Vocal, Guitar, Piano : Gackt
Guitar : Chachamaru [support member]
Guitar, Violin : You [support member]
Keyboard : Igao [support member]
Drums : Toshi [support member]
Drums : Ryuichi [support member]
Bass : Ju-ken [support member]
PROFILE
At the beginning of his musical career, Gackt M.S. Camui didn’t want to become a rock star. In fact, he despised members of rock bands as incapable musician-wannabes with a talent for making senseless noise. Rock music contradicted every sense of order and finesse that his classical upbringing possessed, leaving the young Gackt completely disenchanted with the premise of popular rock music.
Fast-forward to today. Not only did Gackt step away from classical music and leap into the rock genre, but he also transformed himself into one of Japan’s most well-recognized and acclaimed pop-rock artists. Six original albums, twenty-four singles, numerous live and televised performances, and several media campaigns in his solo career alone have gained Gackt his celebrity status. With the full intention of having his music dominating the Asian pop scene, the name and image of Gackt has become synonymous with rock ‘n roll popularity.
BIOGRAPHY
Born into a musically inclined family in Okinawa, Gackt (whose birth name is unknown to the public) almost naturally shied away from the music that was popular in his childhood. His father, a classically trained trumpet player, urged him to begin studying the piano at the age of three. Up until he was about seven-years-old, Gackt enjoyed the lessons. But a rude awakening occurred when he almost drowned in the ocean, forcing him to determine the real reason why he played piano. He did not play for his own enjoyment, but was instead forced by his parents. At age eleven, he gladly quit.
Without piano in his life, prepubescent Gackt was unable to satiate his competitive nature. By fourteen, he returned to the piano, this time studying on his own accord with the motivation to be better than anyone else. Not only did he want to one-up his more skilled classmates, but he set it as his mission to surpass them by leaps and bounds. Gackt soon found himself picking up various brass instruments, becoming familiar enough to be able to play them as well.
Despite his growing classical range, Gackt remained unfamiliar with the music his peers enjoyed. His parents rarely let him watch television, hence limiting his exposure to the music outside what was played in their house. Though his father listened to enka in the car, Gackt’s parents hardly regarded anything other than classical, European music.
Thus, when exposed to rock-style drums in his Kyoto junior high school, Gackt was left dumbstruck. He soon became intrigued with the differences between the music he was familiar with and the bewildering, new genre he was about to discover. The often violent and intense style of rock overshadowed everything he knew about the refinement of classical music. He also found the idea of responsibility resting on four or five musicians who created a band drastically more appealing than the large, orchestral setting where an individual could easily get lost in a sea of sound.
Still, listening to the unpolished sounds of most bands left Gackt reluctant to accept rock as a legitimate genre. He decided that he wanted to bring his trained background into the scene as a drummer. During and right after his high school years, practice led to the joining of several unnamed bands, all of which Gackt found relatively unchallenging to his needs. He required an outlet that would provide him with musicians who could compete on his level and not drag him down into the realm of amateurs that he despised.
Gackt discovered this in YOU, a guitarist he observed at a Kyoto live house. Immediately, Gackt found himself convinced that there were people who played rock music and were talented, worthy musicians. After befriending YOU, Gackt suggested that the two of them form a band. Cains:Feel came into fruition with Gackt on drums and YOU on guitar. However, no vocalists impressed them on the level they required, leaving their options limited.
It was at this point that Gackt brought out the instrument that would later become his most famous: his voice. Coincidently, members of Cains:Feel enlisted Gackt as only a temporary vocalist. Since it was one of the few areas where he had not been properly trained, Gackt’s range was limited to a low register, contrasting those of the popular vocalists at that time. Despite the odds, Gackt worked on his voice, training it to reach higher notes yet still keeping its rich, baritone sound. He soon became the band’s permanent vocalist.
The role of vocalist and frontman of Cains:Feel seemed to suit Gackt’s ambitions only temporarily. In 1995, at the age of 22, he was invited to Tokyo by Mana. The guitarist of Malice Mizer expressed interest in having Gackt join the band as vocalist. Intrigued by Mana’s style and the possibility of reaching a wider audience through this already fairly well-known band in the indies scene, Gackt eagerly joined. The expectations for Malice Mizer outweighed Gackt’s inhibitions towards joining a band that relied heavily on image.
