JO1 make their US debut with ANIMAL, a six-song English EP, and a five-city North American tour

JO1 have released ANIMAL, their first full English-language project and the official start of their US career. The six-song EP came out on 2 October 2026 on all major streaming platforms, and every track was produced by Grammy-winning producer and songwriter Dem Jointz.

Who JO1 are

JO1 are a Japanese boy group formed through a television audition programme and launched in 2020. They have spent six years building a large domestic following, and ANIMAL is their first deliberate step towards audiences outside Japan, in a language they do not usually release in.

The EP

The title track arrived with an official music video, in which the group break out of a cage, finishing with a sequence of around 30 dancers. The release materials describe ANIMAL as showing the group at their most instinctive and uninhibited, a deliberate contrast with the polished image of their Japanese singles.

Putting a single producer across all six songs is a clear choice. It gives the EP one sonic identity for listeners meeting the group for the first time, rather than a sampler of styles.

The tour

The EP is paired with JO1's first North American tour, five shows in five cities:

• 2 October: Danforth Music Hall, Toronto
• 4 October: Webster Hall, New York
• 6 October: Copernicus Center, Chicago
• 8 October: The Warfield, San Francisco
• 11 October: The Novo, Los Angeles

By the time you read this, Toronto, New York and Chicago are behind them. San Francisco and Los Angeles are still to come. Tickets for the New York show were sold through AXS; check each venue's own page for what is left.

Why it matters

Japanese and Korean groups have worked out different routes into the US market over the past few years. For J-pop acts, an English project and a small-venue tour is a quieter, slower route than a stadium announcement, and it lets a group test whether fans abroad will show up before a bigger bet. If the room-sized shows in San Francisco and Los Angeles are anything to go by, we will find out within a week.

We will follow what JO1 do next. For more on the Asian pop scene, see our K-pop and Asia coverage.