10K6 - Girl Talk

Iowa City, IA, Second Floor Ballroom IMU

April 13, 2009

Girl Talk, whose real name is Greg Gillis, was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.  He began producing music in high school at Chartiers Valley with other artists but soon went solo with his own project: Girl Talk.  He continued with GT while studying biomedical engineering at Case Western Reserve University in Ohio.  GT focused on tissue engineering though he quit in 2007 to focus on his music.  Currently 27 years old, GT tours the world performing in a total range of venues.  However, the ticket price is worth it since "No two shows are ever the same."

GT has given different explanations for the name he's chosen to perform under but in an interview with FMLY in 2009 he stated

"The name Girl Talk is a reference to many things, products, magazines, books. It’s a pop culture phrase. The whole point of choosing the name early on was basically to just stir things up a little within the small scene I was operating from. I came from a more experimental background and there were some very overly serious, borderline academic type electronic musicians. I wanted to pick a name that they would be embarrassed to play with. You know Girl Talk sounded exactly the opposite of a man playing a laptop, so that’s what I chose."

GT is known for his mash-up style remixes of tracks, sometimes up to a dozen, that he molds into new songs.  If you would like to listen to some of Girl Talk's latest album, check out his MySpace page. You can name your own price here to download GT's latest album, Feed the Animals.

GT was ranked #4 on Time's "Top 10 Albums of 2008, #24 on Rolling Stone's "Top 50 Albums of 2008", and had the "#2 Album of 2008" in Blender Magazine.

Check out the announcement video from last year!