Hellänelli Moves from Pop Discipline to Club Poise
- Undrtone Blog
- 17 minutes ago
- 4 min read
Hellänelli doesn’t arrive with a mission statement or a grand unveiling. She lets the music speak first, and with ‘Leikki / Herään’, it speaks quietly but with confidence. The double single marks both her first proper step into underground electronic music and Youth Control’s return after a period of silence, and it does so without spectacle or hype. Instead, it offers two carefully shaped tracks that feel considered, restrained and emotionally loaded in the best possible way.
‘Leikki’ opens the door with a pulsing low-end, tight percussion and a hypnotic bassline that slowly pulls you in. It is economical in its choices, every sound sitting exactly where it should, building groove and tension without ever overreaching. ‘Herään’ heads somewhere softer and more introspective, with wider spaces, warmer textures and Hellänelli’s vocal floating gently within the mix rather than dominating it. Together, they feel like two halves of the same internal world, one built for movement and the other for reflection, and that pairing wasn’t even her call in the first place.
“I didn’t decide to put them together,” she admits. “I just sent a bunch of demos to Youth Control, and they chose what felt right. They had a clear vision, and I’m glad I trusted them because I had no idea what would’ve worked as a first release.” That willingness to step back and let others shape the outcome says a lot about where she is creatively. There’s no sense of control for the sake of control here, just trust in instinct and in people who care about the music as much as she does.
Restraint runs through her work, and when you ask how she knows when a track is finished, there’s no technical answer waiting. “It’s just intuition,” she says simply. “It comes from everything I’ve listened to and everything I’ve made.” That instinct has been sharpened by a long career already lived elsewhere. Before Hellänelli, she had spent years in pop music writing sessions, working at speed, chasing briefs and shaping records for names like Bess and Robin Packalen. Gold records followed, along with awards and an Emma Award nomination with her former rap group BÄMÄ, but the workflow that delivered those wins also took its toll.
“Pop taught me how to work fast and how to let ideas go,” she reflects. “You can’t get emotionally attached to everything. Not every idea deserves to survive.” That discipline now feeds into her electronic work too, with reference tracks, efficient sessions and a willingness to step away from something that isn’t working. The difference is that Hellänelli is entirely hers. “I’ve mostly worked alone on this project, but I learned how valuable collaboration is from the pop world, and I’ll bring that here too.”
While she has performed hundreds of shows, she doesn’t credit the stage with shaping her sound as much as the dancefloor itself. “I was a raver long before anything else,” she says. “When I’m producing, I often dance in my studio with my eyes closed. I try to feel when something should change, when it risks losing me. It’s very physical and very intuitive.” That connection to movement gives tracks like ‘Leikki’ their natural flow. Everything feels placed by feel rather than formula.
Her voice, meanwhile, sits deliberately low in the mix. It’s present but never dominant, guiding rather than leading. “I’ve released vocal music before under another project,” she explains. “With Hellänelli, I wanted a clear difference. I want to sing in Finnish, but I don’t want to make lyric-led pop. Right now I’m more interested in building emotion through sound itself.” The result is vocal work that feels like another instrument rather than the focal point, subtle but loaded.
Youth Control’s return with Hellänelli at the centre is a homecoming in more ways than one. Both the artist and the label come from Oulu, and she grew up around their events long before any conversation about releases ever happened. “We share the same background and scene. Starting a new chapter together feels natural and strong. It gives a lot of trust right from the start.”
Despite success elsewhere, she doesn’t frame this move as a risk, just a necessity. “Everything in music is risky,” she shrugs. “I didn’t quit pop. I just burned out. Session after session with very few releases takes a toll. Electronic music has always felt pure to me. After burnout, following that felt comforting and freeing.” There’s no polished persona here, no reinvention performance. “Hellänelli comes straight from my heart. It’s joy, sometimes mixed with a little heaviness, turned into sound.”
And the future remains intentionally open. “Musically, maybe deeper,” she smiles. “I don’t make big promises in this industry anymore, but I do have big dreams. I want to play shows. I want to hear my music on big systems. That’s enough for now.”
With ‘Leikki / Herään’, that journey begins not with noise but with feeling, and sometimes that’s where the strongest statements live.
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