Music mash-up DJ Girl Talk creates art amid controversy
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By Roy York
features@kykernel.comÂ
   A nearly pitch-black ballroom filled with 1,300 bodies pressed together dancing and dripping sweat. Walls rattle with bass hits. The hiss of high-hat cymbals dictates the swinging of hips. Multicolored lights illuminate one man mixing music from over 300 artists to create a one-of-a-kind sound that entrances his audience. He may only be wearing his boxers.
This is the scene the Student Activities Board might set by bringing Girl Talk, the stage name for DJ Gregg Gillis, to perform on campus. Gillis will be showcasing his musical styling in the Harris Grand Ballroom Thursday at 8 p.m. with opening act Grand Buffet, a DJ duo from Pittsburgh.Â
Pictures of Gillis in just his skivvies are easily accessible on the Internet, but his wardrobe is not the only thing unique about his performance. Gillis creates his sound by combining certain melodies and elements taken from pop music to form a song unlike any other. Imagine the lyrics to Ludacris’ “Pimpin’ All Over the World†laid over the bass guitar riff from Boston’s “Foreplay†all wrapped around percussion lines that could be from any hip-hop track. That is what you get from Girl Talk.
“He’s definitely electronica,†said WRFL General Manager Ainsley Wagoner, an interior design senior. “He plays to the Twitter generation. He condenses dance tracks into just the hooks.â€
Gillis has been mixing music since he was in high school, but DJ was not always his career of choice. Gillis studied biomedical engineering at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, and held an engineering job before his music career exploded.
Since college, Gillis has released four albums through the record label Illegal Art under his stage name Girl Talk, and performed at major music festivals such as Bonnaroo, Lollapalooza and Coachella. In addition to money and notoriety, Gillis has attracted some controversy concerning how he creates his music.
One group that may not be jumping to Gillis’ jive is the artists whose music he samples to create his albums. Critics have chastised Gillis since the beginning of his career claiming that he violates copyright laws by using other artists’ material to turn a profit.
Gillis contends his music is protected by the fair use doctrine on the grounds that the amount of material he pulls from each song is not large enough to constitute copyright infringement.
The fair use doctrine contains four main pillars, and Gillis must be able to argue that he is protected against the other three to be safe from lawsuit. Courts take into account whether the infringing work is being used for profit, the nature and content of the infringing work, and the effect on the market value of the copyrighted work.
Gillis’ argument has the edge in the legal community, and he has yet to be the target of a copyright lawsuit. Peter Friedman, a University of Detroit Mercy Law School professor, said in a July 2009 article on the Web site techdirt.com that he would advise the RIAA not to sue Gillis.
“Gillis’ argument that he has transformed the copyrighted materials sufficiently that his work constitutes non-infringing fair use is just too good,†Friedman said in his article.
“I don’t think that Greg Gillis is making any claims that he wrote the songs he uses,†Wagoner said. “Clearly using the artists’ work is credit enough.â€
Gillis released his latest album, “Feed the Animals,†on a pay-as-you-like basis, allowing fans to download his music for free.
SAB, however, invites students to profit from Girl Talk’s talent by giving students the chance to dance on stage while Gillis performs.
“Girl Talk will be picking people to go up onstage on the basis of who is dancing well,†said SAB Concert Director Chris Duncan, an ISC junior.
Girl Talk concerts are known to be dance-a-thons, and Duncan said SAB will also be providing a “hydration station†filled with bottles of Vitamin Water to keep students energized.
In addition to a night of dancing, students can expect a hardcore party atmosphere with deafening music and even louder fans. There might even be a half-naked DJ.
   A nearly pitch-black ballroom filled with 1,300 bodies pressed together dancing and dripping sweat. Walls rattle with bass hits. The hiss of high-hat cymbals dictates the swinging of hips. Multicolored lights illuminate one man mixing music from over 300 artists to create a one-of-a-kind sound that entrances his audience. He may only be wearing his boxers.