At the first live with Gackt as vocalist in October 1995, Malice Mizer sold out the 600 seat AIR WEST venue in Shibuya, Tokyo. Starting in November of that same year, the band had its first one-man show called Sans retour Voyage. Following a string of independent singles and the album Voyage, Malice Mizer jumped onto the major scene with the single “Bel Air ~ Kuuhaku no toki no naka de ~” on July 19, 1997. The single was met with astounding popularity, stealing the number 20 spot on the Oricon Singles Chart for that week.
Arguably, Malice Mizer’s greatest success with Gackt as vocalist came with the release of their first major album, merveilles. At number 2 on the Oricon Album Chart, merveilles fueled the launch of Malice Mizer as a band that would break the boundary between visual kei style and popular music of Japan in the late 1990’s. The album inspired the merveilles ~shuuen to kisu~ tour, which ended in the famous Yokohama Arena in July of 1998.
Before long, Gackt felt that he had reached the success he had aspired to as a young musician. He became a well-recognized face in Malice Mizer, adding to the mix of characters as the tall, suave prince to counter Mana’s Victorian-style lady. Adoring fans anxious to see extravagant costumes and raunchy pantomimes made up the majority of the audience. Malice Mizer was the commercially successful band that countless visual kei artists sought to be.
But success came with a dark side for Gackt. While his voice reached thousands of people, his music did not. The majority of creative control over Malice Mizer was in Mana’s hands, which included most of the musical composition. Though Gackt wrote lyrics, the single “Le Ciel” was the only song over which he had complete control. Self-doubt began to creep up on the band as Gackt thirsted for more influence on decisions concerning Malice Mizer. While the two guitarists Mana and Közi found it necessary to stay true to their particular style, Gackt wanted to go in a different direction. He noted the waning of visual kei’s popularity, and the poster child of the genre would not be spared.
The clash between band members soon led Gackt to announce his interest in a solo career, which later led to his official departure from Malice Mizer on January 19, 1999. Removing himself from both the pressures of people in the Japanese music business and fans, Gackt decided to record his first solo album in Los Angeles, CA. A few weeks before the album’s release, a special Easter Live was held in order to debut the album’s title song “Mizerable.” Though he stressed that his endeavors were part of a solo project, Gackt appeared on stage with members of what would later be called GacktJOB: Masa (guitar), Ren (bass), and another ex-Cains:Feel member, YOU (guitar).
By the time Mizerable was released on May 12, 1999, word had spread that Gackt’s solo career would break expectations about the former vocalist of one of Japan’s most famous visual kei bands. It left its mark on the Oricon Album Chart with its highest ranking at number 2, starting a trend for all of Gackt’s original albums to reach the top ten. A video containing the “Mizerable” P.V. and behind-the-scenes clips soon followed. Gackt, sporting an eighteenth century European inspired jacket, held true to his visual roots in the P.V.
That soon changed, however, with the release of the single “Vanilla” on August 11 of that year. Abandoning the violin for a brass section, Gackt stretched his imagination to create a sound unlike anything he had ever performed before. The rhythm guitar beat like a racing pulse, supporting the raunchy, unsubtle lyrics. Not only was Gackt separating his style from that of Malice Mizer, but also from the conservative, classical genre of his childhood piano lessons.
With the fresh success of Mizerable and “Vanilla,” Gackt greeted the new millennium with a string of singles: “Mirror,” “Oasis,” and “sekirei ~seki ray~.” At just over a year old, Gackt’s solo career produced his first original album, MARS, on April 26. The album soon inspired a cross-country tour the day after its release until July 1. Advertisements on the newly opened official homepage entitled Dears spurred audiences to flock to the various locations across Japan. Appearing with GacktJOB members Masa, Ren, and You, Gackt introduced two new components of his “family:” Yukihiro “Chachamaru” Fujimura on guitar and Toshi on drums. Gackt had finally achieved the vision of music that he composed and performed reaching countless individuals in Japan and abroad.
