Goodbye History

U.S. Girls “Futures Bet”

People saying that they don’t want to have children because of how bleak the future seems to them is a cliché these days, usually expressed with an off-the-rack Millennial internet quip like “gestures wildy at everything.” “Futures Bet” is something of a rejoinder to that mindset, a song that’s dubious of human extinction occurring on any conceivable timeline and reckons that humans in any period will be hazy on the past but always searching for some reason why they’re here. Remy shrugs this off in the chorus – “this is just life.” I’m inclined to side with this point of view, particularly as the most hysterical scorched earth visions of the future come from people who’d somehow been led to believe that they would live an entire lifetime in a world without tumult and catastrophes. That’s not life! Remy sings her lyrics in a warm and soothing tone with the pleasant inflections of 80s pop. She sounds reassuring, but she’s not trying to delude anyone. She’s just trying to remind you, us, her kids, whoever, that there is usually a balance of happiness and pain through life in any historical moment.

Buy it from Bandcamp.