# Darude Sandstorm > Darude Sandstorm is a 2013 trolling meme where users respond to 'what song is this?' questions with this song's name, regardless of the actual track, transforming a 1999 instrumental trance hit by Finnish producer Darude into an absurd internet punchline. "Darude - Sandstorm" is a trolling meme where internet users respond to any "what song is this?" question with "Darude - Sandstorm," regardless of what's actually playing. The joke took off around 2013 on Twitch.tv and YouTube, building on the absurd recognizability of Finnish producer Darude's 1999 instrumental trance hit. The meme turned an already-popular dance track into one of the internet's most reliable punchlines. ## Origin "Sandstorm" was released in Finland on October 26, 1999, by 16 Inch Records[3]. Ville Virtanen, performing as Darude, made the track in a tiny home studio before connecting with producer Jaakko "JS16" Salovaara, who shaped it into its final form[1]. The title came from a quirky source: the Roland JP-8080 synthesizer used in the production displays "sand storm" on its startup screen[6]. Darude had been uploading trance experiments to MP3.com, where the full-length demo built a global following before his label asked him to take it down[3]. The song blew up commercially, topping charts in Canada and Norway, selling over two million copies worldwide, and landing on 200 compilations[6]. Its music video, directed by Juuso Syrjä (Uzi) and shot around Helsinki, became the first Finnish music video aired on MTV in the United States[3]. The meme itself emerged roughly 14 years later. The trolling practice of answering "song name?" with "Darude - Sandstorm" traces primarily to Twitch.tv around mid-2013[2]. On July 24, 2013, the LCS Highlights YouTube channel uploaded a League of Legends clip of streamer TheOddOne completing a quadra kill while "Sandstorm" played in the background. The clip hit the /r/leagueoflegends subreddit and pulled over 1,900 upvotes[2]. Twitch chat users latched onto this moment and began responding to every "what song?" question with "Darude - Sandstorm" as a reflexive joke. An Urban Dictionary entry submitted on November 22, 2013, by user "Faker-senpai" cited TheOddOne's stream as the origin of the Twitch meme[2]. Some accounts also connect it to Dota 2 streams, since the hero Sand King has an ability called Sandstorm, creating a natural reference point for chat spam[5]. - **Platform:** Twitch.tv (meme format), Finland (original song, 1999) - **Creator:** Unknown (community-created from Twitch chat culture); Ville Virtanen / Darude (original song), Jaakko "JS16" Salovaara (producer) - **Date:** 2013 ## Overview The meme works like this: someone asks "what song is this?" or "song name?" in a comment section, stream chat, or forum thread, and dozens of people respond with "Darude - Sandstorm." It doesn't matter what song is actually playing. The answer is always "Darude - Sandstorm." The joke is both the predictability of the response and the absurdity of applying it universally. On Twitch, entire chat rooms would flood with the answer any time background music played during a stream[2]. Urban Dictionary captured the spirit perfectly, defining the track as "the name of every song in existence"[4]. The song itself is an instrumental trance banger composed at 136 BPM in E minor[3]. Its lead synth melody is dead simple and instantly recognizable, which is precisely why the meme works. You don't need to know the song's name to know the song. That contradiction is the whole joke. ## How It Spread Before the meme took shape, "Sandstorm" was already deeply embedded in gaming and video culture. On June 21, 2007, YouTuber GameStream uploaded Call of Duty 4 gameplay with "Sandstorm" as background music. The video pulled over four million views[2]. On January 1, 2009, a video of someone playing "Sandstorm" on a toy trumpet went viral, first on YouTube and then on Reddit's /r/WTF, where it picked up 900+ upvotes[2]. The toy trumpet version resurfaced on /r/videos in November 2013, grabbing 4,500 upvotes[2]. Once the trolling format caught fire on Twitch in mid-2013, it spread rapidly to YouTube comment sections. Any video with background music became a target. Someone would ask "song name?" and the replies section would fill with "Darude - Sandstorm" variations. The joke functioned identically to the "Boku No Pico" anime recommendation troll, where users deliberately give the wrong answer to a sincere question[2]. By June 2013, the meme had branched onto Reddit. A screenshot of "Sandstorm" lyrics on the Pandora music app (which showed nothing, since the song is an instrumental) hit /r/funny and earned 1,100 upvotes[2]. The image was funny precisely because of the meme's logic: the song everyone claims to identify has no words at all. In January 2015, music blog InTheMix published an interview where Darude directly addressed the meme. "I've seen the chatter on these boards for games like League of Legends, and gamers are a lot of the reason there has been this renewed interest," he said. "I was weirded out by it at first, I didn't understand what was going on"[1]. He took it in stride, though, noting he'd played several gaming conventions because of the meme's reach and that spreading his name around "whether it's a joke, or a meme, it works for me"[1]. Twitch eventually cracked down, with some channels banning users for posting the response[5]. But the joke was already everywhere. It moved beyond gaming into any online space where music questions existed. ## How to Use The meme format is deliberately simple: 1. Wait for someone to ask "what song is this?" or "song name?" in any comment section, chat, or forum 2. Reply with "Darude - Sandstorm" 3. That's it ## Cultural Impact "Sandstorm" was already a sports arena staple before the meme, but the internet attention amplified that status. In the late 2000s, marketing executive Eric Nichols added the track to the University of South Carolina's stadium playlist at Williams-Brice Stadium[3]. The pivotal moment came during a 2009 game against Ole Miss, when the song played before back-to-back defensive plays that sealed an upset win. After that, "Sandstorm" became the Gamecocks' unofficial anthem[6]. On November 18, 2023, Darude himself performed at a South Carolina football game against Kentucky, manning a DJ booth during the event. South Carolina won 17-14[3]. The track's athletic footprint extends well beyond college football. Professional wrestlers Toru Owashi and Session Moth Martina use it as entrance music, as did MMA fighter Wanderlei Silva and baseball pitcher Koji Uehara[6]. Nike featured it in a Kobe Bryant vs. LeBron James ad series[6]. It was played at the 2006 Winter Olympics and during the Ice Hockey World Championships[3]. In pop culture, "Sandstorm" appeared in the pilot of Showtime's *Queer as Folk* in 2000 and in *Johnny English Strikes Again*, where Rowan Atkinson dances to it in a club scene[3]. In 2025, a Tesco Clubcard anniversary ad featured a couple dancing to the track, though since Clubcard launched in 1995 and the song came out in 1999, the ad contained a deliberate anachronism[6]. In March 2025, Billboard ranked "Sandstorm" number 65 on its list of "The 100 Best Dance Songs of All Time"[3]. Finland itself honored the track during its 2017 centenary independence celebrations, with Darude performing as one of the main acts in Helsinki[6]. Darude embraced the meme era fully. "If I knew [why it took off], I would have done ten or more the same," he told InTheMix[1]. He described the song's appeal as its simplicity: "The lead melody is so simple, and it's catchy. I don't know why it is like that. It's catchy and simple, but it's not boring or irritating"[1]. ## Fun Facts - The song's name comes from the Roland JP-8080 synthesizer's startup display text reading "sand storm"[6]. - Darude called the song's success "a series of happy accidents," noting he originally just burned CDs for local DJ friends hoping they'd play one of his tracks[1]. - The "Sandstorm" music video was the first Finnish music video ever aired on MTV in the United States[3]. - Darude says he's played "Sandstorm" at almost every gig in his career, with only two or three exceptions out of hundreds of shows[1]. - The track was composed at 136 BPM in E minor using a mix of hardware including a Korg TR-Rack, Roland JP-8080, and Ensoniq ASR-10 sampler[6]. ## Frequently Asked Questions ### What is Darude - Sandstorm? "Darude - Sandstorm" is both a 1999 trance instrumental by Finnish producer Darude and an internet trolling meme where users reply "Darude - Sandstorm" to any question about what song is playing[2]. ### Where did the Darude - Sandstorm meme come from? The meme originated on Twitch.tv around mid-2013, closely tied to League of Legends streams. Streamer TheOddOne playing the song during a notable gameplay clip helped spark the trend[2]. ### What does "Darude - Sandstorm" mean as a meme? When someone answers "Darude - Sandstorm" to a song identification question, it's a troll response. The answer is intentionally unhelpful and has nothing to do with what's actually playing[4]. ### How do you use the Darude - Sandstorm meme? Whenever someone asks "what song is this?" in a comment section or stream chat, respond with "Darude - Sandstorm" regardless of the actual song[5]. ### Is Darude - Sandstorm still popular? The song itself was ranked number 65 on Billboard's "100 Best Dance Songs of All Time" in March 2025[3]. The meme format is a well-established classic of internet culture, though the peak of Twitch chat spam was in the 2013-2015 era[2]. ### Who is Darude? Darude is Finnish electronic music producer Ville Virtanen. He started as a hobby music maker and DJ before connecting with producer JS16, who signed him to 16 Inch Records and shaped "Sandstorm" into its final form[1]. ### Why is Sandstorm used at University of South Carolina games? Marketing exec Eric Nichols added it to the Williams-Brice Stadium playlist in the late 2000s. It became the Gamecocks' rallying anthem after it was played before game-sealing defensive stops during a 2009 upset win over Ole Miss[3]. ### How did Darude react to the meme? In a 2015 interview, Darude said he was "weirded out by it at first" but came to appreciate it, saying "whether it's a joke, or a meme, it works for me"[1]. ### What is the toy trumpet Sandstorm video? A January 2009 video of someone playing the "Sandstorm" melody on a cheap toy trumpet went viral on YouTube and Reddit, becoming one of the meme's most shared clips[2]. ### Why is Sandstorm an instrumental with no lyrics? Darude composed it as a trance track. The Pandora music app famously shows a blank lyrics page for the song, which itself became a viral image on Reddit[2]. ### Has Darude performed at gaming events because of the meme? Yes. Darude told InTheMix in 2015 that he'd played "a couple of gamer conferences, all related to that kind of stuff," directly because of the meme's popularity in gaming communities[1]. ## References 1. [Darude on life as a meme: “I was weirded out at first” | inthemix]() 2. [Darude - Sandstorm - Know Your Meme]() 3. [Sandstorm (instrumental)]() 4. [Darude - Sandstorm - Urban Dictionary]() 5. [Urban Dictionary: Darude - Sandstorm]() 6. [Sandstorm (instrumental) - Wikipedia]() --- Source: https://meme.com/memes/darude-sandstorm Published by meme.com — The Internet Meme Library