It's a Swede life for Basshunter

Basshunter started writing music as a teenager using the computer program Fruity Loops. Photo / Supplied

For some, his music might sound like the infuriating and bouncy Barbie Girl-beats of Aqua. For others, it might recall the stuttering din of Crazy Frog.

But similar to that yabbering green pest, the fresh-faced, 24-year-old Swede known as Basshunter is proving quite a phenomenon here and overseas.

He describes his music as Eurodance, which is a cheesy yet catchy - for some anyway - form of music rooted in trance. And for those who don't know their trance from their Eurodance, let's just say Basshunter (real name Jonas Altberg) makes the kind of pumping, sexed-up pop racket that has seen him become one of the biggest names in dance music.

Next month he plays five shows in New Zealand, including two nights at TelstraClear Pacific Events Centre in Manukau on October 5 and 6, the first of which is sold out; his Wellington show on October 7 is also sold out.

Meanwhile, his last album, Now You're Gone: The Album, has sold more than 20,000 copies in New Zealand and his new album, Bass Generation (out September 28), could be even bigger.

Ask him what he makes of it all and he just laughs: "I see myself as a computer geek."

When TimeOut calls we interrupt him playing role-playing shoot em' up game, Fall Out 3, in a London hotel room.

But considering the majority of his videos stick to the tried-and-true formula of having a bevy of bikini clad women hanging out around the pool by day, and then wearing next to nothing at a club by night, one imagines this superstar DJ and producer might be living and loving the high life.

"I'm a computer geek, but I'm also a crazy guy. I love to get naked and party etc," he admits with a laugh. "But I'd rather do some shoot 'em up shit than be hanging out in a bar drinking gin and tonics."

Altberg is an odd mix of cheeky and slightly earnest, but you can tell he's genuinely chuffed about the success of his music.

"Everything has been happening so fast, and I'm producing and writing my own music, so it's like I don't see myself as anything more than a guy doing what he's supposed to be doing.

"But I still can't see it as a job. No. It's quite impossible to see one of your biggest hobbies as a job. Travelling around the world, seeing cool places and meeting cool people ... the day I start seeing this as my job, kick my arse will ya?" he laughs.

If it wasn't for his computer geek background he would never have started making music and marketing it via the internet. He started writing music on computer program Fruity Loops in his mid teens, spending six hours a day making music for fun, and then posted tracks on the internet.

"It was cool, and I had a little website with free downloads and I could watch the download counter keep going up, and up, and up," he remembers.

After releasing two albums, The Old Shit (1999) and The Bassmachine (2004), via his website, the turning point in his career came with the Swedish-language song Boten Anna.

"That song just exploded in Scandinavia. Sometimes I would be doing 20 shows in a week."

And throughout 2006 Altberg launched a Eurodance offensive with Boten Anna topping the charts in Finland, Austria, Poland, the Czech Republic, and Russia. "Basically, the whole of Eastern Europe," he deadpans.

In 2007, to gain wider appeal he started translating his old songs into English, including re-recording Boten Anna and renaming it Now You're Gone which went to No 1 in Britain.

"Getting into the UK charts is like an upgrade I guess you'd say," he says, "and that opened up the gates to the rest of the world.

"But basically everything was done with the internet. For example, I was big on YouTube before any radio stations added the tune. I used to say without the internet I would be like a fart in the wind."

With the release of Bass Generation - "I have to say it is my masterpiece" - he pays tributes to his loyal fans.

Which makes you wonder, who are these people who are part of his so-called bass generation?

"They are the best people in the world," he jokes. In fact, Altberg has no idea who they are because his shows attract everyone from teenagers to 40-year-olds.

"They are not holding anything back, they are just partying and singing along. So I guess it doesn't matter what generation you're in - if you're my grandparents', parents' or my generation. If you listen to this music and you like it then you're in the bass generation. There is no age limit."

However, there are age restrictions at Basshunter aftershow parties, which is where he presumably likes to get naked and go crazy.

"I like to keep it 18-plus. I don't do cranberry-only drinks at my after party."

Who: Basshunter (real name Jonas Altberg)
What: Eurodance superstar
Where & when: TelstraClear Pacific Events Centre, Manukau, October 5 and 6.
New album: Bass Generation, out September 28
Previous album: Now You're Gone: The Album (2007)