Who-ya Extended, the creators’ unit that sang the Jujutsu Kaisen opening ‘VIVID VICE’, is back on an anime credit roll. Its new single ‘ICARUS’ is the ending theme of PSYREN -Siren-, the TV adaptation of Toshiaki Iwashiro’s psychic survival manga from Weekly Shōnen Jump, and the full track reached streaming services the day after the first episode aired. For most listeners, the song’s first impression is the music under an episode’s closing credits.
The unit wrote the song from the source material outward. In the comment released with the announcement, Who-ya Extended said they read the original manga closely and wanted the song to carry one idea: moving forward on a path and a future you chose yourself, even if it leaves you covered in wounds, rather than following a rightness someone else decided for you. Every credit on ‘ICARUS’ (lyrics, music and arrangement) belongs to the unit, which is built around a vocalist who performs as Who-ya.
The title does the rest. Icarus is the boy in Greek myth who flies too close to the sun, the standard warning against reaching too far. PSYREN is about a teenager who reaches anyway. Ageha Yoshina, a high-school student who takes paid problem-solving jobs, goes looking for his missing childhood friend Sakurako Amamiya after finding a card marked ‘Psyren’, calls the number on it and is dropped into a deadly game set in a ruined future overrun by creatures called Taboo. Pairing the myth’s cautionary figure with a stated theme of choosing your own route, wounds included, turns the old warning into something closer to permission.
Who-ya Extended has built its catalogue on this kind of commission. Its major-label debut, ‘Q-vism’, opened PSYCHO-PASS 3. ‘VIVID VICE’ opened the second half of Jujutsu Kaisen’s first season, and more recently the unit wrote ‘Chained Chase’ for the mobile game Jujutsu Kaisen Phantom Parade. According to its official profile, its streams have passed 200 million worldwide and it has performed in more than ten cities outside Japan.
There are reasons to temper expectations. The ending is the less visible of an anime’s two theme slots: PSYREN’s opening, ‘WARNING!!’ by CLAN QUEEN, is what viewers hear before the story starts, and outside Japan, where Crunchyroll streams the series as it airs, the player is built to move viewers straight on to the next episode. Early numbers are modest. The official audio upload on YouTube had about 7,600 views in its first days, and Last.fm had registered no listeners when the release was logged. ‘ICARUS’ will have to grow week by week, the way anime endings usually do, rather than arrive as an event.
PSYREN -Siren- premiered on October 5 on TOKYO MX and BS11. It is produced by the studio Satelight and directed by Katsumi Ono, and it adapts a manga that ran in Weekly Shōnen Jump until 2010 and fills 16 volumes. ‘ICARUS’ went to download and streaming on October 6, and the CD single follows on November 18 through SACRA MUSIC. Its limited edition, priced at 2,200 yen, pairs the CD with a Blu-ray that includes the ‘ICARUS’ music video, in packaging that uses artwork drawn for the anime. Who-ya Extended made its major debut with ‘Q-vism’ in November 2019, and ‘VIVID VICE’ followed in January 2021.
Icarus fell because he chose the height himself. Who-ya Extended has set a song about that choice in the slot where it must win listeners in the last minute and a half of each episode, one week at a time.
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