Hey kids, what do you know? I'm back in Minnesota and glad to see I brought just a little bit of the warmth home with me. My flight got in just after midnight - consequently I'm dragging today. To boot, this is post number 100. I should be doing cartwheels and lighting off fireworks. Instead, my head's bobbing and I'm thinking fondly of pillows. I got nothing. While I had sworn up and down that today would bring a wondrous return to form, instead it will be just one more slightly truncated post. So what can I evangelize about when I'm feeling so foggy?
Girl Talk. All Day.
That's what's up.
I've talked about mash-ups here at great length, from the artsy compositions of Kids & Explosions to the meta-contextual jokes of the Hood Internet. The golden boy, though, is the massively popular Girl Talk, also known as Gregg Gillis. Gillis has been making music for years, at this point having put out five albums of remixes and mash-ups. His latest salvo, All Day, was so popular and hotly demanded it basically broke the internet when it came out in November of 2010. His site and any other that hosted the album were crushed under the overwhelming surge of traffic seeking a working link. I'm guessing the odds are pretty high that if you're even reading this then you have at least a passing familiarity with this ridiculously talented DJ. Alternately available as either one massive track or 12 separate songs, the album is, in my opinion, even better than his previous release Feed The Animals, even though the All Day hasn't received as high of marks as Animals.
All Day is (to me, at least) the quintessential party album - it's high energy, full of huge hooks and varied enough to keep anyone's attention for a solid hour. Seriously - the choices Gillis makes when playing Dr. Frankenstein are good enough to just listen to it straight through, let alone putting it on for a ripper with your friends. I love the way it opens, kicking immediately into high gear with Ludacris rapping over Black Sabbath. We can all have a good laugh over the trials and tribulations of the dreaded rap rock but when you hear it done right (as it is several times on this album) it absolutely makes sense. It just takes the right DJ to make it happen. There are some absolutely sublime pairings here, like Jay Z's 'Can I Get A...' rapped over some General Public, the swagger of Jigga unexpectedly complimenting the indie-pop of 'Tenderness'. Even better is hearing Beyonce's infectious 'Single Ladies' sung over the raucous exuberance of M.O.P.'s 'Ante Up'. I don't tire of either if those songs on their own, so cutting them up and stitching them together is like making a sandwich from your favorite foods. Just goodness all around. Some of my favorite mid-90s alterna-Gods make surprise appearances here, as well. Portishead, Spacehog and Jane's Addiction all turn up in hilariously solid ways. There is no cognitive dissonance like hearing ODB rapping 'Shimmy Shimmy Ya' over 'Creep' by Radiohead and actually having it turn out better than one could ever think. There's a staggering array of material Gilllis draws from here, from the Jackson 5 to Bananarama, Rhianna to Toad The Wet Sprocket. This is the kind of excellent remix album where, if you find yourself not enamored with a specific track, you can just wait for about 45 seconds and something awesome happens. I've played it for friends who cried blasphemy over the use of 'Where The Streets Have No Name' only to smile and start bouncing their shoulders at the genius reworking of 'Killing In The Name' under M.I.A. It's nuts.
Like I said earlier, the reviews for this album weren't as high as previous efforts by Gillis. I have no idea why, though - I think this album is absolute gold, start to finish. There's no lags in it at all, for me. You're getting ready to go out on a Saturday night, getting dressed in the morning, going for a drive on a sunny afternoon, I don't care. You can put this album on and straight up rock out for an hour. There's something so fun about listening to a mashup album and feeling that moment of recognition when you hear something familiar come flying through the ether. There are combinations here that make me laugh out loud every time I hear them. For real, if you haven't heard this yet go over to Girl Talk's site and pick it up. No iTunes this time, kids. I'm afraid the good people in the record business are a little wary about artistic license in this case. I'd write more about this awesome, super fun album but I'm struggling to make cogent thoughts at this point. I'm glad to be back in MPLS, if only for the signs of spring. See you tomorrow when I'm better rested.
Girl Talk. All Day.
That's what's up.
I've talked about mash-ups here at great length, from the artsy compositions of Kids & Explosions to the meta-contextual jokes of the Hood Internet. The golden boy, though, is the massively popular Girl Talk, also known as Gregg Gillis. Gillis has been making music for years, at this point having put out five albums of remixes and mash-ups. His latest salvo, All Day, was so popular and hotly demanded it basically broke the internet when it came out in November of 2010. His site and any other that hosted the album were crushed under the overwhelming surge of traffic seeking a working link. I'm guessing the odds are pretty high that if you're even reading this then you have at least a passing familiarity with this ridiculously talented DJ. Alternately available as either one massive track or 12 separate songs, the album is, in my opinion, even better than his previous release Feed The Animals, even though the All Day hasn't received as high of marks as Animals.
