Steel Ball Run opening SPIN gives Japanese band Kroi its first US Billboard chart

SPIN, the opening theme Kroi wrote for Netflix’s Steel Ball Run: JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure, has turned the Japanese five-piece into an export. The song led Billboard Japan’s ranking of Japanese tracks played outside Japan and gave Kroi its first entry on an American Billboard chart, built on a sound closer to a spaghetti western than to a typical anime opening.

That sound was the plan. In the statement released with the announcement, the band said it tried to translate the transcontinental horse race at the heart of Hirohiko Araki’s story into music: “We built the song around a sound that recalls westerns, like Ennio Morricone or The Ventures, mixing in funk, soul, hip-hop and all the other music we have taken in.” The members added that they have spent several years writing songs themed around sandy, desert landscapes, so a race across nineteenth-century America landed on ground they already knew. “When we got the offer, we were so excited we practically jumped,” they said.

Recommended ReadingThe Southbank Centre unveils Jubilee events this June 

The numbers followed. On Billboard Japan’s Global Japan Songs Excl. Japan, which tracks how Japanese songs perform everywhere except at home, SPIN reached No. 1 in its first full week of tracking. Streams in that week rose 568% to 3.23 million, according to Billboard Japan, and the song also led the chart’s editions for the United States, the United Kingdom, France and Brazil, with second place in South Africa and third in Germany. In the US, it entered Billboard’s Hot Rock & Alternative Songs at No. 44.

The wider picture points the same way. As the Japanese culture site KAI-YOU reported, SPIN passed 10 million streams in its first eight days, and related videos on TikTok have drawn more than 50 million views. The official video, a band performance that puts the singer in a sombrero, has passed 7.7 million views on Kroi’s YouTube channel.

Kroi was hardly a newcomer. The band started as two pairs of friends who met through Instagram direct messages, and the name comes from the idea that mixing every colour together gives you black, kuroi in Japanese. The band already had anime credits, the openings for Under Ninja and Bucchigiri?!, a sold-out show at the Nippon Budokan and, this year, a single with the British acid-jazz band Incognito. What it lacked was a franchise with JoJo’s international reach.

There are limits to what the charts prove. The rankings SPIN topped measure Japanese music abroad, a field where anime themes regularly sit near the top, and No. 44 on a US genre chart is an entry, not a breakthrough. The song is also tied to a show whose rollout has tested its fans: Netflix premiered the adaptation in the spring with a single 47-minute episode, then left viewers waiting about six months for more. On Last.fm, whose users skew Western, the single counts roughly 23,500 listeners, a reminder that most of this new audience reached Kroi through Johnny Joestar and Gyro Zeppeli. Whether they stay for the band’s own records is the open question.

SPIN reached streaming services on September 24, the day before Steel Ball Run’s 2nd and 3rd STAGE began weekly Friday episodes on Netflix, and the official video followed on October 5. The CD single came out in Japan on October 28 through Pony Canyon’s IRORI Records label, with Johnny Joestar on the cover. The standard edition, priced at ¥1,200 before tax, pairs SPIN with an instrumental version, while the ¥3,600 Blu-ray and DVD editions add live sessions, including three songs recorded at RAK Studios in London.

The next step is on stage, and only in Japan. Kroi Live Tour 2027 visits 15 cities, opening at Zepp Fukuoka on June 5, 2027 and closing at Zepp Sapporo on July 31, with no overseas dates announced. For the listeners in Brazil, the UK or France who pushed SPIN to the top, the Friday opening credits remain the closest seat.

Tags: anime, acid jazz, Funk Rock, JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, Kroi, Steel Ball Run

More Like This

Shania Twain’s New Album ‘Queen Of Me’ Out Now

Spring Into Summer With Gigs And Festivals At Alexandra Palace In 2022

Craft Recordings announces exclusive releases for Record Store Day 2020

Demi Lovato Releases New Album, ‘Revamped’ Featuring Rock Versions Of Hit Songs | See Her Great Performance at The MTV VMAs if You Haven’t Seen It Yet!

WITCH | Sydney Opera House | 4 March, 2024

Madonna and Sabrina Carpenter open Confessions II with a Detroit-house sample