This is the scene the Student Activities Board might set by bringing Girl Talk, the stage name for DJ Gregg Gillis, to perform on campus. Gillis will be showcasing his musical styling in the Harris Grand Ballroom Thursday at 8 p.m. with opening act Grand Buffet, a DJ duo from Pittsburgh.Â
Pictures of Gillis in just his skivvies are easily accessible on the Internet, but his wardrobe is not the only thing unique about his performance. Gillis creates his sound by combining certain melodies and elements taken from pop music to form a song unlike any other. Imagine the lyrics to Ludacris’ “Pimpin’ All Over the World†laid over the bass guitar riff from Boston’s “Foreplay†all wrapped around percussion lines that could be from any hip-hop track. That is what you get from Girl Talk.
“He’s definitely electronica,†said WRFL General Manager Ainsley Wagoner, an interior design senior. “He plays to the Twitter generation. He condenses dance tracks into just the hooks.â€
Gillis has been mixing music since he was in high school, but DJ was not always his career of choice. Gillis studied biomedical engineering at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, and held an engineering job before his music career exploded.
Since college, Gillis has released four albums through the record label Illegal Art under his stage name Girl Talk, and performed at major music festivals such as Bonnaroo, Lollapalooza and Coachella. In addition to money and notoriety, Gillis has attracted some controversy concerning how he creates his music.
One group that may not be jumping to Gillis’ jive is the artists whose music he samples to create his albums. Critics have chastised Gillis since the beginning of his career claiming that he violates copyright laws by using other artists’ material to turn a profit.
Gillis contends his music is protected by the fair use doctrine on the grounds that the amount of material he pulls from each song is not large enough to constitute copyright infringement.
The fair use doctrine contains four main pillars, and Gillis must be able to argue that he is protected against the other three to be safe from lawsuit. Courts take into account whether the infringing work is being used for profit, the nature and content of the infringing work, and the effect on the market value of the copyrighted work.
Gillis’ argument has the edge in the legal community, and he has yet to be the target of a copyright lawsuit. Peter Friedman, a University of Detroit Mercy Law School professor, said in a July 2009 article on the Web site techdirt.com that he would advise the RIAA not to sue Gillis.
“Gillis’ argument that he has transformed the copyrighted materials sufficiently that his work constitutes non-infringing fair use is just too good,†Friedman said in his article.
“I don’t think that Greg Gillis is making any claims that he wrote the songs he uses,†Wagoner said. “Clearly using the artists’ work is credit enough.â€
Gillis released his latest album, “Feed the Animals,†on a pay-as-you-like basis, allowing fans to download his music for free.
SAB, however, invites students to profit from Girl Talk’s talent by giving students the chance to dance on stage while Gillis performs.
“Girl Talk will be picking people to go up onstage on the basis of who is dancing well,†said SAB Concert Director Chris Duncan, an ISC junior.
Girl Talk concerts are known to be dance-a-thons, and Duncan said SAB will also be providing a “hydration station†filled with bottles of Vitamin Water to keep students energized.
In addition to a night of dancing, students can expect a hardcore party atmosphere with deafening music and even louder fans. There might even be a half-naked DJ.
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As taboo as it may be to dissent with the WRFL General Manager, Girl Talk is definitely not electronica. He is a mash-up artist, or more specifically, a sample artist. Taking clips from different users and blending them electronically does not make you an electronica artist. While he may take samples from artists who fall into the electronica category (for instance, MGMT could be defined as neo-psychedelic electronica), he himself does not fall into the category in any way, shape, or form. And “playing to the Twitter generation” seems like a strange comment to make, as it insinuates that his music is enjoyable to only those with an ADD proclivity (Besides, do many college students actually use Twitter? I think we all have an account, but rarely actually post on it). Personally, I think he manages to take bland and uninspired popular music and blend it into something awesome and unique. All that aside, his music still can not be classified as electronica.
I’m going to go out on a limb and say Ainsley was misquoted. Just a guess.