St. John's punk band Snitfit wants to evolve beyond its Riot Grrrl label

Cramped into guitarist Ruairi Hogan's parent's 90s-style basement, the band plays a new, unreleased tune — as hard and as fast as anything they've done so far. 

Punk songs are well-known for their brevity, but this one sneaks up on you with a breakdown that comes back around to a blistering verse.

Drummer Dom Lamouche bashes away mercilessly on his kit, Hogan happily drives the song with their signature intensity, as singer Etta Cessac-Sinclair screams her lungs out into a megaphone while wearing a star-patterned aqua-coloured dress.

They're still looking for a bass player, but this is Snitfit, a band that identifies as anti-capitalist and anti-fascist, and at times comes off aggressive politically.

The teen punk group based in St. John's adopted the Riot Grrrl movement attributed to many female-led feminist acts over the years. But they're working hard to evolve beyond the movement's shortcomings.

"In [Bikini Kill and Le Tigre's] Kathleen Hannah's autobiography, she talks about wanting to lean away from the title Riot Grrrl because, historically, it marginalized a bunch of people," said Cessac-Sinclair. "So we always call ourselves post-Riot Grrrl. I think that's what we are."

That sentiment will be on full display on Saturday, when the band takes the stage during the annual Lawnya Vawnya festival in St. John's. 

Although the band is confident about the motivation, the group admits to sometimes feeling constrained by labels. They're mixing it up a bit on their upcoming efforts.

It's obvious beneath the screaming, the ear-melting instrumentation, and the band's political views, there's a lot of love behind it all.

"I feel you should go about educating people with love and not hatred," said Hogan, referring to his right-wing friends and the polarization of society. "It's very important to have compassion, but also a loud and clear voice."

"I wrote a really long song [when] this article came out [some time ago]," Cessac-Sinclair says, describing the inspiration of one of Snitfit's upcoming tracks. 

"There were terrible photos showing how the planet is dying … a whole village is burning, a family is hiding under a bridge, and a baby's dying. So I read this article, cried, wrote down the description of each image, and that's one of the songs."

The members have raised thousands for Palestine relief with their performances.

"It doesn't feel nice to just talk about it and not do anything", Cessac-Sinclair said.