League of Legends: Worlds 2019 official song, ‘Phoenix’ is out!

The League of Legends 2019 Worlds official song by Cailin Russo & Chrissy Costanza, “Phoenix” has been released along with the music video!

We’ve gone through all five stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. There were cries of outrage, false starts, and plenty of memes, but at long last the nightmare is over. That’s right, the League of Legends 2019 Worlds song has been released!

The song, titled “Phoenix” by Cailin Russo & Chrissy Costanza, is a mix of pop and a rock power ballad, with hints of electronic tones. This marks Costanza’s second collaboration with Riot for the League of Legends Worlds song. Two years ago, in 2017, she and her band Against the Current helmed the theme song “Legends Never Die,” one of the most treasured Worlds songs by the League of Legends community. Phoenix is a bit softer and more mellow in tone from Legends Never Die, but it still has a lot of hype moments.

The song was first teased on China’s Apple Music with a 30-second preview of the single, with the full song being released later. The song was officially released following the conclusion of the Splyce/Unicorns of Love series, including the music video.

The video features multiple pro players, including G2 Caps, SKT Faker, and champions Irelia, Karma, Lissandra. As the chorus encourages us to “tear down the ceiling and fly, Phoenix, fly” it’s very clearly a nod to those players who are looking to rise from the ashes of past disappointments (Caps making Worlds finals last year but just narrowly missing a title, Faker missing Worlds for the first time last year, and Rookie the possible “new empire” the lyrics alluded to, who’s struggled domestically in the LPL).

All in all, I think the song itself is really cool and the video animation is kind of dope. Even though I liked the style of the music video for “Rise” a bit better, I like that Riot kept the theme of focusing on players and their climb for the World Championship.