2017 marked a decade of U.S. Girls, the protean musical enterprise of
multi-disciplinary artist Meg Remy. Remy’s second release for 4AD, which also
includes her recently released single, ‘Mad As Hell’ – a clarion call for
pacifism – was tracked in collaboration with Toronto-based instrumental
collective the Cosmic Range, and features arrangements by long-time contributors
Maxmilian Turnball and Louis Percival. The dizzying buffet of live grooves on In
a Poem Unlimited represents an inversion of the dusty, sample-based minimal
textures of
Half Free, Remy’s euphoric 4AD debut.
Steered into focus by Remy and mixer/co-producer Steve Chahley, In A Poem Unlimited features disco employed as a protest vernacular (‘Mad As Hell’), as well as an unrelenting assault (‘Time’); moody, slowburning funk (‘Velvet 4 Sale’ & ‘L-Over’) and earnest synth anthems ‘Rosebud’ and ‘Poem’, which form the album’s emotional core.
In A Poem Unlimited features dark meditations reflecting charged atmospheres
that directly precede and follow acts of violence. Many of the songs are
character studies of women grappling with power; how to gain and exert it
spiritually, as well as desperate strategies to mitigate its infliction. Remy
also rallies against the public lies told by political and religious leaders,
and more crucially, questions the lies we tell ourselves in order to survive.
While U.S. Girls, denoting the plural, is no longer a misnomer, In A Poem
Unlimited may be Remy’s
most individually distilled protest to date.
Singles ‘Mad As Hell’ and ‘Pearly Gates’ have been featured heavily across alternative radio nationwide.
