Y’all Don’t Wanna Hear Me (You Just Wanna Dance)

“Y’all Don’t Wanna Hear Me (You Just Wanna Dance),” 2022, performance with LRAD 100x, dimensions variable, ArtPapers Live, Atlanta, GA

“Y’all Don’t Wanna Hear Me (You Just Wanna Dance)” is a durational performance in which an LRAD* is used against its intended purpose of crowd dispersal, alternatively presenting it as a technology that might unite and even guide a crowd through sonic affect. Over the course of the device’s battery life, Toussaint-Baptiste will play music through the device, using its built-in microphone to speak with willing attendees and talk about his artistic practice, recite facts about the device’s history, and otherwise find ways to misuse the technology in an effort to reclaim something that has been funded by the public but used against the populace, and instead use it to bring public joy and conversation.

* Often referred to as “sound cannons,” Long Range Acoustic Device (LRAD)’s have been deployed by police forces across North America as a “non-lethal” sonic weapon against civilian populations engaged in protest as far back as 2004.