You Should Be What You Wanna Be

Hans Appelqvist “Zenna & Marie” – A few years ago, I was in a car in deep New Jersey, very late at night, with a driver who was flipping from station to station, and happened on some hip-hop station that was having a call-in talent hour. Two young girls had phoned in and were doing a complicated clap-and-slap-and-rap routine; I still remember the sound of it, like they’d never had this much fun before and didn’t even think it was possible. The recording that’s come closest to the feel of that moment for me is this song, from the Swedish composer Hans Appelqvist’s 3-inch CD Att M?ta Verkligheten, on which he plays with recordings of people’s speaking voices in a bunch of languages. Hint: keep listening–it goes places by the end that aren’t at all obvious at the beginning, and it sounds awesome at the same volume, at the same deep-night hour, and through the same speakers you’d use for a hip-hop station’s call-in show. I don’t think the two little girls here realized that there was going to be music added to what they were saying… but what song are they trying to remember, or sing along with?

This track appears here by kind permission of Mr. Appelqvist. Americans can buy Att M?ta Verkligheten through Forced Exposure, here; you can also get it through the extraordinary Swedish experimental label that released it, Hapna (Also highly recommended from them: the wild organ/accordion/drum duo Sagor & Swing’s Orgelplaneten.) And you can download a bunch of Appelqvist’s other work here.