Loituma Girl
Loituma Girl (also known as Leekspin) is a Flash animation set to a gibberish section of the traditional Finnish folk song "Ievan Polkka" (sometimes misspelled Levan Polka) sung by the Finnish quartet Loituma, taken from their 1995 debut album Things of Beauty.[1] It appeared on the Internet in late April 2006 and quickly became popular, drawing over a million viewers.[2]
The animation consists of a 4-frame animation of the Bleach anime character Orihime Inoue twirling a leek to a 27-second loop from the song. The animation loops continuously.
Content
The animation of Loituma Girl is taken from episode two of the Bleach anime series. In the clip, she is twirling a negi, a Japanese vegetable closely related to the leek while talking to other characters. The scene is an instance of a recurring joke surrounding her character, in which she wants to cook something so unusual that it seems almost inedible. The cartoon uses the second half of the fifth stanza (four lines) and the complete sixth stanza (eight lines) from the song. Unlike the rest of the song, these two stanzas have no meaning, consisting mostly of phonetically-inspired gibberish that vary from performance to performance and are usually made up on the spot by the singer (compare scat singing in jazz). These stanzas are therefore not generally listed on lyrics pages, causing confusion for people looking for lyrics that match the cartoon. (See Ievan Polkka.)
Popularity
The origin of the animation is unclear.[2] Within a few days of its appearance, tens of thousands of pages either directed to the possible origin or had the file uploaded on their own server. On 10 July 2006, the Finnish newspaper Helsingin Sanomat reported that Loituma Girl had caused a resurgence in Loituma's popularity, and the band had received thousands of fan letters from around the world.[3]
Band member Timo Väänänen describes his initial reaction to the video:[2]
I first found out there was something going on when I looked at the statistics of my own web page and then I realized that something weird is happening because there is such a huge traffic there. And most of the traffic came from Russia and then I started to track down what is happening and then I found this video. And well, I have no idea what this video is about, and what this girl is about.
BBC's The World radio program even covered the animation in a segment, in which they noted the clip's trance-inducing qualities. Patrick Macias, who was interviewed in the program, described the animation:[2]
This is basically a joke for someone who spends all of their time staring at a computer, made by people who spend all of their time staring at a computer. It's possible to read deeper meanings into it, but it sort of defeats the purpose because in the end it's just this hypnotic clip of animation.
As with most Internet phenomena, there are numerous videos, remixes, and parodies that have been inspired by the Flash cartoon. These may feature the animated background, the song clip, or otherwise reference the style of the animation.
The lyrics of the text seem gibberish to most languages, but for balkanic languages (Croatian, Serbian etc.) a part of it seems like obscene language ("gurni ga u dupe") which made it really popular (as a mobile ringtone etc.).[citation needed]
Commercialization
In August 2006, German ringtone provider Jamba! began selling a collection of media based on the animation. The video shows an anthropomorphic donkey (called Holly Dolly) dancing to the animation which is displayed (flipped horizontally) in the background.[4] The song/animation is marketed as the "Dolly Song", and the music is played faster than the original Loituma version. It was also given an extra 30-second drum preface, which was not present in the original version. Additionally, a Dutch mobile phone media provider similar to Jamba features a remade version of the animation, with the girl in Western style art.[5]
In January 2007, a similar video, entitled "Holly Dolly - Dolly Song (Leva's Polka)", appeared in the Google Video Top 100, though it was present on the Internet for a while before. It features the same donkey, along with some dancing sheep and a snowman, but the leek-spinning girl in the background is there briefly.[1]
In April 2007, a Dutch power company (Eneco) used the song/melody of Loituma Girl in its TV commercial for "ecostroom" (green energy).[6]
In May 2007, Wrigley's used this song in their German TV spot for their Extra gum.
The Dutch company Artiq Mobile launched a website where people can upload home-made Loituma girl spoof videos. TV commercials state the best video will win 500 euros.[7]
The Romanian company Romtelecom uses the song in one of their commercials for Dolce, a satellite television service.
In Oct 2007, McDonald's Hungary used this song in their Hungarian TV spot for their McCafé commercial.
Unsurprisingly, it is also a card in the Bleach Trading Card Game. (Orihime - Leek Spin (R190))
In Nov 2007, a website was opened dedicated to the popular flash animation. It contained the 4-frame flash animation as well as the gibberish section the the original song.
References
- ^ "NorthSide Catalog - Things of Beauty - Loituma".
- ^ a b c d Werman, Marco (2006-08-18). "Global Hit" (radio). The World. Public Radio International. Retrieved 2006-08-18.
- ^ "Hittibiisi kulman takaa". Helsingin Sanomat. 2006-07-10.
- ^ Holly Dolly Song (MPEG). Jamba!.
- ^ "Ad featuring the Western variant of Loituma Girl as featured in video ringtone ads in The Netherlands".
- ^ "Dutch Eneco commercial".
- ^ "Preidols.nl - Jouw eigen meisje met de prei!" (in Dutch). Retrieved 2007-06-11.