Girl Talk

Gregg Michael Gillis (born October 26, 1981), known by the stage name Girl Talk, is an American disc jockey who specializes in mash-ups and digital sampling. Gillis has released five LPs on the record label Illegal Art and EPs on both 333 and 12 Apostles. He was trained as an engineer. Early life and education Gillis began experimenting with electronic music and sampling while a student at Chartiers Valley High School in the Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania suburb of Bridgeville. After a few collaborative efforts, he started the solo "Girl Talk" project while studying biomedical engineering at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio. In school, Gillis focused on tissue engineering. Influences Gillis states his musical inspirations to have been Squarepusher, Aphex Twin, Just Blaze, Nirvana and Kid606 among others. He has also stated interest in punk rock, as well as noise musician Merzbow. He stated that he was first introduced to the genre of Plunderphonics by John Oswald. Gillis has also stated that he was always into hip-hop and pop music. As he aged, he started to like older musicians such as The Beatles. Career Gillis worked as an engineer, but he quit in May 2007 to focus solely on music.