Read the news and it’s all “piracy is killing the music industry” this and “kids don’t even think about paying for music” that. But there’s a bigger problem that having thousands of illegally downloaded songs at your fingertips hath wrought — Gregg Gillis, a.k.a. Girl Talk, knows you don’t have the patience to listen to a full song anymore.
His new “album” Feed the Animals obviously took a tonne of work to put together, not least of which is figuring out exactly how much of a song you need to hear to recognize it. Will the drums from the Beastie Boys’ “So What’cha Want” be enough or do you need the hook too? How long can he let that section of The Police’s “Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic” loop under Busta Rhymes’ “Woo Hah!” verses before it gets annoying?
Not long, at least if you like listening to songs all the way through. 50 Cent’s “I Get Money” has its own atmosphere and an ass-kicking synth riff that builds through all 3:46 of the song; Girl Talk’s “Still Here” only has one atmosphere, and that’s a jumble, an aesthetic that got boring somewhere around the 5,000th listen to 2 Many DJs’ mixes. What I want to know is, who’s so bored with pop music that they need to listen to 12 songs at once to get off? (http://illegalart.net/)
NOTHING DOING
You can, in fact, make a dope track using just one sample source. Take “The Opening Title Sequence” to The Mixtape About Nothing, Washington, DC thinking-man’s-MC Wale and DJ Nick Catchdubs’ brilliant ode to Seinfeld that samples the show’s theme. Er, Seinfeld? This ain’t no one-joke mix. “Most niggas love nothin’ / so I made this tape,” Wale raps, with a raised eyebrow. He ain’t most. (http://tinyurl.com/6hpkxw)
SONG OF THE WEEK
Beck, “Orphans”: For a supposedly rush-released album, why does it feel like it’s taking forever to get here? At least this MySpace-streaming chilled-out ‘60s hip-shimmying track helps calm you down. Not too calm though —?we’re not in Sea Change territory yet, thank you sweet merciful Jesus. (www.myspace.com/beck)