Girl Talk: Cuz some of you really know yer music

[John M]

Positive review of this yesterday on NPR of all places.

[Turner]

Oh man I have been listening to tracks 5 and 6 off this latest album p. much nonstop since it was released. I just can't get over some of the mixes on those two tracks. ODB and Radiohead? Shit yes.

[boundgear]

Girl Talk - All Day samples.

Lets normal listeners hear Girl Talk the way crate diggers do. It's a little lag-y on my machine, but it works and is kinda fun.

[CallMeJay]

I was skeptical--- but it rocks ("fair use" or not).

[merlinago]

i love that this kind of music is touched on... lesser known electronic artist incorporating elements of classical music and shakesperean sampling is Menton Matthews of Sunday Munich, also known as Saltillo. If you check out the info on his motivation for this album "Ganglion" it's really deep. He's a classically trained violinist and cellist.



thanks,
-Hamid.

[Vancouverdave]

That was great, especially because he's so blatant about his craft - the video is a perfect analog of the music.

Of course, as soon as I saw the name, I flashed to this:



But 50's the new 40, right?

Thanks for the Rockpile clip! Saw them live several times in 1978-1980, still covet Lowe's 8-string Hamer bass.

[davids]

You can't mention clipping without mentioning Avalanches. (I've never seen the video until now, pretty amazing) Always Bonus points for any John Waters reference.

How could I have forgotten this? Brilliant, especially the end:

Can you think of anything that talks, other than a person?
Umm... a bird? Yeah!
...sometimes a parrot talks.
Yes, some birds are funny when they talk.
Can you think of anything else?
Umm... a record!

[xjoex]

I dig the new album. But how can he feel so entitled as to not pay for the rights to use the samples? His product is totally riding the coattails of the original artist.

-Joe

[Turner]

You can't mention clipping without mentioning Avalanches. (I've never seen the video until now, pretty amazing) Always Bonus points for any John Waters reference.

I just found this out today, but apparently if you want the "true" Avalanches experience, you need to find the Australian version of the album. Apparently there were a bunch of samples that they were not given permission to use for the US CD release, so you can only hear those samples if you get the Australian version of the album. The more you know, I guess.

[The Narg]

Mixed feelings about Girl Talk. Both albums are undoubtedly super fun at points, but I find myself getting fatigued after a while with the repetitiveness. The rampant misogyny of many of the hip-hop tracks is annoying....yes, I understand the idea of being ironically removed from the genre...but the hateful words are still just hateful. I have a sister who is a junior in college and it bothers me to think of her at parties where shit like that is perpetuated. Maybe I'm old.

GT is certainly an impressive technician, but with the lack of true, live performance I would hesitate to call him a DJ. More of a cunning editor/sonic experience producer. Great fodder here for commentary on contemporary culture and media consumption habits as well. More and more consumers are not really listening to any one single song, but that song in interlaced comparison to surrounding music/media. The point is less about the song in your ears, and more about how it differs and relates to the other songs you've heard. Recognizing each sample and how it fits in feels good. I think Girl Talk is pleasurable to a large extent because his albums compress those moments of recognition of difference and relationship by the hundreds into a digestible chunk. It's like mass consumption of popular culture. Along that line--while the editing is impressive--I'm also struck by how structurally similar so much popular music is...even the disparate "genres".

Interesting to me how good it feels to recognize a song in the mix...when I first realized U2 was building I got a rush of satisfaction...not just because I love U2, but simply because of the recognition. It's like that with smells, tastes, faces, as well as sounds. Maybe that's an evolutionary biology question.

Anyway...sorry if I have gone off the deep end with this one. I just had a bout of norovirus and my brain is in a strange place. I did lose 8 lbs in 36 hours. Worst diet ever.

[EricKeller]

I dig the new album. But how can he feel so entitled as to not pay for the rights to use the samples? His product is totally riding the coattails of the original artist.
-Joe

We could talk all day about this, but I don't see anything wrong with what he's doing here. I was a lot more involved in music back when sampling became affordable, and then it became pretty much impossible due to the lawyers. Things have reverted to a more reasonable approach now. I'm guessing he has a fairly impressive pile of cease and desist letters though.

[Rodador]

Girl Talk: I like it.

Also, I have it on good authority that he is into bikes. Older, lugged steel bikes. That must be a point in his favor.

[chasea]

Being a musician, this isn't exactly my thing. I'd prefer to hear original stuff than DJ/mashup stuff. I was talking smack about it as some friends were playing it on Thanksgiving, and then...wait...is that?...oh no he didn't...SPACEHOG?!?! Spacehog has been my "hey, remember the 90s" obsession for a few months now.

[davids]

I downloaded the new album and I'm 3/4 of the way through it. I can decide if it's a joke; brilliant; or a brilliant joke.

There've been more than a few moments that had me in awe - "Hey Ladies" over "Lust for Life" for one - and a lot more that put a big smile on my face. And the steady rain of context-free bits & pieces of the last 40 years of popular music has it's own hypnotic force in & of itself.

I'm into it now. Let's see how I feel after a month.