The 50-second video is a broken-English earworm starring DJ Crazy Times (comedian Kyle Gordon) and Biljana Electronica (Audrey Trullinger). The pair dance through a shopping mall in cropped tops, baggy pants and sunglasses while lip syncing vaguely Aqua-like nonsense such as:
Biljana: “When the rhythm is glad / There is nothing to be sad. / Danger and dance / Clapping the hands.”
DJ Crazy Times: “Boom! Hear the bass go zoom. / Have a body, feel the groove. / Cyber system overload / Everybody movement!”
Made as a promo for the song’s release on streaming services later this month, the video spread like wildfire after appearing online on July 28, gaining tens of millions of views across various social media platforms.
Committing to the bit, Gordon released a second promo video for “Planet of the Bass” on Thursday, inexplicably with a different performer (Mara Olney) playing Biljana over exactly the same vocal track.
Fans of Trullinger’s original performance flooded the comments with complaints: “Where is she?” “Bro bring back blondie or I’m out.” Gordon had to explain in interviews that he was satirizing real Eurodance bands’ reputation for swapping out their members.
Trullinger, an actress from New York City, isn’t even the actual singer of the song. “Planet of the Bass,” which is planned to release on Spotify, Apple Music and other streaming platforms on Aug. 15, is performed by Chrissi Poland and Gordon. It’s co-written by Gordon and Brooks Allison, a sketch writer for “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon.”
But fans don’t care. They want to know what happened to the first Biljana Electronica. So The Washington Post caught up with Trullinger and asked.
Q: How do you feel about the soaring popularity of the “Planet of the Bass” video?
A: I have just been giggling to myself, because obviously when filming it, I knew that it was going to be the most bizarre, funny video, but I didn’t know that the response would be like this. I did not think that it would blow up the way that it has. And I feel like that’s what everybody says, but genuinely, I had no idea that the response would be this ginormous.
Q: How were you tapped to be Ms. Biljana Electronica?
A: Kyle reached out to me a few weeks ago and was like, “Hey, I don’t know if you’re familiar with my character DJ Crazy Times, but I made a song that is being produced by a record label and I’m making a video to promote it.” And I was like, “Yeah, why not?” because I love Kyle [and] all of his comedy sketch videos. So I was like, “Yeah, I would absolutely love to be a part of it.” He sent me the song and he was like, “Yeah, if you can just learn these lyrics and wear something that is ’90s club dance vibe, that’s perfect.”
I showed up that Sunday morning. We went to the Oculus [a shopping center at the World Trade Center], so of course there was a million tourists. It was so packed. And we just filmed it on an iPhone and got a million shots, and then we got kicked out of the Oculus. The cops came up to us twice.
Q: Police kicked you guys out of the Oculus?
A: Yeah. At first they came up and they’re like, “Hey, sorry you can’t film here.” And we were like, “Oh, okay, why?” They didn’t have an answer. So we walked down the hallway and went to a further part of the Oculus, not right in the middle. We got a few more shots, and then this other cop comes up. So we were like, “All right, fine.”
Then we went to the Fulton Street [subway] station. When you go down to the subway platform, it opens up to the next floor so you can see between the two floors. So that’s where you see those aerial shots. We didn’t get kicked out of there, luckily. There were a few more shots that Kyle wanted to get in the Oculus that we were not able to get, but the video still came together fantastically.
Q: And it was extremely well received. I think that’s why fans were so shocked when you were replaced in the second video. Was it always the plan for your version of Ms. Biljana Electronica to disappear?
A: I hadn’t really asked Kyle about it. I think I had seen that he was filming in the DJ Crazy Times outfit with Sabrina Brier. She’s another content creator. I had seen that he was filming with her, and she was in a similar outfit to mine. And I initially I was like, “Oh my God, did he replace me? Were the shots that we got not good enough?” But then the video came out, and I was like, “Well, I guess he didn’t replace me. I guess they must have filmed another version of the video.”
Then I saw the second version. He didn’t tell me. I didn’t even know that was going to come out. I was like, “Oh, this is so funny.” I didn’t expect the response to be, “Where did she go? Where did the original one go?” because I thought that the other actress was fantastic and hilarious. It was a funny response to see, especially because I didn’t know that was necessarily happening.
That’s him playing into the ’90s Eurodance bit I think, because apparently they used to replace girls all the time with no explanation. I haven’t even asked him. I’m just letting it roll. I’m not asking too many questions.
