picture by Kissi Ussuki
Crucial Features is an all-girl band from Vilnius, Lithuania, which has been around since 2016 and plays some kind of 90s Riot Grrrl grungy punk heavily influenced by Babes in Toyland.
Oh and all the songs are in Lithuanian, which is both great and unusual to my ears.
The band started as a quartet and is now a trio.
Crucial Features is, since the beginning, really close to the photographer and artist Kissi Ussuki who, on top of taking great pictures of the ladies, is responsible for the artwork of their two albums. As you will probably notice her collage technique is not without reminding Mr.James Patrick Shannon Morey (AKA Winston Smith) or the Crass Records era.
The band started as a quartet and is now a trio.
Crucial Features is, since the beginning, really close to the photographer and artist Kissi Ussuki who, on top of taking great pictures of the ladies, is responsible for the artwork of their two albums. As you will probably notice her collage technique is not without reminding Mr.James Patrick Shannon Morey (AKA Winston Smith) or the Crass Records era.
Released in 2018, Kaprizai (Whims) is the band first release and features 6 songs of fast and angry grungy punk. With the heavy guitars and drums, the band has clearly chosen the sound of the 90s and despite a few unfortunate metal-influenced drum patterns and guitar solos it is an enjoyable piece of what sounds in my ears like a 90s post-USSR eastern european punk rock.
My lithuanian is a bit rusty but from what Evil Corp Google translates for me the lyrics are well written on top of being emotionnaly and politically engaged like in Badmetis (Bad Year: about hunger and famine), Ir Šuo Kariamas (And the Dog is Suspended: about social alienation and depression?) or Gyvatės (Snakes: about individualism and mercyless competition).
My lithuanian is a bit rusty but from what Evil Corp Google translates for me the lyrics are well written on top of being emotionnaly and politically engaged like in Badmetis (Bad Year: about hunger and famine), Ir Šuo Kariamas (And the Dog is Suspended: about social alienation and depression?) or Gyvatės (Snakes: about individualism and mercyless competition).
Venera Budo (The Awakening of Venus), the first full-length album of Crucial Features, was released in late march 2020 (self-released, digital only) and is without any doubt (and by far) their best release.
The band has clearly digested the whole discography of Babes in Toyland, I mean it's almost like a slav reincarnation sometimes, from the vocals to the recording everything is a vivid example of the successful result of their adoration for the Minneapolis trio.
No more bad taste, no more unsound hesitation, Crucial Features is delivering a perfect album of the best of 90s Riot Girl punk...
Powerful, fast, angry but perfectly mastered, the 10 songs got the right breaks at the right moments, the perfect screams and gang vocals of feminism angryness at the right time... This album is a success from the first second to the last...
picture by Nannook
The lyrics remain a bit of a mystery but as it is stated on their page "Crucial Features are digging into subjects of unconventional beauty, the
cult of vanity and “woke” culture hoping to find an awakening of their
own."
And I do believe they do.
You can listen to Crucial Features and other great stuff on Rien à Faire #11.
N,J'Oi!
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