Somewhere, between the Frat parties, raves, Hot Topics, and myriad of mini-dress meat markets CONSTANTLY spewing “Don’t Stop Believing” or wtf-ever, Greg Gillis (or Girl Talk, as he performs) stands on top of a table, bathed in confetti/toilet paper/strobes/sweat, conducting the ugly waves like Mickey Mouse in the Sorcerer’s Apprentice.
Tonight, the party wizard brought his mash-up mess to Knoxville, TN, where I live. I love this town, but given the chance, it can show up looking just AWFUL, and tonight ….it way did. My town looked like a scorchingly hot mess, between the worst of each fratty or fake punky or alpha-slutty crowd really turning it up a notch for Mr. Gillis. The most horrific was probably the “I better wear something crazy and get palsy-level drunk in the parking lot…I mean….it’s Girl Talk” subset. The crowd was, TRULY, a bag of mashed-up assholes. And a lot of fights! That part was actually pretty cool. I still love you, K-town.
But ON the stage was one of our day-and-age’s innovators, putting on his signature (tweaked and constantly improved) party, driven by his bulletproof mash-ups and song combinations. The Girl Talk aesthetic is as effective on the giant light-screen behind the laptops as it is in the speakers, with a constant flow of……just stuff….just cool stuff that everybody wants to see. There were happy babies, knives, chairs, tacos. This show is about the stuff that people like. And it is down to a science. Especially effective was working the city name into the lo-fi light presentation. “hey, THAT’S US!” The show is great fun, even though you DEFINITELY know what you’re going to get from it LONG before the first 100 hipster girls vaguely dressed as Native Americans ram into you (and somehow take a picture of themselves making “duckmouth” in the process). The show is what it is, and that does mean that it’s predictable, but it also means that it is pretty powerful amounts of crazy and fun. And Mr. Girl Talk NEVER stops moving. Dude should do a workout video.
The most notable thing in my mind is the audience reaction to the never-ending string of familiar samples, especially when they know the (sometimes VERY) obscure counter-samples, usually of various hip hop songs. Typically, there are 3-4 very recognizable samples playing out at once in a Girl Talk song; it can be a lot of fun to gauge which sample a person is pumped about, or if they ONLY know the mashup, which is the most compelling possibility of all, in my opinion, as it totally removes the branding and nostalgia that Girl Talk is obviously built around. Sometimes you have people standing side by side, clearly freaking out to different songs, but dancing to the same one. I find these shows pretty fascinating, even just to watch those similar and different waves of excitement that move through parts of the audience one moment and another part the next… Or chuckle at the spattering of older folks shouting along to “move bitch” and the obvious hordes of doofuses at the show who only know the singalong Ooooooh from “where is my mind?” as the Girl Talk version of “Big Pimpin.”
The show is what it is, and that rules.
Party On, you sweaty wizard.
