Bocchi the Rock!’s Kessoku Band is sweeping the music charts in real life.
As recorded by Billboard Japan, Kessoku Band, the fictional all-girls band from Bocchi the Rock! topped the Billboard Japan album charts for Top Downloaded Albums with “Kessoku Band” during the week of Dec. 28, 2022, surpassing the K-Pop eight-member boy band Stray Kids. “Kessoku Band” released on Dec. 28, 2022, with 14 songs, including the opening song “Seishun Complex” and the ending song “Distortion!!” Stray Kids’ album “Replay” ranked third after its release on Dec. 21, 2022. ELLEGARDEN’s album “The End of Yesterday,” their first full-length album in 16 years, came in second.
Kessoku Band Beats K-pop Idols on Billboard Charts
Billboard Japan also announced Kessoku Band topped the charts in their Weekly Album ranking, beating out yet another popular K-Pop boy band, NCT Dream. According to Billboard Japan, “Kessoku Band” recorded 73,244 sales during the counting period of Dec. 26, 2022, to Jan. 1, 2023. NCT Dream’s winter special mini-album “Candy” sold 32,312 copies while “HiGH&LOW THE WORST BEST ALBUM,” an action media franchise centered around Exile Tribe, pulled in 18,397 copies.
Bocchi the Rock’s achievement is impressive, considering how popular Stray Kids and NCT Dream are. Stray Kids, formed by JYP Entertainment in 2017, landed their first album in second place on the Billboard World Albums chart prior to their debut. Their 2022 album “Oddinary” topped the Billboard 200 albums chart with 110,000 album units earned in the U.S. NCT Dream, the third sub-unit of the K-Pop boy band, debuted in 2016. Their debut single, “Chewing Gum,” peaked at number two on the Billboard world Digital Songs Sales chart. The group also became the first and only East Asian artist to appear on Billboard’s “21 Under 21” list three consecutive times.
Written and illustrated by Aki Hamaji, Bocchi the Rock! is a four-panel manga series that began serialization in Manga Time Kirara Max since December 2017. CloverWorks (Spy x Family) adapted the series into an anime in October 2022. A slice-of-life music series, Bocchi the Rock! follows Hitori Gotō, an intensely anxious and introverted girl who has trouble making friends. Although Hitori’s first live performance in a band, later named Kessoku Band, isn’t much of a success, it spurs Hitori’s determination to use the powers of her online alias “guitarhero” to defeat her social anxiety. Bocchi the Rock! surprised many with how popular and beloved the show became, even beating out MAPPA’s adaptation of Chainsaw Man for most popular currently airing anime on My Anime List and ranking fourth on the CBR Editor Picks for the 10 Best Anime of 2022. Many viewers found the anime endearing and grounded the characters were, especially Bocchi, particularly in the depiction of her internal struggles with her social anxiety.
All 12 episodes of Bocchi the Rock! are available on Crunchyroll. As of this article’s publication, there is no word on a second season for the anime.
Source: Billboard Japan (1, 2)
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