Basshunter

At 39 years old, Basshunter has this physical status:

Altberg began producing music under the stage name "Basshunter", a reference to his musical style, at the age of 17, after six months of using the software program FruityLoops. He described the name as commercial and powerful.

In 2004, Basshunter was chosen in an online poll and performed live for the first time at a rave party in Älmhult. Alex Music released Basshunter's first studio album, The Bassmachine, on 25 August 2004. In 2005, a remastered version of this album with improved sound quality was released. In 2006, Basshunter re-released The Bassmachine as The Bass Machine and also released his first compilation album The Old Shit through his own website. Basshunter's interest in music deepened as time went by. He recorded a YouTube video, entitled Basshunter Tutorial, showing his recording process in Fruity Loops. The track from the video was covered over 200 times.

Basshunter published his music mainly through the Internet for free download on platforms such as chat channels and gaming websites. He was registered on online communities like Efterfest, LunarStorm, Nattstad, Porrigt, Playahead, Skunk and Trance.nu. For several years he was a DJ in Swedish clubs.

In March 2006, Basshunter published his song "Boten Anna" online and within twenty-four hours, it had been downloaded 37,000 times. Basshunter's single "Welcome to Rainbow" was released on 1 April 2006; it included the track "Boten Anna". With this success, Basshunter received several proposals from managers and music labels. Swedish DJ and party organizer Joakim Jarny contacted Basshunter via Internet Relay Chat and Jarny was soon overwhelmed by hundreds of requests from club owners in Sweden, Norway and Denmark who wanted Basshunter to perform at their clubs. Jarny contacted his friend Henrik Uhlmann at Extensive Music and in April 2006, Basshunter signed with Extensive Music and Warner Music Sweden. On 9 May 2006, "Boten Anna" was officially released as a single. By 8 June 2006, the song had been downloaded over one million times. In that year, he moved to Malmö, where the headquarters of Extensive Music are located.

"Boten Anna" peaked at number one on the Swedish singles chart and reached number 13 on the Swedish Best of All Time list, and was certified platinum. It also reached number one on the Danish singles chart, staying there for 14 weeks, and was certified triple platinum for selling 61,000 copies. It was also certified gold in Austria. "Boten Anna" was covered twice by Dutch duo Gebroeders Ko, whose "Boten Anna" bootleg charted at number three in the Netherlands, right after Basshunter's version. The next cover called "Sinterklaas boot (Boten Anna)" reached number two. An official German-language version was released in 2007.

Basshunter's second studio album LOL was released on 28 August 2006. He worked on the album for three-and-a-half weeks, during which Ali Payami helped him with three songs. Basshunter described it as a connection of vocal music with hard dance and hard trance music; Basshunter's use of vocals is a significant departure from his earlier works. An American version of LOL was released on 1 January 2008, with the same Swedish songs as the original album but with lyrics and some titles translated into English. The new release also included new tracks, including "Now You're Gone", "Russia Privjet", "The Beat", "Jingle Bells", "Beer in the Bar" and "DotA (Club Mix)". A special version of this album was released in 2008, and includes the German version of "Boten Anna" and three music videos. LOL peaked at number five in Sweden, number four on the Finnish chart and number three on the Danish albums chart, and was certified double platinum in Denmark.

The second single from LOL, "Vi sitter i Ventrilo och spelar DotA", was released on 13 September of the same year. The single peaked at number two in Finland, number six in Sweden, and number seven in Norway and Denmark. It was certified gold in Denmark. His song "Hallå där" charted at number 51 on Swedish singles chart. The album's third single, a remake of the Christmas song "Jingle Bells", was released on 13 November and peaked at number nine in Norway, and number 13 in Sweden. The single also made it onto the Dutch and United Kingdom charts. The single "Vifta med händerna", which features the duo Patrik & Lillen, peaked on the Finnish charts at number seven and on the Sweden charts at number 25. On 5 November 2007, a new version of the "Vi sitter i Ventrilo och spelar DotA" was released under the title "DotA"; it charted on Germany's singles chart. This is different from the 2008 version from Now You're Gone – The Album.

On 29 December 2007, a re-recording of "Boten Anna" entitled "Now You're Gone" was released. "Now You're Gone" was originally made by Mental Theo in 2006 under the alias Bazzheadz. Initially, Basshunter tried to translate "Boten Anna" into English but it turned out to be very hard to keep the "hock" and the story so in 2007, he recorded his version of "Now You're Gone", which features DJ Mental Theo. It was the initial release for Hard2Beat Records label (later Dance Nation). The single charted at number one in the United Kingdom, where it peaked at number one for five weeks. It was the first Swedish song to reach number one in the UK since "Dancing Queen" by ABBA. "Now You're Gone" sold in excess of 667,000 copies in the UK and was certified platinum there. It also charted on the UK Top 100 Songs of the Decade list. "Now You're Gone" also stayed at the top for five weeks in Ireland, made it to number two on the Swedish chart, and number three in New Zealand, where the single was certified platinum. On the French singles chart, "Now You're Gone" peaked at number six. "Now You're Gone" also charted at number four on the European Hot 100 Singles chart.

