I thought it was a brilliant concept, and in a way I still do. I called a bunch of random phone numbers and recorded the sounds of people answering and saying “Hello?” I had no microphone or way to be heard on the other end of the line and I have no idea who I called. It was months ago that I made the calls.
The sound of those voices is spooky. There’s this attempted connection that the people I called believe is in play, and some people respond with a sort of cruel urgency, since there must be someone there waiting to talk to them since that someone took the time out of their day to dial their phone number. Some people stay on the line for several minutes, repeatedly asking “Hello?” shifting the tone of their voice as if that’s going to make a difference. One woman sounded normal enough at first but as she persisted the tone of her question varied from almost hostile to something like serene, as if the latter would somehow coax the caller into speaking.
I cannot be the first person to have done such a project as this, collecting people saying “Hello?” Or can I? I don’t know, but cursory web searches turn up nothing but sound samples of professional voice actors.
So my daily stroke of genius was to play these recordings through the kiosks. People would think telephone lines had been crossed or that urgency was afoot. In fact that seems to be exactly what they thought. The only sounds more likely to get a quick hit by the kill switch were the Howler and plain static. I heard people talking to these recorded “Hello?” voices, saying something like “You guys have been randomly connected or something.”
Meh, it’s a decent idea but pumping it through the kiosks didn’t work.
