Barmy of me

listen to Army o' War (Dr Syntax and CB Turbo v Rivethead mix)

It is a little-known fact that Bj?rk's song Army of Me, which opens her 1995 album Post, has its roots in the English folk tradition. If you pick through early field recordings of the original, Army o' Me, you will hear its chorus - "And if you complain once more, you'll meet an army of me" - sung by the men of the village to the accompaniment of sticks and a strange kind of body percussion. The message, sternly delivered, yet with energising vigour, was aimed at young people: knuckle down, or things will only get worse.

That's all rubbish, of course. It's really a sad and desperate attempt to hide the fact that I and two friends may have created a Frankenstein's monster, an awful new music that can only be described as Electro-morris.

It all started last week, when Bj?rk decided to release an album to raise funds for Unicef. Since Post was released 10 years ago she has been sent various unsolicited remixes and cover versions of Army of Me, which she is pooling for the new album, due for release around the end of February on the One Little Indian label. Not having quite enough tracks to fill two CDs, the company put word out that anyone could have a go at a remix, email the results in and be considered for the album. With a few hours spare in the studio, we decided to have a go.

"Have you seen the 160 drive?"
"No. What does it look like?"
"It's a drive with 160 written on the side."
"It's not this drive that says 120 down the side?"
"No. That'll be the 120 drive."

You need a lot of that kind of "setting-up" chat before you get down to any work in the studio. Nerd stuff. Then you must have intense philosophical debate about the name of the mix. Ours resulted in: Army o' War (Dr Syntax and CB Turbo v Rivethead mix). Finally we got round to putting Bj?rk on.

It sounded great. You can't argue with a production team of Nellee Hooper, Graham Massey and Bj?rk. But it was quite grumpy. "Stand up. You've got to manage. I won't sympathise any more ... We won't save you. Your rescue squad is too exhausted." The track was a munitions factory in full swing - relentless bass, orchestral stabs, the groaning of heavy machinery in the chorus. It sounded like the Terminator's birthday party.

"Maybe we could cheer it up a bit?" I said. Perhaps that's where the rot set in. Because from that moment, I couldn't shake the image of morris dancers clapping at the end of each run of the bass line. CB Turbo (Chris) and Dr Syntax (Tom) looked slightly cautious, but I forced them into it. I can admit that now.

All that gleaming equipment, with its infinite and stunning sonic possibilities; and there we were in the recording booth armed with a drum, a tambourine and a hammer. The ensuing "jam" must have triggered something in Tom, who is Cornish - and a man of many beats. He started slapping himself to the music, in a sort of disgraceful Bobby McFerrin way, grunting a bit. This started a grunting duet, which then became the Cornish pub singer's guide to Bj?rk. Having little artistic integrity to hand at that precise moment, or indeed any other ideas, I insisted we record it.

Speaking from the control room, Chris saved us from ourselves. "Yeah, I think without the heavy accents is best. Maybe just sing it straight. It's kind of more odd that way. In fact, why don't I sing it?"

"Because you're quite good at singing, and we need this to sound crap," said Tom. "In a good way."

After that, the whole English village got a bit out of hand. We were heading for larks ascending, church bells pealing, and the gentle putter of a lawn mower. Cheering the track up was one thing; turning it in to an episode of The Vicar of Dibley quite another.

We were on a cliff edge, like Michael Caine's bus in The Italian Job. We had to reverse, or fall in to the abyss. We needed Bj?rk back.

Often, when you do a remix, you get an a cappella version of the track - the vocals on their own. This means you can keep the voice sounding the same as on the original, but put your own sounds underneath. We didn't have the a cappella, so we had to start chopping up the original to find bits where there weren't too many instruments, to sprinkle the vocals back in. But that was quite good, because you could change Bj?rk's mind on a few things. "If you complain once more" soon became just "once more" ...

The morris dancers' sticks (hammer) got chopped up too, and began to sound like flying clocks. Hysteria eventually gave way to a chin-stroking appreciation of all things subtle: bass resonances, compression rates and all kinds of other studio pots-and-pans. And to think that one point we had been considering recording my bicycle. Some musical integrity had sneaked back in to the room.

That's a worry. Did we head too far the other way, making it all serious again? Ah well, we'll fix it in the mix, as they say. Actually, just had a thought: it could probably use some bagpipes ...