08 КУКЛА ~ Hranimo Se Rečima by КУКЛА published on 2019-08-22T07:06:07Z The debut album ‘Katarina’ contains the innocence of a newborn who is screaming into the yet unknown world, but also the well-versed melancholia of a person at the verge of writing a suicide letter. This conceptual contrast is escorted by a clear stylistic resemblance to Milošević’ turbo-folk era on one side and American R&B goddesses of Bush era on the other. Both, a strong Slavic introspection with a taste of the working-class fatalism, and the progressive gender non-conforming pop sound of the West add to a stylistic richness of the album. Kукла's voice is warm and playful throughout the album, and remains bright when she is singing about the grim and often hopeless moments of her life, which shows how her music and art have often saved her from the dark side of herself. In the song Zvezdana she lifts the curtain, segregates life from death but leaves the innocence of her youth intact. Palma feels like a tender admission of her idealist aspiration of romance, whereas Astronaut exposes the inadequacy of her ex-lovers. The album characterizes Kукла’s imprisonment and her strong will to breach the walls that confine her artistic potential. It makes the listener feel like Kукла is playing in the closet - choosing dresses, picking identities, only to face the world even more naked and raw than she ever was before.