In the last year, Greg Gillis' Girl Talk has become a sort of household name for the music community at large as his third full length album, Night Ripper, stopped party-goers in their tracks and took the art of mixing to an entirely new level. Bio-medical researcher by day and party catalyst by night, Gillis is an entrepreneur of sound as mind fuck: spinning Top 40 radio against explicit rap and hip-hop against 70s easy listening and, well, Boston. Night Ripper was #7 on our year end list here at Austinist (follow the link to read our review of it), and we can't wait to see what the live show brings at SXSW. Recently we had a chance to hear from Gillis himself on his life in the Pittsburgh medical research community, his last experience in Austin, and his thoughts on the mash-up.

In your day to day life as a member of the Pittsburgh community and a bio-medical researcher, there must be choices you make as far as what (if anything) you will reveal about Girl Talk. Has there ever been a person or situation that really called for full disclosure that you had to resist? Or is all the attention made it impossible for you to decide who knows about your alter ego?

I have two worlds. My job world, and the entire other world. At my job, I don't tell anyone about what I'm to on the music side of things. I think there's a good chance that someone knows about all of it and is too embarrassed to call me out on it. I also think there's a good chance that my coworkers are too busy feeding their families and cleaning their houses to even know who Kanye West is. In the rest of my life, such as with my family or dentist or friends, everyone knows that I'm in a sample-based band called Girl Talk.

You've been to Austin before, right? Care to share a story about it?

I've been making music as Girl Talk for about 7 years now, and I've toured the country a number of times. In the past, I was used to riding around in vans without air conditioning to play for 10 people in every city across the entire USA. But back in those less-glorious days, Austin seemed to always shock my friends and I with the attendance and enthusiasm. It was like the only place in the country where more than 50 people would come out.

On the other hand, my worst "show" of last year was in Austin. I had a 102 degree fever, and I was flying down to play a house party. My flight was delayed, and I got in at 2:00 AM and felt like dying. The people throwing the party talked me into playing. I show up at this sweaty house party, and it was the only show of my entire life where my computer would not start. I think it was because of the insane humidity in the room. So I was standing there in front of a bunch of drunk people waiting to party, I'm about to puke, and my computer won't even start. I went to a friends house and had fever nightmares the whole night. It sucked.

Girl Talk will be performing at the Pitchfork party @ Emo's on March 16. For more information on SXSW events and links to other interviews & goodies, visit our Interactive Guide

Photo courtesy the artist's MySpace

[Girl Talk MySpace]
[Girl Talk Official]

Night Ripper is fantastic because of a lot of things, not the least of which is the dichotomy between samples: are there any songs that you've wanted to put in contrast (or closeness) with each other and just couldn't make it work? What was the first track you wanted to mix?

The way I go about putting together music is completely trial and error. The amount of combinations that I've tried and did not work out far outnumber the ones you hear on Night Ripper.

My first attempt at sampling music was in my high school noise band. We used to turn on the radio and mess with the source material in real time. I think the first thing we really focused on was Hole's "Celebrity Skin."

How do your parents describe your music?

They would say something like, "He just takes all of these songs and puts them together. It's like even stuff from our days. It's got a good beat." They've seen a bunch of shows and push my CD's on their co-workers. My mom listens to Night Ripper while jogging, and my dad jams it on his iPod while mowing the lawn.

Are there any acts you are really excited about seeing at SXSW?

I really haven't seen who is playing yet, other than at the shows where I'm performing. I'm going to pretty much focus my SXSW time on snacking out, getting drunk, finding pools, and hanging with my friends.

Any albums you really loved in '06 that interest you mix-wise?

For my live sets this year, I used a bunch of Rick Ross, T.I., Justin Timberlake, and Al Fatz.

How often can we count on seeing you topless while you're here?

I plan on wearing a shirt during my shows but wearing exclusively swim trunks for the rest of the time.

Night Ripper isn't a mash-up album, and you've made it known that you consider your work to be original, but it seems like it might take some argument to convince some people of that. Does the association with the mash-up / remix movement bother you or do you think that it's fair?

I'm open to people interpreting this music in any way they want. I think my comments on mashups in the past were misunderstood. There is clearly a mash-up influence in my music. I am layering songs together in the exact style that is known as "mash-ups." I think that any form of sample-based music can hold an identity beyond the original source material. I'm not saying, "What I do is original, unlike all of these other artists." I think there's a ton of original music being made through preexisting music. All that I meant in the past was if you call Night Ripper a mash-up album, it might lead people down the wrong path. Some people who love mash-ups may hate my album, and some people who hate mash-ups may love my album. It really doesn't matter to me. I'm just trying to make party music.

Let's go swimming.

Who wins the NBA finals this year?

Cavs baby!