How Crust Survived the Millennium Bug (part 3): Lost "Fear-Strach" Lp, 2003

"Do you like Lost?" 

 

If you are ever being asked the above question during a dinner party held at normies' (collective gasp of horror), the possibility that they are referring to the once-famous-but-now-antiquated American series is strong indeed. In this particular case, it is highly advisable that you come up with something that will make you look both profound and witty in front of the guests - but not so much as to make them feel intellectually threatened - so that you get reinvited next time around (free food is free food after all). The very least you can do is bleat "They were all dead from the very start, innit?", a weak attempt perhaps but one that should insure that you are allowed to stay at least until dessert. If the very same question is formulated at an open air punk festival by a towering middle-aged crusty, still standing despite it being well past 4am, then it is a safe bet that the inquiry has to do with the early noughties Łódź-based band. If, under such circumstances, it is not, then you should probably avoid this interlocutor as you are about to embark on a lengthy conversation about metaphysical angst and the perpetual feeling of "lostness" or, as is more accurately in sententious academic circles, "Verlorenheit". That or a lunatic speech about survival in inhospitable and unfamiliar arctic forest and how to eat leaves, roots and shit (in that order). Either way, you 'd better head straight to the bar.

 

A couple of crows apparently no longer talking to one another

 

Discogs tells me that Lost has been a rather popular band name throughout the years, ranging from UK house techno breakbeat, Portuguese depressive black-metal, Italian eurodance or German gothic metal. Pick your kings. Going for Lost as a name is sound enough of course. Because it evokes powerful images of desolation and conveys an atmosphere of nothingness, it is an ideal moniker if you aim to create dark and oppressive music, a criterion that certainly applies to Polish crust and even more so to Lost, who were probably the heaviest and darkest band around at that time. 

 

I have already written at length about the Polish school of crust in the past, most notably through the Pulitzer-winning series Polish Tapes Not Police States (with Disgusting Lies, Monoteizm-Co-Existence, Stupor, Earth Movement, Undecided and Bisect) I did in 2018 but other 90's bands like the typical Money Drug, the classic Homomilitia and the mighty Filth of Mankind were also offered the Terminal Sound Nuisance treatment so that the TSN staff is far from unconversant with the Polish crust sound (it is even a job requirement). However, Fear-Strach cannot be sanely described as your typical crust band and, while Lost retained significant classic elements of crust, they were a distinctly different animal, one that did emerge from the same crust habitat but thrived on a different diet. Lost have often been referred to as a post-Homomilitia band, which is both true since Agnes used to sing in Homomilitia before and also something of an understandable distortion since, even though the other members were not part of it, Homomilitia were undeniably Poland's most iconic crust exports in the 90's. 

 

One meditative Deviated Instinct-ish crow

 

Lost formed in Łódź in 2000 with a lineup of Agnes on vocals, Jaro on the bass guitar and Marcin on the drums. Apparently Tomek from Filth of Mankind was the first guitar player but was quickly replaced with Simek and then a second guitar player, Jarek, joined in. It was this lineup that recorded the Thoughtless-Bez Zastanowienia Ep in 2001. Frytek then took over the drums and second guitar player Jarek left, thus giving birth to the team that would record one of the strongest crust Lp's of the decade, Fear-Strach. Beside Agnes' connection with Homomilitia, the Lost members were equally busy bees. Guitar player Jarek and drummer Frytek - along with Strzała from Red Corps and Homomilitia - also played between 2000 and 2004 in a band called Disable who, according to sources close to the matter, were quite popular and active at the time and actually toured with Lost. In fact, there was even a first incarnation of Disable in the mid-90's that did not last long and only played the one gig. If you are interested in hearing a sonic rendition of a meeting between Sanctus Iuda and Hellkrusher at a Hiatus gig in 1995 then the Disable cdr from 2003 comes highly recommended and it also gets additional old-school punk points for the use of the Disaster font before the Disaster reissues. Aforementioned Jarek and Frytek also teamed up with guitar player Simek in a rather obscure hardcore band called Hard Life in the early 00's, that never released anything but some videos of live performances can be found if you look hard enough, while Jarek also played in the much mysterious Compos Mentis. Have you been following?

