Thor Christensen is the pop music critic for The Dallas Morning News. Archive Bio E-mail
10/23/2008Janet Jackson not the showstopper she once was To gauge just how far Janet Jackson's career has fallen, you need only have looked to the rafters Wednesday night.10/22/2008Weezer concert a frenzy of music and shtick There's always a point when a Weezer concert turns into pure silliness. Tuesday night at Nokia Theatre, it came 75 minutes into the show when the band brought out 22 local amateur musicians for a jam that ranged from wacky to ramshackle but was never predictable. Who knew "Island in the Sun" would sound so good with an accordion solo?10/20/2008Gregg Gillis is serious about his Girl Talk music mash-ups
Andrew Strasser
Gregg Gillis, a.k.a. Girl Talk
It all started in third grade with a cassette tape of Bell Biv DeVoe. Later, Gregg Gillis became a fan of Nirvana, which led him to Sonic Youth. And before the mix master knew it, he was creating experimental music on a laptop computer and building cutting-edge dance music from samples of Styx, Huey Lewis and Kenny Loggins. "This is not ironic. I'm fascinated by mainstream pop music," he says. "You might think Hall & Oates are slightly nerdy or you might hate Styx, and that's fine with me. But maybe you'll like the way I manipulate them into this project." The project is Girl Talk, the nom de rock the 26-year-old Pittsburgher uses for his electronic mash-ups. Music blog:Hear tracks, get show info
Cat Power ended her concert night at the Palladium Ballroom by thanking fans "for letting us play such an amazing show for you." Surely she was joking. "Amazingly odd" is a better description for a show she performed almost entirely in the dark, a tactic that prompted half the audience to leave before it ended.
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