Review: Girl Talk, Night Ripper

Girl Talk is DJ and remix artist Gregg Gillis.  Gillis garnered a good deal of popular media attention a year or so ago for his blatant use of clearly recognizable samples without regard to copyright in his remixes, his frenetic club shows which often involved him stripping to his underwear, and his obvious talent as a sample-based remixer.

Night Ripper unfolds as a nonstop combination of hip-hop and rap vocal samples combined with a wide variety of muscial underpinnings.  It’s a markedly mixed bag.  On the one hand is Gillis’ musical talent.  He is a masterful mash-up artist who is familiar with a fairly wide range of music.  The mix on Night Ripper is terrific.  Gillis uses samples that are long enough to be clearly recognizable and it’s not only fun hearing segments and riffs you know in unexpected places and combinations, but also enjoyable appreciating how well he puts it all together.

On the other hand is Night Ripper’s simplistic and often crass vocal content.  Many of the vocal samples feature the kind of crude sexual proclamations that are typical of a segment of hip hop but have come to stereotype and stigmatize the genre among people who don’t listen to very much of it.  The excuse that will be given is that this is party music so the emphasis on crass sex is appropriate.  If your idea of a party is getting down with some guys who chant “Head down, ass up, that’s the way we like to fuck” , you’ll be right at home here.  If you’re not still fourteen, it’s likely to come across as unrelentingly juvenile.

If Girl Talk had anything interesting to say, Night Ripper would be a great album.  As it is, you have terrific music combined with empty vocals that some listeners will find offensive.