The Danish pop-rebel Asbjørns album tour for ‘The Secret Our Bodies Hold’ comes to Privatclub Berlin today, April 9. In this exclusive, Asbjørn dives into three memories from his time in the city that influenced his music, accompanied by an analogue photo series by Berlin-based photographer Andrej Russkovskij.
Words by Asbjørn @asbjornmusic
Photography by Andrej Russkovskij @andrejrusskovskij
As a 19-year-old Danish newbie on the music scene, Berlin seemed to extend an open invitation to my strange and uncommercial-sounding pop music. I felt seen as a musician and a human, so in 2014 I made Kreuzberg my home, wrote and produced albums, partied hard, felt how the city resolved me, broke my heart and bled into my music.
I have recreated three memories from my time in the city — each memory became a song, inspired albums and changed my path. So without further ado, put on your headphones, press play on the first song and dive into its memory…
Farbfernseher, Kreuzberg
The dance floor of my favorite club is the size of a teenage bedroom, one of the bartenders consistently serves every type of liquor as a longdrink for 3€ and and I fucking love ouzo. It’s a hot summer night, and my friend and I are adventuring the city, terrorizing people on every dance floor. Like, why do all people at the clubs dance in this introverted way? I never got it. It feels so serious, kinda joyless, and sometimes a little arrogant, honestly, and I just wanna connect with people! laugh! flirt!
After many failed attempts at making people dance with us (except a brief breakdance session with a group of Australian skateboarders on the street), my friend suggests in my ear, “Let’s see what the fuzz is about… just close your eyes, feel the music and move your body”.
“Is this my body?” I think to myself,f after I don’t know how long. Unbothered by outside perspective, it moves with a new softness and careful exploration. Not bound to the staccato rhythms of the deep-house track but pulsating in a sort of stretched timing. I’m not dancing to find catharsis, and I have no idea where my movement is heading or what effect my presence has in the room. But I know that I’m feeling an intense mix of trust and control loss; like the music is embracing my free-moving body and letting go of a control I’ve held on to, since becoming my label-boss at the age of 19. My body is outsmarting my mind — and the body knows better.
Hasenheide, Neukölln
I realized that I was in love with him in the middle of my show at Tallinn Music Week in Estonia. Naturally, I made it official right then and there, to a room of music business professionals who shrugged, sipped wine, some left, and I sang ‘The Love You Have In You’ to him, who was waiting for me back in Berlin. He and I are so alike, in our mid-20s, completely invincible, thirsty for life and quenching it with wine, cigarettes, kisses, heartache, dancing, swimming, hangovers, music, poems, intense conversation and döners. He might not be gay, but he loves me and love conquers all, you’ll see.
We locked ourselves out of our apartment when I got back to Berlin and have mostly spent the past three days in Hasenheide. It’s an everlasting picnic, we buy fruits, beers and take-out, do somersault competitions, clapping games, analyze each other’s dreams, sniff each other’s armpits, and slowly become one. The drug dealers in the park have accepted us as part of them and hang out in between deals. When we finally get back to normal life, our friends literally can’t tell our voices apart anymore, they find us increasingly annoying and excluding,g and it’s true, we only see each other and our future together, just need to figure out that sexuality-thing, but it’ll work out… right?
come, baby come
in the warm summer night
and feel
how you’ve got nothing to lose
you’ve got nothing to lose unless you lose yourself to me
Museum für Naturkunde, Mitte
The Brachiosaurus in the main hall is my Berliner therapist. Entering the museum, I look up, instinctively take a deep breath and exhale with my mouth open, overwhelmed by her grandeur and elegance. This is where I go every time life is throwing curveballs at me. Wandering among my prehistoric fossil-friends connects me to a childlike awe in myself, no matter how blue I feel — and today I need them more than ever.
I’m roaming around somewhere in the Triassic, as a lyric hums from my mouth in a repetitive three-note melody.
he doesn’t want my body
he only wants my mind
The staff finds me hours later at closing time, curled up with my notebook underneath the terrifying black skull of Tristan the T-rex. I’ve written the most devastating lyric of my life, but sitting there, I somehow feel completely safe. From now own, Tristan and all the other Dinos will be my close co-writers, as I go through ups and downs in life and the music industry. Long after I’ve moved from the city, I will honor them in an interview and photoshoot with Berliner Zeitung that will go viral and make me forever known as The Cringeosaurus.
On the new record, Absjørn impressively fuses dance and music. The album was created in close collaboration with Steffen Lundtoft (Lowly) and was fuelled by the idea of translating movement into sound – an approach that emerged from a spontaneous dance moment at a bus stop and inspired the song ‘Vulnerably Happy’. Released on his label, Asbjørn’s album combines powerful synthesisers, catchy melodies and profound lyrics that revolve around themes such as self-determination, vulnerability and the balance between strength and inner turmoil. The central question: ‘Am I strong enough to be so vulnerable?’
