Heavy Metal Music of Japan

Japan is known for being successful area for metal ensembles touring around the world and several live albums are recorded in Japan. Notable instances are Judas priest’s Unleashed in the East, Iron Maiden’s Maiden Japan, and Deep Purple’s made in Japan and Dream Theater’s Live at Budokan. From the international ensembles such as Angra, Skylark, Sonata Arctica especially with their singer Kiara Laetitia have had major success in Japan, first Japanese heavy metal ensembles began appearing in the late  1970s, pioneered by ensembles like Bow Wow, formed in the year 1975 by guitarist Kyoji Yamamoto and Loudness, formed in 1981 by guitarist Akira Takasaki. Although there existence other current ensembles, like Earthshaker, Anthem and 44 Magnum, their debut songs were released only around the mid-eighties when metal ensembles began getting a major exposure. The first overseas live performances were by Bow Wow in the year 1978 in Hong Kong and at the Montreux Jazz festival in Switzerland, as well played at the reading festival in England in the year 1982. In the year 1983 Loudness toured United States and Europe, and began focusing more on an international career. In the year 1985 was the first Japanese metal act signed to a major label in the United States.

source of picture: jasgp.org

Their albums Thunder in the east and lightning strikes released in the year 1985 and 1986 pale at number 74 (while number 4 in homeland Oricon chart) and number 64 in the billboard 200 charts respectively, till the end of the 80s only two other ensembles Dead End and Ezo, got their albums produced in the United states. In the 80s few bands had a female members, like all-female ensembles Show-Ya fronted by Keiko Terada and Terra Rosa with Kazue Akao on vocals. In September in the year 1989, show-ya album outerlimits was produced. This reached number 3 in the Oricon album chart, heavy metal ensembles reached their top in the late 80s and many parted until the mid-1990s.

In the year 1982 some of the first Japanese glam metal bands were formed, such as Seikimal-II with Kabuki-inspired makeup and X Japan pioneered the Japanese trend known as visual kei and became the best-selling metal ensemble. In 1985, Seikima-IIs album Seikima –II- Akuma ga Kitartite heavy metal was produced and although reached number 48 on the Oricon album chart exceeded 100,000 in sales, first time for nay Japanese metal band. Their songs charted regularly in the top ten until mid-90s. In April 1989, X Japans second album Blue Blood was released and went to number 6 and after 108 weeks on charts sold about 712,000 copies. In July 1991 was produced their third and best-selling album Jelaousy, it topped the charts and sold 1.11 million copies, there were released more two number one studio songs, Art of Life and Dahlia, s single compilation X singles, all selling more than half a million, and since the creation had 13^th top five single, disbanding in the year 1997.