28.06.2008
I’m not going to try to review the new Girl Talk album “Feed the Animals” because I could go on for hours about how outstanding and revolutionary it is. NPR talked to blogger Matthew Perpetua about the album in which he says is displeasing because of its rawness and illegality. Perpetua claims that Gregg Gillis (aka Girl Talk) is “stealing” the samples from over 150 of the not-so-greatest hits of the last couple of years and created something of A.D.D. chaos with them.
I think differently, however, with a generational gap and audience in consideration. First off, it may be entirely illegal to sample all of the songs without clearances, but I think it is only for the better of the artists that he is sampling. Not only is Girl Talk using their past singles – which makes you want to start listening to them again – but he is bringing the artists back into the spotlight for greater success on possible future singles.
Perpetua says that the 50-or-so-minute mash-up is nothing but utter A.D.D. chaos, but honestly, I think that it is exactly what my generation wants to hear: the best ten seconds of all of the hits that brought us memories. After all, we are better known as the “M.T.V. A.D.D. generation.” All of these hits are solidified to create something that we can dance our emotions away with. Better yet, instead of using only obscure indie music in his mixes, the mainstream songs will open him up to a wider audience.
Releasing “Feed the Animals” in a Radiohead-fashion “pay-what-you-wish” is the perfect marketing strategy. Assuming that Girl Talk’s greatest fans (aka the “trendsetters of the American Apparel wearing-indie obscurants-dance and rave culture”) will download the album for free and start listening to it, it is bound to be passed on to a greater audience. Once it hits the mainstream, they will be able to release hard copies of the album and put it up for digital sale via iTunes, Amazon, etc. The mainstream audience will be forced to purchase the album rather than download it for free.
Greater than album sales, Girl Talk is interested in DJing. Since DJing is a live production, he will be able to support this album with worldwide arena shows that are more like massive dance parties or raves (much like a Daft Punk show at the Los Angeles Sports Arena, the recent Justice shows at the Mayan Theatre, the upcoming Electric Daisy Carnival or the sold-out HARD events.)
Will Girl Talk sell millions of “Feed The Animals” and stick around for generations? I doubt it. He might, however, just have started a revolutionary marketing strategy for the music industry. We’ll just have to wait and see.
Listen to NPR talk about Girl Talk’s New Album.
Update: AbsolutePunk.net covered both the release of the album and the NPR interview. The people who respond to AbsolutePunk are a very different audience than those who you’d assume to listen to the new album. However, check out what they have to say!
NPR Likes Girl Talk
Girl Talk Album Up for Download
andy warhol was right, everyone will get their fifteen minutes of fame:
it sickens me when horrific events like this happens.
This was the first day in over three weeks that I woke up to nothing on the schedule – no Microsoft Entourage Reminders to give me a daily mess of conflicting disasters. So I got out of bed, took a shower and went to the park in the mountains. I hiked for a bit and then sat there motionless for about two hours and listened to soft music in the ninety-five degree weather.
I’m working Thursday and Friday and have over five-hundred photographs to sort through from a photo shoot last weekend. But it was amazing while it lasted. Welcome summer!
Just when I was hoping that our world would slow down, stop relying on technology to live our lives and enjoy the world around us before we destruct it, I read a blog entry from Yahoo! that was put out regarding one of their new services:
“We’re all impatient, Blackberry-wielding, microwave-cooking, Tivo-recording fiends. Why should we wait a minute longer than we have to for our stock quotes? Yahoo! Finance gets that impulsive nature and found a way to get you real-time stock quotes, courtesy of BATS Trading.”
Apparently, the ability to be patient is now a bad thing? One of the few times that you are forced to turn off your communication devices is on a plane. Don’t worry folks, WiFi on airplanes is coming very soon!
Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb
Sex, Lies and Videotape
…to be continued.
