The concept of the mashup seems like a terrible idea at first. Why would anyone want to hear two or more songs they like crushed together into a new track? It’s very unlikely that it’ll be better than the original song and may even ruin the number if it’s put together with a song they don’t like. Very few artists have managed to pull off the mash-up successfully. Luckily, Greg Gillis, also known as Girl Talk, proved to be the exception as he played a high-energy show at Rose Hill on Sept. 4.
Playing in the Lombardi Fieldhouse, Girl Talk took to the stage around 10 p.m. He quickly turned the gymnasium into a dance floor using nothing but his laptop to mix together a variety of contemporary songs. He didn’t go for typical or easy combinations, either. While the Jackson 5’s “ABC” and Rihanna’s “Umbrella” seem like they’d work well together, who knew throwing in Queen’s “Bohemian Rhapsody” would work just as well. Compared to some other points, that mashup wasn’t really that unusual. Some of the weirder tracks thrown together were Nirvana with Deee-Lite’s “Groove Is In The Heart,” Wu-Tang Clan with Argent’s “Hold You Head Up,” and Nine Inch Nails with Kelly Clarkson’s “Since U Been Gone.” The stranger the mashup, the better it sounded.
Girl Talk’s performance wasn’t just for the ears. He made sure it was for the eyes as well. Using a projector screen behind the stage, Girl Talk flashed various fast-paced, graffiti-oriented images that mostly wrote his own name in different ways. Other lights swirled spiral patterns around the entire gymnasium, turning the large room into a small club. The 20 plus students that were randomly chosen to go on stage added to this feeling. Girl Talk himself never stopped moving, even when “playing” his laptop. He spent his time at the mic pumping the crowd up and shouting his support for the New York boroughs. He also had a couple of people wielding toilet paper guns, who must have been told to go Rambo with them. They shot toilet paper at the crowd, the stage and anything else they could manage to hit. Later on, balloon props were thrown out to the crowd, adding another element that just screamed “Party!”
While the show itself was good, there were a couple of low points in terms of the setup. The barricade between the audience and the stage was shaped like a “T,” dividing the crowd almost straight down the middle. This created a pretty bad crush on both sides of the divide. Instead of everyone being a little more spread out and trying to move to the front, the audience was split into two smaller, cramped sections that made it impossible to move if you were in the front. People in the front must’ve also gotten their ribs bruised from the strong push and heavy dancing. Another problem was that the water coolers ran out before the show was over. Given that many people there had been dancing for about three hours straight, water was a necessity that there should have been more of.
By the time the concert had ended, everyone was exhausted and sweaty, but they looked like they had the time of their lives. Girl Talk has certainly taken the idea of a dance to a whole new level with his performance. Hearing a regular dance song may now feel too safe or normal after the jagged patterns of Girl Talk’s tunes. The entire set supported the statement that flashed on the screen at one point: “I'M NOT A DJ.” That’s true. He’s a lot more fun.
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