Meg Remy has been busy with U.S. Girls this year. Following an excellent new record, she's been on tour here, planning a European tour, and apparently still recording new stuff. This new stand-alone single is well worth a listen this week.
"Running Errands (Yesterday)" is built upon repeating hooks and tape loops. The samples seem to work out a riff of their own as they bring vocals in and out around the central hook. Meg Remy has said that this is "a song that consumes its own tail, never wholly free (Half Free, you could say…), never wholly bound, forever changing as it repeats." Far more direct is the flip, "Running Errands (Today)" where the smart rhythmic near-funk of the tune is more apparent. Meg Remy uses this one to serve up a faux soul pastische that's a bit like something from early LCD Soundsystem. It's got a lot of weight to it, and it is, like the A-side here, proof of the continuing invention of Meg Remy as U.S. Girls.
"Running Errands" and Scratch It by U.S. Girls are out now via 4AD.
[Photo: Colin Medley]