If you’ve ever watched an anime, you’ve almost certainly heard a song by Flow. The band has been responsible for dozens of the most recognizable anime openings and endings over the past two decades.
Flow, often stylized as “FLOW,” released their first extended play in 2001, FLOW #0. They quickly became one of the most recognized Japanese rock bands thanks in large part to their great music. The band combines pop, rock, and hip hop elements to create an exciting soundscape. It’s this tendency to create energetic yet emotionally moving music that makes Flow’s music a great fit for anime.
Their music has soundtracked well-known anime properties like Naruto, Dragon Ball, and Code Geass. among others. Some 20 years after their career began, the band still continues to put out music, both onscreen and off. To celebrate that success, let’s go over 10 of Flow’s best anime openings.
10. “Kaze no Uta” (Tales of Zestria The X)
Flow released “Kaze no Uta” in 2016 as the first opening for the anime, Tales of Zestiria the X. Despite a great opening, the song takes a while to get where it’s going; but once it does, it delivers one of the best choruses in anime. I love the bagpipes in this track. We need more bagpipes in music!
9. “World End” (Code Geass)
“World End” is the fifth opening of the anime, Code Geass. The driving guitars, drums, and string section help create a feeling of excitement while the vocal melody is both hopeful and full of melancholy. Hopeful and melancholic are probably the two words I associate the most with great anime openings, so this is a good thing.
8. “Howling” (The Seven Deadly Sins)
“Howling” is a collaboration between Flow and fellow anime opening legends Granrodeo, for the anime, The Seven Deadly Sins. The song combines chanting with a sick guitar riff before launching into a quintessential anime opening chorus. A successful collab if I’ve ever heard one.
7. “Brave Blue” (Eureka Seven: AO)
“Brave Blue” was used as the second opening for Eureka Seven: AO. While the anime itself had mixed reception, “Brave Blue” is near universally loved — at least, by those who have heard it. The underrated track combines piano and electronic elements to create an uplifting soundscape, but it’s sadly not on major streaming platforms in the U.S. We’ll have to watch the music video if we want to listen to it for now.
6. “Hey!!!” (Beelzebub)
Beelzebub only aired for about a year but it did provide us with some great openings. One of these is Flow’s “Hey!!”, a fun song that doesn’t take itself too seriously. Sometimes a song can just be silly and still be good.
5. “Re:member” (Naruto)
“Re:Member” is the eighth opening of the first Naruto series. Flow continues to provide music for the Naruto franchise even now, including a recent Boruto opening. Like many Naruto openings, this song makes me want to go run in a field with my friends.
4. “Days” (Eureka Seven)
Flow often combine elements from multiple musical genres into their songs and “Days” is a great example of that tendency. “Days” opens with drums and a string section straight out of an Earth, Wind, and Fire song and a guitar riff that would be at home in a punk song. They combine this instrumental with a familiar chord progression (Sorry, I had to do it — here’s a great explainer on that chord progression to make up for that) to create one banger of a song.
3. “Sign” (Naruto Shippuden)
“Sign” is the sixth opening of Naruto Shippuden and it sountracked some of the best episodes in the entire series. They’re also some of the saddest episodes (I may or may not have teared up rewatching this opening for this article). The anime needed a great song to go along with these important plot events and “Sign” is objectively a great song, bias or not. If you grew up watching Naruto, it’s almost impossible to not sing along when this one comes on.
2. “Colors” (Code Geass)
I haven;’t watched Code Geass (yet) but I can’t help but feel a rush of nostalgia when I hear “Colors.” Despite never hearing it until my adulthood, “Colors” has a great chorus that makes me think of simpler times watching anime (but somehow not Code Geass) on Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim program as a kid. Opening with that wonderful horn section and then going straight into the chorus starts the song off on such a strong note. But somehow, Flow keeps up the momentum without making the song sound too “same-y.” This is not just one of Flow’s best songs but one of the best in anime.
1. “GO!!!” (Naruto)
You could argue there are better songs than “GO!!!” and you’d probably be right. But in my opinion, “GO!!!” is Flow’s best. Nothing makes me want to go overcome insurmountable odds with my friends like this song and really, isn’t that the metric by which an anime opening should be judged?
