The song and its performers
Ievan Polkka is a Finnish folk song that the group Loituma recorded in a pop arrangement for their 1995 album Things of Beauty. The record's distinctive feature is a passage of scat singing (diddling), in which the female vocalist sings a meaningless string of syllables instead of lyrics, imitating the sound of an instrument.
It was this passage, rather than the song as a whole, that became the basis of the animation: short, rhythmic, and easily recognizable, it suited a looping video only a few seconds long perfectly.
The animation and its source frames
The animation's footage consists of several frames of Orihime Inoue, a character from the anime Bleach, who twirls a spring onion (negi) in her hand. The frames are taken from an episode of the anime and looped so that the motion looks continuous. The author of the edit itself is unknown; it is usually described as the work of an anonymous user of Japanese imageboards.
The pairing of a meaningless yet infectious movement with a song that has the same effect of meaningless singing turned out well almost by accident: neither the animation nor the track was made for the other.
Emergence in 2006
The video began spreading in late April 2006, presumably first appearing on Japanese imageboards, and then reaching English-language platforms such as 4chan. From there it quickly spread to YTMND and other sites specializing in looping clips with music.
Soon a dedicated website appeared, showing the same animation alongside a view counter. The counter became a subject of interest in its own right: users visited the page simply to watch the number climb, which further fueled the video's spread.
Reaction and impact on the group
Before the animation went viral, Loituma was known mainly in Finnish folk circles and had no broad international audience. After the video spread online, the track Ievan Polkka was discovered and replayed by millions of new listeners, and the group unexpectedly found itself cast as the creators of an internet phenomenon.
Accounts of the band members' reaction vary, from surprise to interest in how a folk song found a new audience a decade after it was recorded. There are no verifiable direct quotes from the musicians about this particular video.
Example of use
The video is most often used as a reaction to a meaningless but catchy repeated action or phrase. A typical comment caption reads “Got this stuck in my head all day: Yak tsup tsop, tsop tsop...” when someone describes an earworm.
The animation is also used as a playful insert in edits when a looping, slightly absurd action needs to be shown without further explanation: viewers already know the clip and read the reference instantly.
Place in internet culture
Leekspin is considered one of the first truly international Flash memes of the pre-YouTube era: it spread mainly through looping clips and imageboards rather than video hosting sites, which were only then gaining popularity. This makes it a kind of transitional phenomenon between the era of forum memes and the age of video.
Today the video is more often remembered as a historical example of how a chance pairing of an animation and a song can shape perceptions of both for years, with an unexpected effect on both sides.
