Janne Da Arc

After toiling for quite some time in Japan’s indie rock and roll scene, Janne Da Arc only found success in the past due 1990s once the five-piece were found from the Avex Trax label and radically overhauled their image to complement the prevailing visual kei craze of that time period, which basically involves male bandmembers looking androgynous and moody while playing theatrical pop-metal, wearing plenty of makeup, and sporting oversize hair. Vocalist Yasunori Hayashi created Janne Da Arc with four of his Osaka senior high school classmates — guitarist Yutaka Tsuda, bassist Kazuyuki Matsumoto, and keyboardist Kiyo in 1996. (Although within the group right away, drummer Shuji Suematsu would just become an “standard” bandmember in 2006.) A manga lover influenced by ’80s Japanese fresh wave functions Boøwy, Deceased End, and X-Japan — probably the first visible kei music group — Yasu didn’t consider the band’s name from Joan of Arc but instead from a personality within the Proceed Nagai-penned manga Devilman. JDA released three mini-albums individually before they authorized to Motorod, an offshoot of Avex Trax. Their 1st single on the fresh label, “Crimson Zone,” proceeded to go Best 50 and spent three weeks within the Oricon graphs, while debut recording D.N.A., released in 2000, cemented Janne Da Arc’s placement as you of Japan’s most widely used rock and roll acts. It’s a posture that during the period of five albums the group offers however to relinquish, despite a short-term hiatus used 2006 so the bandmembers could go after various solo tasks. Predictably, probably the most effective of the offshoots offers been the Yasu-fronted Acidity Dark Cherry. Yasu in addition has written a book in line with the 2003 JDA recording Another Tale, and attempted his hands at manga, including a tale about JDA’s development. During the period of their profession, JDA provides gradually well developed down the make-up and outlandish locks cuts connected with visible kei bands, rather counting on old-fashioned rock and roll & move swagger to obtain message across.