Kara Dennison
June 12, 2024 
Anime and manga series about aspiring bands and musicians have been a big deal for a long time… but K-ON! changed everything when its in-series band, Ho-kago Tea Time, became the first fictional characters to top the Oricon weekly music charts. Now the age of anime idols and bands is upon us, with diegetic divas conquering Spotify on the regular. And even as that’s going on, what constitutes an anime band is changing constantly.
Take these three anime bands, for instance—they’re conquering their respective music scenes in ways that would have been unheard of even a few years ago. Not only that, but they’ve got tunes to show for it!
Kessoku Band
The anime adaptation of BOCCHI THE ROCK! has won over fans of all ages, launching one of the most popular anime bands of recent years. The series follows self-taught guitarist Hitori Gotoh, who once achieved a modicum of fame by playing guitar facelessly on YouTube. Now, with the help of her new friends, she’s overcoming her social anxiety and chasing her dreams.
Bocchi’s success is similar to that of many real-life talents who play music from home, many of them self-taught. In fact, music stores are using the series’s popularity to inspire music fans to learn guitar from home, too. BOCCHI-branded lesson books and instructional videos are making the rounds as part of collab events!
PathTLive
The age of VTubers is upon us, but Kizuna no Allele imagines a future where aspiring performers could potentially go to school for it! Inspired by Kizuna AI herself, this series follows a group of ADEN Academy hopefuls as the train up and compete for the Lapin d’Or. As they pursue this prestigious award, they form entire new anime bands… including central group PathTLive.
These VTubers each have their own style of song and presentation, as well as their own ideas of what constitutes talent and success. While this initially causes friction, it leads to a well-rounded group that helps each other learn and grow.
JELEE
Not all anime bands—or real-world bands, for that matter—consist of just musical talent. In the age of utaite, many musical projects also include programmers and artists. Such is the case for JELEE, the central group of the anime Jellyfish Can’t Swim in the Night. What starts as one former idol trying to get back on her feet turns into a multimedia project that goes viral.
With music, lyrics, art, and animation, JELEE create enchanting music videos featuring their own jellyfish mascot. The best part? You can watch these in-series videos and listen to new songs from JELEE at the end of the episodes. Or you can do like their fans do in the series and watch on YouTube!
Here are more ways current anime explores life online.
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