Trying to Decipher The Hellp

Poster-sized prints of children holding pistols covered the art gallery’s tall white walls. In the center room, people stood around a small monitor that displayed footage of America’s military prowess. Towards the exit, plastic bags holding a VHS tape and a water gun were being sold for $100. It was a toasty August evening in downtown Manhattan, yet every other person in the building sported a leather jacket and black pants. While this event was billed as a music video premiere, the eccentric installations did not come as a total surprise. It’s all part of The Hellp experience.

The video for “Go Somewhere” features the same children in the photos. They’re armed and jumping gleefully as an acoustic guitar-led glitchbeat shakes the room. The lyrics speak to a nagging escapism that latches on as one passes through youth. Some of the scenes are visceral, but the timing struck a nerve. Just five days earlier, a shooting at Apalachee high school in Georgia left two students and two teachers dead. Is a child pointing a gun at the camera supposed to represent the hope of shifting a cruel power imbalance? Are the kids putting nozzles in their mouths supposed to signify that they're held hostage to the deranged society they were born into? Or is this all merely a light show of stimuli meant to leave us speechless, but not lead us anywhere?

This line of questioning can be applied to much of The Hellp’s output. Their work is so layered with ambitious ideas that it can be hard to decipher what lies at its core. What is clear, however, is that their intentions run deeper than mere shock value. The duo, composed of Noah Dillon and Chandler Ransom Lucy, have stayed consistent in their approach for upwards of nine years—an increasingly impressive feat in an age of music characterized by algorithm gaming. Early on, their following was a small set of art and film school types, then steadily but slowly grew by word of mouth and their proximity to celebrities. Noah, a well-known photographer who has shot campaigns for Gucci, Maison Margiela, and a myriad of rappers and models, teetered on the outside of certain high-class circles. The Hellp’s music entered some of them, with Kanye West allegedly blasting one of their songs in his private jet, and Frank Ocean apparently using their video for “Confluence” as inspiration for Blonde, but they were never given a real push by any of these A-listers who they brushed shoulders with. Their star began to rise more intensely about two years ago, after signing to Anemoia Records, an imprint of Atlantic, and being roped into the infamous “Indie Sleaze revival” pseudo-scene.

This scene was a fad in New York City led by artists like The Dare, Frost Children, Snow Strippers, and others who pushed the return of grimy party tunes. The majority of the acts involved wore their influences on their sleeve—or, commonly, as a mask—and were seemingly as focused on being social connoisseurs as they were musicians. The Hellp, though based in L.A., were roped into this craze by association. While investigating all of this in early 2023, I was struck by how hollow and manicured everything about the “scene,” which was supposedly the thing happening in New York, felt. Then, I did a deep dive on The Hellp, and quickly realized that they were much more than posh scenesters cosplaying a fading past.

Take the video for “Caustic,” which uses actual footage from a high school student’s last day of senior year. The initial clips play as if a dozen starry-eyed spirits were caught in a bottle. Then, the POV flips to The Hellp and follows them as they blaze a fiery trail of delinquency across Los Angeles. Purity dissolves before our eyes. Is this to say that the tragic beauty of humankind is revealed during the process of our decay? Or is it meant to strike a more personal note, perhaps a lamentation of the clean-cut futures the bandmates never pursued?

Before first seeing them perform, I was certain they were a proper three or four piece act with analog instruments. Just listen to “Orange Crush,” a track more in the vein of Public Image Ltd than Crystal Castles. I was surprised to find that they are just two slender men who hunch their backs and stamp their feet while twisting knobs. Although their music is electronic—a chaotic, cinematic brand of it—their energy and image are distinctly rock and roll. A friend once likened them to The Ramones: leather jackets, shag haircuts, colossal personas. And these personas have made them quite polarizing. In some circles, they are insufferable, pretentious, and utterly bombastic tools who have built a following off perplexing visuals, Noah’s preceding fame as a photographer, and their penchant for rare Bosnian jeans. In others, they are considered to be the future of music and art as we know it, two idols whose very presence triggers drool from devout fans.

It is worth noting that most of the hate towards The Hellp is centered on their projected aesthetic and attitudes—not the music. This is because the music has always been strong, but has long been overshadowed by talk of their egos and confounding art direction. However, during the past few months they seemed to have locked in, releasing their debut album, LL, in October.

The album solidifies The Hellp as serious musicians, and quiets the aspects that have muddled the discourse around them for so long. LL is a premeditated, full-bodied project that serves as their most vulnerable and mature work. It is not a flash of brilliance like 2021’s Enemy EP, nor is it an experimental palette like Vol. 1. There are a few highs, lows, twists and turns, but its strength lies in its stability. Epileptic pop songs, atmospheric ballads, and pulsing hardstyle somehow flow seamlessly, while tracks like “Ether” and “9_21” come out of left field to add texture. While largely lacking lyrical substance, offering broad thematic strokes rather than pointed stories, LL still serves as a long-awaited statement from the band that has, for many years, promised greatness, and even asserted that they will change American pop culture as we know it. If their recent show in New York is any indication, they’re certainly moving in the right direction.

Earlier in November at Irving Plaza, two I-shaped phosphorescent lights illuminated The Hellp from behind in a soft shade of blue. I heard a voice in the crowd explain it to their friend. “It’s supposed to represent the Twin Towers. One for Noah, the other for Chandler.” Their faces were hidden and their outfits, save for Chandler’s camo ball cap, were indistinguishable from one another: leather jackets, black skinny jeans, dirty white sneakers. Chandler took the stance of a sprinter racing off the blocks while twisting knobs, and Noah was singing hunched over like someone suffering from stomach ulcers. The crowd was packed tight; a ferocious bunch shoving and smiling at every thump. Other than Noah screaming “New York!” and “Aye, turn those lights off!”, the audience was not addressed until the final bow. The band zeroed in on the music, playing for over an hour straight. Fans fed off the intensity–there was a genuine oneness in the venue that is hard to come by. The artists emitted an energy that the crowd absorbed then threw right back. It went on like this for the entirety of the set. I’d be surprised if even the biggest haters could detract from their live show; it was a focused and impassioned performance that succeeded off good sounds alone.

While their following has grown, they still remain in the territory of “if you know, you know,” or “your favorite artist’s favorite artists.” Given how abrasive their work is, a commercial breakthrough seems unlikely. Yet, for the indoctrinated fans, there is a collective fascination that I believe to be an admiration, or envy, of the fact that these two guys have executed complex multimedia projects time and time again without compromising stylistic integrity.

What I also think sticks with people, and helps explain this microchasm’d craze with The Hellp, is their ability to project an unmistakably bright yet Icarian lifestyle. They cast a murky dream world of California sunsets, Colorado skies, crushed Modelo cans and uncut grass. A dark yet regrettably eye-opening vision in the tradition of Charles Baudelaire and Lou Reed. The needle constantly moves, a dull moment is not to be found. There is life and death, nothing in between.

I’d be surprised if even the biggest haters could detract from their live show; it was a focused and impassioned performance that succeeded off good sounds alone. We’re drawn in by acid trips on the beach, the endless highway, and, as it seems, two guys doing their best to live out whatever it is they yearn for—every wannabe’s dream. It’s the hippie era’s romanticism of sheer American beauty mixed with a nihilism that feels inseparable from our modern age.

Now, the music is stronger, their reach a bit wider, and through it all it seems as if their central message remains the same—whatever that may be.