Girl Talk quotes:

I was into alternative stuff, but I was also open to a little bit of hard rock and metal, like Guns N' Roses, Metallica.

I use minimal software to make my music - a wav editor and a calculator for my beats to make sure everything falls on mathematical precision. If you were just mapping this out visually, it works by math. I guess it's slightly engineering influenced.

The music is in no way politically based - I'm not trying to make a point about sampling. It may bring up issues but I'm not trying to push it on anyone.

Fair use is a part of United States copyright law. You don't know if it falls under fair use until you go to court. Someone has to sue you and then you have to challenge it.

I can't wait to wake up in the morning and listen to music in order to try to find something to work with.

I do have some weeks coming up in the summer where I will actually be in my house, and I love working on new music and all of that.

Sometimes the show needs that kick in the ass so being able to sing a Nirvana song kind of takes it there. I've grown up putting on extravagant shows with Girl Talk so when I'm playing I like to go nuts. After 30 minutes of pointing and clicking it's nice to scream into a microphone for three minutes.

I have my small little cult following, I play random shows from house parties to opening up for rock bands.

I was a jaded high schooler, I was still into pop music, though not as sincerely as I am now. It was more tongue-in-cheek back then.

A lot of times when I say I didn't do anything I was actually in Miami doing a show.

Anytime there is any lyrical meaning or combination in my mixes, it's very blatant. I'm not trying to make any statement or anything like that.

I feel like there's always something to prove.

I always like to borrow bits and pieces of things. There's a line between jumping on something that's happening and incorporating bits and pieces of it into my work.

I'm trying to separate myself from other people by having songs that would be considered - technically - original things. I don't seek out mashups. I'm associated with the whole mashup movement, and it's too bad because I'm not a huge fan of them.

I sampled a bit of stuff from my dad's collection. He has probably a bigger record collection than I do. I try to buy as much as possible, because I've never been able to keep an MP3 collection organized. I like to keep my computers as clean as possible.

A lot of people aren't aware of the years and years of humiliation and horrible shows I've played.

A lot of times people have issues with me because they don't understand where I'm coming from and haven't seen the years and years of hard work and shows I've played.

As the times are changing, you don't hear as many sample issues with rap artists. Part of that has to do with production styles these days, but the nature of copyright is also changing as the internet becomes more of a giant.

CDs are clearly dying out, and it's going to be moving to an all-digital format. Along with it, you raise this interactivity with the music. I feel that it's not stealing sales from anyone; it's turning people on to the music.

I always like the people who keep moving forward, but kind of stay in their own lane.

I am always excited for gaps of time where I can actually hang out with my friends.

I am ultimately comfortable with what I'm sampling.

I can't edit live as meticulously as I can for an album.

I didn't change much in terms of my setup or how I was making my music. It's evolved to this point where I think people look at it as one big traveling party.

I do try to pick music that is from different worlds and typically doesn't flow together. When you do that, you get songs with conflicting messages, but for me, it's on a musical level first and foremost.

I don't think my record collection or musical knowledge is vast. I just listen to the radio all the time - I'm a pop music enthusiast.

I feel like all the artists that I really love, they've had a strong contingent of people who really hate their work as well.

I found out about college radio and this whole noise genre blew me away. When I saw that guys could just get up there and have no traditional music ability and be in a band, it was really appealing to me.

I guess in a way I try to avoid being labeled as a traditional DJ.

I guess people naturally try to find meaning in music.

I hear something I like, and sometimes, I think it's gonna work, and I will cut it up, try it out, try to work with other material. Sometimes, it falls flat, and other times, it works out, so in that way, I'm constantly listening to music because I enjoy it.

I like to give stuff away for free and play shows for cheap and not rely on music as a job.

I like to use recognizable songs, but other than that, this song would be perfect.

I listen to music constantly, and I'm always hearing things I love that I'm excited to use.

I love getting out there and traveling and doing shows and all of that. But when I can be home, it's a special time.

I make a living off of playing shows; the albums only make me a fraction of what I make off of shows, especially since I'm doing around 100 shows a year.

I sometimes get in the car [and] jump all around hunting for a sample, and then I can get really annoying if anyone's in the car with me. But if I'm actually listening to music, I have a pretty solid attention span.

I still like weird music but there's such an overabundance that it's hard for me to stay enthusiastic about it.

