RIPPING THE MASH-UP REMIX

Remember the first time you heard A Stroke of Genius by Freelance Hellraisers, or a bootleg mix CD my 2ManyDjs? I was originally blown away that Christina Aguilera's Genie in a Bottle and the Strokes Hard to Explain mended together so well, I didn't understand how two seemingly unrelated tracks could be meshed into such a genius track. This was the beginning of a huge trend in bootleg music; mash-ups began to pop up all over the internet. 2ManyDjs took it one step further and released full CDs of their live sets, which were chalk-full of mash-ups. And to be honest, I've become totally bored with the concept...up until now. Nothing could have prepared me for the sheer audio assault that is Night Ripper, the third release by Girl Talk, a.k.a. Gregg Gillis. Tons of ink (...or blog space) has been spilled/filled in the last two weeks about this album, and all of it is well deserved. Gillis takes the mash-up concept to an entire new level, each track on Ripper mixes a minimum of 4 to 6 songs to create a unified track that does not sound disjointed or poorly mixed in any sense. His ear for mixing is sublime as is his song selection. Ripper clocks in just over 40 minutes and in that time he manages to squeeze in 150 samples. The tracks usually consist of one or two vocal pieces mixed over at least 3-5 layers of back track. Every genre is represented, tons of hip-hop (which I'm the most unfamiliar with), indie rock (I almost fell over when he mixes in Neutral Milk Hotel), Top 40s pop, UK Grime, and a selection of older tunes that would fit into the playlist at Mix 99.9. Lauren and I were driving around the north-end of the city yesterday afternoon trying to pick out as many samples as we could. Night Ripper has been released by Illegal Art, which means you'll have a difficult time procuring a copy, but just like Dangermouse's The Grey Album, it's available for download all over the net. Go forth and download, this album will be a contender for album of the summer.

Pitchfork reviews the album here.

Buy a legitimate copy directly from Illegal Art here.

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