The Piass(THE妃阿甦,za piasu) are a Japanese visual keihardcore punk band formed in the early 1990s in Sapporo. Three of the four original members died within a span of two years, however Takayuki continued the band, having gone through many line-up changes, and they are still active to this day.
Visual kei is a movement among Japanese musicians, that is characterized by the use of varying levels of make-up, elaborate hair styles and flamboyant costumes, often, but not always, coupled with androgynous aesthetics, similar to Western glam rock.
Japanese hardcore is the hardcore punk scene in Japan, which originated to protest the social and economic changes sweeping the country in the 1980s. The band SS is regarded as the first, forming in 1977. Bands such as The Stalin and GISM soon followed, forming in 1980 and 1981 respectively. Occasionally, Japanese hardcore musicians include elements of crossover thrash, thrash metal, anarcho-punk, horror punk, D-beat and grindcore in their songs.
Sapporo is the fifth largest city of Japan by population, and the largest city on the northern Japanese island of Hokkaido. It is the capital city of Hokkaido Prefecture and Ishikari Subprefecture. It is an ordinance-designated city.
The Piass was formed in 1990 by vocalist Chihiro, guitarist Takayuki, bassist Yoshio and drummer Hiroshi.[1] After a while Chihiro left the band and was replaced by Takashi, who didn't stay long, only providing vocals for their first release. Chihiro returned and this formation became noticed in the music scene.
In February 1993, The Piass' first omnibus album appearance Braintrash was released; it also contained a song by Malice Mizer. Their next few songs ended up being released on many different omnibus albums through Anarchist Records, the label with which they signed their first contract. Two years after, they released their first album, Ryouki Kousatsu Chissoku-Shi, which almost reached the top ten of the Oricon indies charts.
Malice Mizer was a Japanese visual kei rock band active from August 1992 to December 2001. Formed by guitarists Mana and Közi, their earlier music and themes were characterized by their strong French and classical influences, later moving away from deliberate French romanticism and incorporating Gothic aspects after several difficulties befell the band.
Oricon Inc., established in 1999, is the holding company at the head of a Japanese corporate group that supplies statistics and information on music and the music industry in Japan. It started as Original Confidence Inc., which was founded by Sōkō Koike in November 1967 and became known for its music charts. Oricon Inc. was originally set up as a subsidiary of Original Confidence and took over the latter’s Oricon record charts in April 2002.
Everything was going well for the young band until the October 25, 1995, which marked the end of band activities for a time. Chihiro and Hiroshi died after falling from a twenty meter high bridge during a PV shoot that day.[1] Their deaths became a mystery with many different versions. Some believe that it was a suicide pact, as the two were tied together when they fell. However, it is usually deemed an accident because of the stunt they had wanted to perform for the PV. Although the band was naturally on hiatus at the time in 1996, Anarchist Records still released another two songs by The Piass.
In the year 1997, Yoshio committed suicide, leaving Takayuki as the sole living member.[1] The reasons are unknown, once again fueling different speculations.
On October 25, 1998, exactly three years after the first tragedy, Takayuki began to rebuild the band. The new members were the former Slum Junkie vocalist Kirala, Ruiji (ex-Mazohysteria) became bassist and the lineup was completed by Shizuki as drummer. The band published their second demo tape in 1999, and changed the spelling of their name. The Piass now written in Japanese, 妃阿甦, the last kanji meaning "resurrection".
Kanji are the adopted logographic Chinese characters that are used in the Japanese writing system. They are used alongside the Japanese syllabic scripts hiragana and katakana. The Japanese term kanji for the Chinese characters literally means "Han characters". It is written with the same characters in the Chinese language to refer to the character writing system, hanzi (漢字).
In 1999 The Piass released their second album, a self-titled effort which would prove to be a huge departure from their original sound; the group now had a frantic punk rock sound opposed to the more hard rock sound of the previous album. An EP was recorded the following year, Gekka Kyoushou. They released a single in 2001 called "Akinazuna: Akina Zuna".
2002 Kirala disappeared for a while in February and then officially left the band on the third of March. Guitarist Takayuki became the new vocalist of the trio. During this same time period, Takayuki was active as the guitarist for Anti Feminism's releases as well. After this lineup change, The Piass stopped all of its own music releases and only released music on the omnibus album Anarchist Records IV published in May 2002. From this point on, they became a live-only band, and Takayuki continued to work more with Anti Feminism.
The new single after four years was finally released on May 24, 2006 and called "Kansen Shou Paranoia"; it included a DVD clip. In November 2006, their first DVD Shiiku Mousou was released, containing a small collection of PVs.
In February 2007, the official website announced the addition of new vocalist Tetsuya, and Takayuki returned to guitarist. However, in March 2007, before they could even perform one live, bassist Ruiji and drummer Shizuki left the band, stating musical differences. The band continued on with Tetsuya and Takayuki as the official members and made use of support members for the rest of 2007 and 2008. The duo released a mini-album in August 2007 called Dolei: Dorei.
On October 8, 2008 vocalist Tetsuya did not perform at their live show. Takayuki had said at the live that “Tetsuya can’t come on stage now”, but nothing more insightful.
In 2009, The Piass transformed into a five-member band, gaining four new members and announcing two coupling tours to start off the year.[1] Joining The Piass were guitarists Thifu and Tsubaki, bassist Tenteke and drummer Toro. The first tour of the year, GaixTokkanxNippon Angya Tour: Zenhansen, begins in March, and the second tour of the year, beginning in April, is called GaixTokkanxNippon Angya Tour: Kouhansen.
Christian Death is an American gothic rock band formed in Los Angeles, California in 1979 by Rozz Williams. The band became a highly influential act, heralding the American gothic rock and deathrock movements.
Arch Enemy is a Swedish melodic death metal band, originally a supergroup, from Halmstad, formed in 1995. Its members were in bands such as Carcass, Armageddon, Carnage, Mercyful Fate, Spiritual Beggars, Nevermore, and Eucharist. It was founded by Carcass guitarist Michael Amott along with Johan Liiva, who were both originally from the death metal band Carnage. The band has released ten studio albums, three live albums, three video albums and four EPs. The band was originally fronted by Johan Liiva, who was replaced by German Angela Gossow as lead vocalist in 2000. Gossow left the band in March 2014 and was replaced by Canadian Singer Alissa White-Gluz but remained as the group's manager.
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Anti Feminism is the solo musical project started by vocalist Kenzi in 1991. None of the other members are considered official. The rotating supporting members come from various parts of Japan, including Tokyo, Osaka, Sapporo, Fukuoka, and Nagoya. In 2007, Anti Feminism toured through Europe and the U.S. with Hagakure.
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