Why U.S. Girls Rules by Chris Worden (2017)
U.S. Girls
U.S. Girls? Holy moly, now there’s a show. I’ve been a fan for about 9 years or so, I guess. I’ve seen U.S. Girls when it was just Meg Remy and a bunch of analog gear in a suitcase, singing “Red Ford Radio” and “So Ladder Strong“. I’ve felt her big voice barreling downhill through a hypnotized audience, from the sparsely-lit outdoor stage and into the darkness of the woods beyond. It sure as heck made an impression on me. Only a year after that, I saw U.S. Girls as a full band for the first time. She played in the driving rain of a thunderstorm that tried and failed to show her up. I heard people talk about that for weeks afterwards.
Meg provides a weird, new angle on all our shared musical history. Different elements resonate with different people. Driving around with my mom when I was tiny, it was The Supremes, The Crystals, The Shangri-Las, Lesley Gore – that was the stuff that got turned up loud between commercials on 1460 CJOY, and which consequently burned itself into my brain. In part, U.S. Girls represents the logical evolution of the work done by these artists, as well as the rest of the best pop music from the past 60 years. She’s got a long view of the history behind her sound, and it gives her a clarity of vision and purpose for the road ahead that is darn impressive. That’s what happens when you take more than half a century of accumulated musical history and focus it on a tiny point, I guess. You become a laser, and you get to help burn the new path.
That forward motion is what U.S. Girls is all about. Meg is all progress, no backslide. U.S. Girls just keeps getting better. There are no dips. Near as I can tell, it’s more or less just been a straight climb these past 9 years. At any given U.S. Girls show, what you’re seeing is one of the best performers in Canada at the peak of her powers. That’s what you’re going to get at Kazoo! Fest this year. You’re so lucky.
Chris Worden is a musician (Natural Thirst, Baby Cages, Wolfcow), festival director (Electric Eclectics), and Kazoo! Board Member. He sure likes U.S. Girls.
Catch U.S. Girls at Kazoo! Fest 2017 on Thursday April 8th with Cold on Pluto and OBUXUM @ eBar.