 

A flying crow

 

The city of Łódź is often considered to be one of the birthplaces of the black-clad crust genre in Poland, for good reason, (the ace Nausea live Lp in Łódź only adding more to the mystique) and it has been delivering quality crust acts for the past three decades. Still, Lost's Fear-Strach went beyond what one could rightfully expect from a solid Polish crust punk work and proved to be a unique hybrid pervaded with a vibe that had no real equivalent in the crust universe, although it cannot be said to be really breaking new grounds either. I remember getting this record upon its release after reading a review of it in an issue of the Leeds-based Attitude Problem fanzine. I remember the iteration of the word "dark" throughout the short review which only meant that Lost were bound to sound, well, really dark. While I expected and presumed to embrace the music's darkness, I was not quite prepared to such a level of suffocating heaviness. I was aware of, but merely vaguely familiar with, the doom/sludge metal genre and therefore the punishingly massive slowness that make up large portions of Fear-Strach, interpersed with galloping vintage crust punk or mid-paced stenchcore moments, were almost too much to bear at times and would leave me drained and, well, in a really dark mood. I could withstand some slow and heavy music without hyperventilating though and enjoyed bands like Cult of Luna, Facedowninshit or indeed His Hero Is Gone. But Lost were different, nastier, more menacing, more organic, dirtier too, their hopeless anger barely contained, they sounded like I was being grabbed by the collar by a reincarnation of anger and given a right bollocking for no other reason than the world is a depressive and lonely place where illusions of happiness are left to rot and feed the crows. And while I am on the subject of morbid birds, crows, either literally or figuratively as symbols of decay, inform the whole of Fear-Strach. They are on the cover, on the backcover, on both labels, on both sides of the insert and on the introduction to the first song (while the terrifying last song "Słowa" starts with the barks of fighting dogs). I sense that, had it been available, Lost would have been called Crow but then they just had to give up all hope.

 

The band photoshopped inside a giant crow

 

As expressed subjectively above, Lost blended metallic old-school crust with sludge and doom metal, resulting patently in a heavy, downtuned and joyless mixture that one could locate on the fringes of the crust sandbox. The most obvious influence is the New York City doom-crust band 13 which Lost cover and even thank on this album, but I guess Grief, for their antipathic aggression, and Eyehategod, for their mean rocking aspect, are worth mentioning too. As far as the sheer display of crust power is concerned, late Nausea also come as an evident inspiration, especially when Lost rock their devastating mid-paced moments, as well as the late 80's heavy versatile and pissed sound of Contropotere and I cannot help but hear some modern version Guttural Breath-era Deviated Instinct at times, but probably out of a similar creative intent rather than design. Counterblast's Balance of Pain is also a work that meaningfully sprang to mind, not because Fear-Strach sounds like it, but because both albums presented something different and hybrid, full of personality, but still completely congruent with the crust orthodoxy with its crunchy and filthy - but precise like the rest of the instruments - guitar sound. The incredible vocals of Agnes emphatically propel the music forward into furious oppressiveness. Never has her voice sounded as harsh and almost possessed with uncontrollable pain, although it has to be said that by the time Homomilitia recorded their second album, she was already experimenting with a throatier and raspier vocal style (akin to Alicia 13 and Mags Excrement of War). She prominently affected the overall vibe and atmosphere of Lost, enhancing the overwhelming intensity and black vibe of the music. Polish crust has had a long tradition of powerful female-fronted bands, from pioneers Homomilitia, Silna Wola, Stradoom Terror, Monoteizm-Co-Existence, Stupor, Insuiciety or current bands like Social Crisis (to name only the crusty bands, there are far more examples in other subgenres) and Lost were potent representatives of that tradition.

 

A surprisingly crow-free poster

 

The lyrics of Lost are, well, really dark. Depression, loneliness, inner pain, isolation and of course the obligatory anti-system song, everything that inevitably bury your joy of living deep into the cold ground. The band's Ep, Thougthless-Bez Zastanowienia, from 2001, is also thoroughly enjoyable, though not as heavy and sensibly faster. I would argue that the full album format fits Lost's songwriting, meaningfulness and aesthetic ambitions far better and, with Fear-Strach lasting over 40 minutes, they did cleverly take their time to build the atmosphere they craved for. An atmosphere that is, well, really dark. The Lp was released on Malarie Records, well-known and proficient label from Czech, and Berlin-based Schandmaul Records. 

 

Really dark indeed. 

 

The feast of crows 

 

More crows