Former Pavement lead singer and ‘90s slacker avatar Stephen Malkmus sees a double standard in his inability to name his new album with his band the Jicks L.A. Guns and the pervasive use of sampling. Malkmus had been advised by his record company’s lawyers that L.A. Guns, the glam band, might sue him if he took the name.
And whom did he think to mention first as an example of these song-stealing charlatans, these thieving hacks who somehow avoid any legal recourse? None other than Dan Deacon, of course. Wait, what?
“There’s this Dan Deacon guy who makes mashups and is super popular with the college kids,” Malkmus said in a Salon interview. “He doesn’t have to pay sample clearances for some reason, even though he’s totally taking these songs.”
Okay, we were 99.99 percent sure he meant to say Greg Gillis, aka Girl Talk, and a subsequent tweet by Nils Bernstein, director of publicity at Malkmus’s label, Matador Records, confirmed this suspicion. (Interestingly enough, the text of the interview on Salon has since been changed from “Dan Deacon” to “Girl Talk”).
Honestly, any accusations of hackery levied against Gillis would be totally justified. But Dan Deacon, as we know, is composing film scores for Francis Ford Coppola, giving TED Talks, curating another Gunky’s Basement film series, and other cool stuff. He is a composer, an artist of the highest order, a regular renaissance man.
Regardless of where you stand on Malkmus’s opinion on sampling, we can forgive this verbal slip. Malkmus has always been known for being charmingly passive. Do you really think he spends his time poring over music blogs and Pitchfork? Doubtful.
Still, it would be cool if, as a penance of sorts, he took the opportunity during his Sept. 29 show at Rams Head Live with the Jicks to break out the old Pavement gem “Transport Is Arranged,” which boasts the line, “Walk to Baltimore, and keep the language off the street.”
