Black★Rock Shooter (song)

Black★Rock Shooter (ブラック★ロックシューター, Burakku Rokku Shūtā) is a song written by ryo of supercell and performed by Hatsune Miku. The song features huke's eponymous character, with a music video hosted on Niconico since June 13, 2008.

History
huke uploaded the illustration to Pixiv and his personal blog on December 26, 2007. The illustration inspired ryo to compose a song based on the character, surprising huke, who recognized ryo's previous works such as "Melt", when ryo contacted him for a collaborative project.

Music composition and lyrics were both produced by ryo, while huke as a new member of supercell provided artwork and animations for the video. The whole project took approximately half a year to complete. Although huke did not provide explanations behind the creation of his character, ryo managed to write the lyrics solely based on his drawing, which would closely match huke's feelings on how he recovered from artist's slump via Black★Rock Shooter.

The music video was uploaded to NicoNico (then known as Nico Nico Douga) on June 13, 2008, which surpassed one million views by October. On April 11 2010 the video reached its 3 million views milestone. As of August 2021, the song "Black★Rock Shooter" was still among the top 30 of the most viewed Vocaloid songs on NicoNico.

After the original song's debut in 2008, there have been two official updated versions of the song since then. The first version, titled "ブラック★ロックシューター 2M MIX", was released as part of the Black★Rock Shooter pilot edition. The 2M MIX features different instrumentation and uses Hatsune Miku Append's soft-β voice type. The second version serves as the opening theme for the 2012 Black★Rock Shooter TV Anime series, with further updated vocals and instruments.

The original version of the song was used as the ending theme for the final episode of Black★★Rock Shooter DAWN FALL.

Some of the illustrations used in the music video make cameo appearance in the first episode of RWBY: Ice Queendom.

Other media
"Black★Rock Shooter" is a playable song in several Hatsune Miku: Project DIVA rhythm games by SEGA, including Hatsune Miku: Project DIVA f (PlayStation Vita), Hatsune Miku: Project DIVA F (PlayStation 3), and Hatsune Miku: Project DIVA Future Tone (PlayStation 4). Japanese version of Hatsune Miku: Colorful Stage! also included the song as part of a collaboration project with Black★★Rock Shooter DAWN FALL, with the English version of the game following suit a year later.

The song is also playable in several of Bandai Namco's Taiko no Tatsujin rhythm games, such as Taiko no Tatsujin 14 and Taiko no Tatsujin (2011) on arcade, Taiko no Tatsujin Wii: Minna de Party Sandaime on Nintendo Wii, and Taiko no Tatsujin: Drum 'n' Fun! (also known as Taiko no Tatsujin: Nintendo Switch Version!) on Nintendo Switch, with the last one available as part of a paid downloadable content.

Gallery

 * Full article: Black★Rock Shooter (song)/Gallery

Trivia

 * All eight episodes of the Black★Rock Shooter TV Anime are each named after parts of the lyrics to the song.
 * Starting with Hatsune Miku: Project DIVA F, The TV Anime version of the song would be used in all iterations of Project DIVA where Black★Rock Shooter is a playable song.
 * The music video for the song in Project DIVA features various references and imagery seen in the original Black★Rock Shooter music video on NicoNico.