Interview by Ali Williams
HOKKA are not easing their way into their new release. They are kicking the door off the hinges, draping the room in red capes and dark mythology, then having the nerve to make it all look effortless.
Speaking with HEAVY, Joel Hokka comes across as the kind of frontman who has already lived enough band life to know exactly what matters and exactly what doesn’t. There is no wide-eyed “we just got lucky” routine here. HOKKA might be new on paper, but this is not a band fumbling around in the dark hoping to strike a chord. This is the sound of seasoned musicians taking the scenic route through chaos and somehow arriving with a debut album, a label, festival slots and a clear creative identity before most bands have even agreed on a decent group photo.
The origin story is almost insultingly efficient. After Joel’s split from Blind Channel, he linked up with Pauli, formerly from The Rasmus with both men bringing years of Finnish rock pedigree and enough experience to avoid wasting time pretending the business side of music is some mystical accident. What began as informal sessions and song ideas quickly snowballed into a real band, real momentum and a debut release in MiSERIA IV. That sort of rise would be nauseating if it did not also make perfect sense. When two people with history, hunger and unfinished business get in a room together, things tend to move.
And that unfinished business matters. One of the more entertaining truths to emerge from the chat is that HOKKA’s creative engine is not powered by incense, deep breathing and trust falls. It is powered, at least in part, by revenge. Joel says it plainly, with the kind of grin you can almost hear through the transcript: revenge is a fantastic motivator. It is a wonderfully unpretentious admission, and honestly, a refreshing one. Rock music has always done some of its best work when someone is at least a little bit annoyed. HOKKA are simply organised enough to turn that irritation into riffs, spectacle and a whole new era.
That edge is part of what gives the band such immediate identity. Joel does not describe songwriting as a mechanical exercise of bolting parts together until something vaguely radio-ready falls out. For HOKKA, songs begin with an image, a story, a strange little cinematic spark. A track like Death By Cupid’s Arrow came from the idea of love as something lethal. Blackbird was built from visualising birds in the sky and turning that mood into sound, before twisting it into something darker and more ominous. It is not just songwriting, it is world-building, and that larger vision sits at the centre of what makes HOKKA feel more ambitious than your average new heavy act with a few moody press shots and a social media plan.
Joel refers to that expanding mythology as the “Hokkaverse”, which is exactly the sort of phrase that could go horribly wrong in lesser hands but actually works here because the band seem fully committed to it. There are red capes, characters, symbols, lore and a deliberate visual language shaping itself around the music. The influence of acts like Ozzy Osbourne and Ghost is obvious in the best possible way, not as imitation, but as an understanding that heavy music should occasionally remember how to be theatrical. Not everything needs to be a bloke in black jeans staring at his sneakers while a backing track does emotional labour in the corner. Sometimes the genre needs some drama, some pageantry, a bit of danger and a silhouette that looks like it might either bless you or hex you.
That theatricality is still growing into itself. Joel is realistic enough to know you do not roll into smaller clubs with an arena production and a budget stolen from a Marvel film, but the intention is there. For now, the visual identity, costumes and character of the band are doing the heavy lifting, and that might actually work in their favour. It gives HOKKA room to build properly rather than blowing everything at once and leaving nowhere to go but bankruptcy.
There is also something deeply charming about the practical balance within the band. Joel and Pauli bring experience and scars, while drummer Yimi represents the newer generation, already carrying a sizeable online following before fully stepping into life as a professional touring musician. Add a live guitarist into the mix and HOKKA already feel like a modern heavy act built with both instinct and strategy. Nothing about it sounds accidental.
As for MiSERIA IV itself, Joel seems almost relieved to hand some of the attention over to the deeper cuts. The singles have done their job, but it is the album tracks that currently have his attention, which usually says a lot about where an artist’s head is really at once the promotional smoke clears. More importantly, HOKKA do not sound like a band treating this record as a one-off statement before vanishing into a twelve-year creative nap. Joel made it clear the second album is already taking shape conceptually, and the writing process remains loose, instinctive and fun rather than forced. That matters. You can usually hear when a band are straining to repeat themselves. HOKKA, at least for now, sound more interested in chasing momentum than embalming it.
Australian fans should also note that Joel is very keen to get here, having somehow made it around the US, Europe and Japan without yet setting foot down under. His taste in Australian music apparently stretches from Savage Garden to Parkway Drive, which is a sentence that deserves to be framed and hung in a hallway somewhere. Plans are being eyed for 2027, and if HOKKA’s current pace is anything to go by, it would be unwise to bet against them making it happen.
What makes HOKKA relevant right now is not simply that they have pedigree, or polish, or a debut record with weight behind it. It is that they sound like a band born out of timing, hunger, chemistry and a healthy refusal to waste emotional damage. There is bite in the music, ambition in the presentation and enough self-awareness in Joel’s delivery to keep the whole thing from disappearing up its own cape. For a band still in its opening chapter, HOKKA already feel very sure of the story they want to tell. And, annoyingly for everyone else, they seem to be telling it very well.
HOKKA’s debut album MiSERIA IV is out April 24 (Nuclear Blast Records).