I think a lot of times people from the traditional DJing world think I'm trying to come up with an ultimate dance mix. That's not really what I'm doing. I'm trying to make something a little bit progressive and challenging.

I think collaborating with a DJ could be interesting musically and it's something that I'd like to get into down the road, but I think on the live show tip I'm sticking to my guns for right now.

I think if I lived in New York I would be really stressed out going out to a club and seeing a good DJ who's doing something on a similar level. I'm pretty critical of myself when it comes to the music. Maybe they're not doing as many samples or the samples aren't put together as specifically but it would stress me out to feel like I needed to be one upping someone. In Pittsburgh, I'm in my own world - I know I'm the guy doing this here.

I think it's an interesting thing to have to produce an album that you'll want to listen to for 50 minutes.

I think some people form the traditional DJ worlds misunderstand where I'm coming form.

I think there's always room to grow.

I think we're approaching an era where there's a consistent dialogue going on between artists and consumers. And I think that's going to be part of the solution to actually selling music.

I typically get around to most major cities at least once a year. I think people see that as their chance to go nuts for the year if they're into the style of music.

I want the material I make to be mine; that's always the goal of the record and of the show.

I want to make new and interesting music out of pop music in a way that isn't ironic. I want to stay sincere to the source material but at the same time manipulate it and take it to a new world.

I want to make something that's fun to listen to but still challenging and unique.

I wanted to make experimental music out of pop.

I wasn't trying to make a following. I was just trying to make interesting music. That's not being modest, that's just being realistic.

I'd been to a lot of shows and I was just tired of people being jaded about music in general. Just a lot of pretensions, a lot of the attitude that goes along with it was a little difficult for me to deal with.

I'll put out an album, and people review it, and some people love it, and some people tear it apart. By nature of the project, I've always wanted this to be something where people react strongly to it.

I'm interested in anyone cutting up music and doing remixes. I just don't think it would work in a live setting right now to do shows with a traditional DJ, but it's something that might happen eventually.

I'm interested in branching out and seeing where my music goes.

I'm most excited about going swimming and riding water slides, shooting off fireworks, and playing basketball, and things like that. That's what I really love doing. Summer is a great time.

In 1990 if you heard a song on the radio and you really wanted to hear it again you'd have to buy it on tape or CD. Hearing music doesn't hold that kind of value anymore because anyone can hear it. It's going to become even easier.

In 2008 it's easy to get huge before you have an album out with the Internet. I think that's great and you see a lot of artists like that. It seems like it's becoming rarer to find a band that has been touring for six years, doing small shows and then breaking out.

In the past, hearing music had more value.

In the two years of preparing material for shows, I realized there are elements that are definitely going to work live, but might not be the most exciting thing to put on a record. And there's stuff that I really love but it falls flat live.

It's easy to hate on things that are close to your world that aren't exactly what you're doing.

It's hard enough to get things to work in a musical way.

It's hard to play a laptop in the midst of band and have people want to buy your t-shirts and CD's.

It's rare when I feel like I can extract a lyrical message out of combining two things together.

It's weird for me when someone asks me to do a remix as Girl Talk and not use samples.

I've always enjoyed taking pre-existing sound, songs I like, songs I want to share, and manipulating them and trying to do my own version. So just knowing there's that potential for that thing out there that I haven't discovered yet, really gets me motivated every day.

I've been approached about doing some live performance collaborations with DJ's. That is something I'd be interested in getting into down the line, but I've worked very hard to distinguish myself as a laptop artist.

I've been cataloguing samples for years, I have this massive library. Songs come out everyday so it's never ending.

I've been dedicating my life to doing remixes and sample based music. Whether you're into it or not I'm going to continue to pump it out.

I've grown up playing pop music for the experimental crowd and I always feel like I'm pushing something weird on people. I had this underdog feeling. It's crazy that all of a sudden I'm the overhyped band you read about on the blogs.

KRS-One is one of my favorite rappers ever. I actually don't even know why I have this on my computer, but I do. I really like this album, Criminal Minded.

Me and my friends would drive for eight hours to play for twenty people. That was cool, and if a couple of people bought t-shirts, that would be the greatest thing. We could go eat some hamburgers that night.

My dad's been one of those dads who loves showing newspaper articles to the neighbors.