The next single "Please Don't Go", a cover of the KC and the Sunshine Band 1979 song, was released on 19 May 2008 and reached number six on the Swedish singles chart. The third single "All I Ever Wanted" was released on 29 June 2008 and peaked at number 2 in the UK, where it sold about 400,000 copies and was certified gold. It reached number one on the Irish singles chart. The single "All I Ever Wanted" was certified gold in New Zealand and charted at number 10 on the European Hot 100 Singles chart.

Basshunter worked on Now You're Gone – The Album for two-and-a-half weeks before releasing it on 14 July 2008. The album entered the UK Albums Chart at number one sold 376,017 copies in the UK, and was certified platinum there. It also topped the album chart in New Zealand and was certified platinum there. Now You're Gone – The Album charted at number two in Ireland and reached number six on the European Top 100 Albums chart. The song "Angel in the Night" was released as a single on 8 September 2008; it charted at number 10 in Ireland and number 14 in the UK. It also charted in Sweden. After nine months of 2008, Basshunter became the 11th-best-selling singles songwriter in the UK according to data compiled by Official Charts Company.

The album's fifth single "I Miss You" is a dance cover of a Westlife song and was released on 14 December 2008. The single appeared on the UK, Swedish, and German charts. On 5 April 2009, the single "Walk on Water" was released, as was a deluxe edition of the album that includes all of the original album together with remixes of singles; "I Can Walk on Water" was replaced with the single version and renamed "Walk on Water".

On 25 September 2009, Basshunter's fourth studio album Bass Generation, was released. The Double Album Version includes remixes of some of his singles, and the tracks "Without Stars" and the Swedish version of "Camilla". In early September 2009, prior to the album's release, the track "Numbers" was released as a free download via Basshunter's official Bebo account. Bass Generation reached number two in New Zealand, and number 16 in the UK and Irish album charts. It sold more than 60,000 copies and was certified silver in the UK.

The track "Every Morning" was released as a single on 18 September 2009; it reached number 13 on Swedish singles chart and number 14 in New Zealand. It peaked at number 17 in the UK and Ireland. "I Promised Myself", a cover of a Nick Kamen hit, was released on 29 November 2009.

The single "Saturday" was released on 5 July 2010; it reached number 14 on the New Zealand chart and was certified gold there. It also charted in the UK and Ireland. On 20 April 2011, the next Basshunter single "Fest i hela huset", which was recorded during his time in the Swedish Big Brother series, was released. The single charted at number five on the Swedish singles chart. His following single "Northern Light" was released on 14 May 2012 and the next single "Dream on the Dancefloor" was released on 18 November that year.

Basshunter's compilation album The Early Bedroom Sessions, which consists of tracks from albums The Bassmachine and The Old Shit, other early releases and unreleased tracks, was released on 3 December 2012. In 2012, Basshunter moved to Dubai and he also lived in Mallorca for six months. Extensive Music also moved to Dubai.

On 13 May 2013, Basshunter's fifth album Calling Time was released. In the version released in Ireland and in the UK, the track "Saturday" was replaced with "Open Your Eyes". Basshunter recorded more than 30 tracks for Calling Time and selected the final fifteen; he said he tried to grow as an artist with an album that has classic Basshunter sounds and music he has not released before. The album charted at number 25 on the US Dance/Electronic Albums chart. On 20 June 2013, the single "Crash & Burn" was released; it charted on the Russian airplay chart. The last single from the album was "Calling Time", which was released on 27 September.

On 26 July 2013 Basshunter announced he was retiring from singing to focus on DJing, producing, and songwriting. He met new artists and invited them to sing on his songs. He made the decision after four exhaustive performances in four days. On 20 November 2013, the single "Elinor" was released. In 2014, Basshunter announced a new album was in work. In 2016, Basshunter returned to recording; he said he would not release a new studio album but would focus on recording singles in accordance with prevailing trends in music industry. Almost after five years since his last single, on 19 October 2018, the single "Masterpiece" was released; it did not appear on major national charts. Since then, he has released three more singles: "Home" (2019), "Angels Ain't Listening" (2020) and "Life Speaks to Me" (2021); a tribute to Avicii. His latest single "End the Lies" is a collaboration with Italian duo Alien Cut.

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