some other festival-goers what he was hoping to learn from the eclipse: “I’m thinking, that’s a stupid fucking question. It’s just a celestial moment, it’s not that crazy… but I’m on acid, and so that elephant was planted in my head… What message am I going to get from the eclipse? Then once the sun came back and the music came back up again in the distance, I looked down at my answer, and it said: I’m here because I enjoy myself… I think that’s the message I want to convey to people.”

Zone is VAL/IN/TIME’s most recent release, available for purchase on Bandcamp, but Val is the most active on YouTube where you can find a wealth of his other recordings. You can also see him live for SLUG Localized on August 20, where he will be joined on the bill by Lab Animals!

Read past SLUG Localized features:
Localized: Die Shiny
Localized: Modern Speed

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