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Last week I was at a Stephen Malkmus show (not taping) and about halfway through the show, a gentleman behind me made the following proclamation:

“These are the most boring people I’ve ever seen. Just look at them! They’re like fucking zombies!”

I really wanted to turn around and tell him “Hey guy. Turns out no one gives a shit.” but I didn’t. I guess he kind of has a point. Concert goers –especially in Seattle– have a penchant for standing and lightly bobbing their heads. And, honestly, can you blame them? Do you really want everyone doing The Jerk and The Pony to a fucking Stephen Malkmus song? Truth is, most rock music is head-bob-worthy but not really shake-your-ass-worthy. That’s just how rock music is.

I’ve read the opinions of Girl Talk’s detractors online and one thing that rubs a lot of the contrarians the wrong way is that Greg mashes top 40 hip-hop with seemingly unfitting pop radio hits (such as The 5 Stairsteps’ “Ooh Child”) and listeners are expected to lap it all up with a healthy spoonful of irony. Other people claim that mashups are just plain boring and uninspired. Still others say that his latest album Night Ripper is nothing more than a DJ set and not really an album worth praising.

I will say this, though: No matter what beef you have with Greg Gillis’ musicianship and “hipster cross-over” appeal, you cannot deny that, at the very least, he is forcing all of those asshole hipsters that the Internet loves to bash to gyrate their hips, shake their asses, raise their arms, and move their feet. And that is something that is inarguably good. Something that only happens because the Internet Hype Machine got the hipsters on board with Girl Talk but didn’t tell them that at the shows they’d have to actually participate and visibly have a good time.

The show was amazing and epic. He comes out in a full sweatsuit and cheap sunglasses while his intro plays. Throughout the set he gets sweatier and sweatier until he’s just wearing pants. And he’s not just getting sweaty because the stage lights are hot; no, he’s breaking a sweat because he takes every opportunity to dance with the crowd that has formed on stage with him or crowd surf on the audience below him. During his finale Nirvana cover, he was hanging upside down from the rafters above the stage lip and shouting into the microphone while the audience held him up.

And there was dancing of all kinds. The same “zombies” you see at Sonic Youth shows staring at Thurston’s pedal boards were busting moves, cutting rugs, popping, locking, and getting their collective freak on.

Girl Talk – 2007-01-27 Chop Suey – Seattle, WA
Download FLAC: gtalk2007-01-27.akgc1000s.flac16.zip
Download MP3 gtalk2007-01-27.akgc1000s.mp3.zip
MP3 Sample: gtalk2007-01-27sample.mp3

Vellela Vellela – 2007-01-27 Chop Suey – Seattle, WA
Download: vv2007-01-27.akgc1000s.flac16.zip
MP3 Sample: vv2007-01-27sample.mp3

This entry was posted on Sunday, January 28th, 2007 at 5:11 PM and is filed under Main, Taping.