"Mixed Nuts" (Japanese: ミックスナッツ, Hepburn: Mikkusu Nattsu) is a song recorded by Japanese band Official Hige Dandism, released digitally on April 15, 2022, through Irori Records label. The song was featured as the opening theme song for the anime series Spy × Family. It peaked at number one on the Japan Hot 100 and number 61 on the Billboard Global 200. The Mixed Nuts EP was released on June 22, 2022.
Contents
Composition and lyrics
"Mixed Nuts" is a jazz and pop rock song, composed in the key of F-sharp major and is set in time signature of common time with a tempo of 150 BPM, runs for three minutes and 33 seconds. It was composed and written by vocalist Satoshi Fujihara for the anime Spy × Family, with the family theme in mind, as well as main character Anya's love for peanuts. "I once heard Anya say that she liked peanuts. I suddenly thought of peanuts in the mixed nuts that I often eat myself and looked them up, and found that although they look similar, nuts that grow from trees and peanuts that grow under the ground are classified as two different kinds, and that peanuts are really a different kind, despite their appearance." He later stated, "I felt that this was the theme of this work, that there is something interesting about playing a fake family while hiding one's true identity and confronting something like a real family, and that the happiness and joy that comes to you is all that matters, rather than whether it is genuine or not. I created this work with the original in mind."
Music video
The music video for "Mixed Nuts" was released on April 15, 2022, the same day as the single released, and directed by Takuto Shimpo.
The music video depicts a family of three entering a hotel during a storm. As the song begins, the hotel is struck by lightning, and the mother and father mysteriously vanish. As the daughter searches the hotel, she encounters the band members dressed as film noir investigators, who open up a metal box to reveal a bomb wired to a timer. Meanwhile, the mother and father have reappeared, and band members dressed in hazmat suits give them a pair of pliers to cut the wire to the bomb, but that only causes it to tick down faster. Fleeing through the hotel, the parents and daughter are reunited with each other in a large ballroom, and they hug in relief. As the lights come on, the family watches the band perform "Mixed Nuts" on a stage. During the closing notes of the song, the band hand a gift-wrapped box to the daughter, who opens it up to reveal the bomb. As she drops it in a panic, the dynamite explodes into a harmless shower of nuts, and the family laughs.
Track listing
Digital download / streaming
"Mixed Nuts" (ミックスナッツ) – 3:33
CD / digital download / streaming (Mixed Nuts EP)
"Mixed Nuts" – 3:33
"Anarchy" – 4:29
"Choral A" – 3:59
"Hagan" (破顔, "Smile") – 4:41
Personnel
Official Hige Dandism
Satoshi Fujihara – lead vocals, lyrics, composer, additional drums, programming
Daisuke Ozasa – guitar, backing vocals
Makoto Narazaki – bass guitar, backing vocals
Masaki Matsuura – drums, backing vocals
Additional musicians
Atsuki Yumoto – trumpet, horn co-arranger
Toshihiro Kawashima – trombone
Andy Wulf – saxophone
Seiya Yokota – additional drums, drums co-arranger
Production
Genki Wada – drums technician, additional drums
Kazutaka Minemori – guitar technician
Kazuhiro Saito – musical instrument technician
Shota Kinebuchi – musical instrument technician
Takuya Kondo – musical instrument technician
Masahito Komori – engineer
Randy Merrill – mastered engineer