My music should fall under fair use because it's transformative, it's becoming its own entity, and it's not negatively impacting anyone's sales.

My start came with experimental musicians and live bands. I never played with DJ's because it wasn't really the correct fit. It fit in more with someone using a laptop to create their own electronic music. When you're doing music like that, it's hard to get more than 20 people to come to your show.

Nowadays when you buy music its like you're donating to that cause, because you most likely could hear it in some capacity for free.

People can judge me on whatever level they think but I've always tried to make my own songs.

People see me on stage and sometimes they think, "Who's this hotdog thinking that he's the best." They miss the point that what I'm doing now comes from a whole different world of doing it for no one with nobody caring.

Samples are kind of my instrument of choice.

Sharing information, art, music, and everything on the internet now has become a part of everyone's lives.

Something that distinguishes my solo work from normal rap production is that it has a lot of melody - it's not just cutting up a song and having someone rap over it.

That's something I've always been down with: creative commons and people being able to license their music and allow other people to reuse it and recycle it.

The goal for me is, I build the record that I put out as one individual song. Even though it's broken up into tracks, to me it's like one hour-long piece of music. In assembling the whole thing, I'm really thinking, okay, it's gonna end here, it's gonna start here, and I kind of have the idea of the journey.

The goal of the work is always for it to come across as original material, as transformative material.

The internet helps with information exchange in general so it's obviously easier to check out tracks and whatnot from different genres. I think people are a lot more open to music in general because it's being communicated easier.

The point has always been to make music, it's not like I've always been running a giant money making scheme.

The point of making records for me isn't to hear 300 songs in 50 minutes; it's to hear the 50-minute piece of music.

The primary goal isn't a financial gain; it's to put out interesting music.

The traditional DJ world isn't a world that I come from.

The whole basis of the music is that people have these emotional attachments to these songs - whether they love it or hate it. Being able to manipulate that is a really easy way to connect with people.

The whole point of doing the pay what you want is to be reasonable with the fans.

Throughout hip-hop people have been putting different elements with different types of music.

To get 300 songs to fit together on an album, it's not like I choose 300 songs and say these are the ones I wanted to pick. To get those 300 songs I sampled 1000's of songs and narrowed down the ones I felt worked the best musically.

When I was 18, I was playing to 18 to 21-year-olds, and then, when I was 25, still playing to 18 to 25-year-olds. As I've gone on, the crowd has gone in both directions, both younger and a little older now than it's ever been. It is an interesting thing to hit 30.

When I would play pop music at underground shows, it was offensive to some people. I wasn't doing it to piss people off: I just didn't believe in those strong divisions that you're supposed to listen to this or that.

When I'm performing, this is what everything builds up to, and everything has allowed me to be here.

When people come to my shows they know there is a distinct beginning and end. It's difficult for me to play for much more than an hour, so people kind of come out and treat it like a rock show. They're fiending and ready to dance.

When someone is buying a sample-based album, they are investing in the concept of that album. If they really like the original source material, they can go buy it.

When there's something negative in my life, be it in the art or the music world or in my personal life, I really just want to face it as immediately as possible. I don't run from it. I just want to immerse myself in it, get through it as quickly as possible, understand it, and look into what is positive about it.

When you're playing for 30 people and you're jumping around stage, screaming, getting in peoples faces and acting cocky you're kind of poking fun at yourself.

With rap music, there are billions and billions of samples that are uncleared that people have never been bothered about on an underground level.

You can feel a little vulnerable when you see people tearing you apart on the internet or saying, "It's the end of music." "This guy is a total hack." I've read it all. But at the same time, even though I feel a little vulnerable with that, I do feel comfortable.

You can write very obtuse and abstract lyrics, and if they want to, people are going to find something amazing that you're saying.

A lot of artists are used to their music being reused online and have come to accept and embrace it. You have a generation who go on YouTube and remake and remix music online all the time. They remake and upload songs and videos, and then other people remake the remakes; it just keeps going.

That's kind of a nostalgia thing. Nirvana was my first favorite band, in third or fourth grade. Then I got out of them. But one day in college a few buddies and myself all started listening to them again and it blew me away. They still stand out as my favorite band ever.

I'm just making fun music so you can let your guard down and enjoy it, don't worry about what's cool and what's not.