Gackt hardly stopped there. Rounding out the year 2000, Gackt released two more singles and video footage of the tour’s final performance entitled MARS ~ Sora kara no houmonsha kaisou. In December, his first PLATINUM BOX was released. The special item included P.V.s, behind-the-scenes clips, and a CD of the audio from the concert. PLATINUM BOX ~I~ and the PLATINUM BOX sets to follow show fans Gackt’s devotion to giving something a little extra that most artists ignore. Musicianship is not enough for Gackt; he wants to please the fans, giving them the satisfaction that he is an artist who cares.
One way to appease the public was to reinvent his music yet again. Gackt’s eighth single, “Kimi no tameni dekiru koto,” and second album, REBIRTH, gave a taste of his pop-rock side. But he went even further with “ANOTHER WORLD,” released on September 5, 2001. Gackt’s highest grossing single proved his previous notions that visual kei was out of style, and that it was time to embrace the world of pop.
2001 also saw the rise of Gackt the marketing mogul. While he had already participated in a television advertisement for the Kirin brand beverage FIRE in September of 2000, Gackt appeared in commercials for neue MEN’s cologne, e-ma brand candies, and the Konami video game Metal Gear Solid 2 by the end of 2001. To add on to his busy schedule, Gackt became a regular guest on the television variety show Domoto Kyoudai in mid-April, taking a brief break for his latest tour Requiem et Reminiscence.
On December 16, 2001, Gackt began a holiday tradition by releasing the single “12Gatsu no Love Song,” the video of which chronicled the expression of unity people displayed just a few months after the September 11 attacks on New York City. The single has spurred several revamps as Gackt rearranges the music and/or rewrites the lyrics in a different language each consecutive year. Other than the original Japanese, the single has been written in English (“December Love Song”), Mandarin Chinese (“Shi Er Yue De Qing Ge”), and Korean.
By 2002, Gackt’s fame had reached beyond Japanese borders. While he continued with more single releases, commercials, television appearances, and the third album MOON, Gackt was invited to perform in China at a diplomatic commemoration concert. Along with several other Japanese and Chinese artists, Gackt appeared live and on television on September 22, his music reaching the ears of countless individuals across Asia.
Soon after the success in China, Gackt returned to Japan for his next tour, Kagen no Tsuki. But it wasn’t Gackt’s music that peaked the public’s interest at that point. At the end of 2002, he announced the future release of the film MOON CHILD. As both star and co-writer, Gackt stretched his talents into new territory. Not only did the movie command the attention of Gackt fans, but also the fans of his co-stars: fellow Japanese vocalist HYDE and Taiwanese actor Wang Leehom. Heavy campaigning and merchandising fueled the film’s cult following even before its release on April 19, 2003. The film was presented at film festivals abroad as well, later to be released in the United States on DVD by TLA Video.
Gackt continued to step outside the realm of music as he provided the voice for the anime New Fist of the North Star. Later on in the year, Gackt sported his martial arts abilities as the model for the main character in Taito and Sega’s Red Entertainment video game Bujingai. The game, which was released in Japan and the United States, not only featured Gackt’s body and voice, but also contained special, unlockable interviews with him in both versions.
Despite contributing to numerous other projects, Gackt continued to stay true to his love for music. Three original singles were released as he hit the road on his tour called Jougen no Tsuki. In December, a special Gackt Surprise Party Campaign began in which contestants would get one wish granted as long as they bought the singles “Last Song” and “Shi Er Yue De Qing Ge,” his fourth album CRESCENT, and PLATINUM BOX IV.
But what really made 2003 stand out as a pivotal year for Gackt was the publishing of his autobiography entitled Jihaku. The book gave fans and critics alike the true “confessions” of Gackt’s various life experiences. From his near-death drownings to leaving Malice Mizer to his taste in cars, Gackt revealed just enough of himself while still leaving some tidbits up to the reader’s imagination.
Just after the fifth anniversary of his solo career, Gackt released on February 25, 2004, a best-of album entitled THE SIXTH DAY. Unlike the singles collections of most artists, Gackt rerecorded fourteen tracks, making adjustments to the accompaniment and his own voice. THE SIXTH DAY & SEVENTH NIGHT tour followed, surprising fans with theatrical martial arts, masked dancers, and even a disappearing act. While on tour, Gackt released another set of rerecorded songs, SEVENTH NIGHT, this time making them entirely acoustic.
Continuing with the acoustic trend, Gackt produced his twentieth single “Arittake no ai de” and seventh album Love Letter in the winter of 2005. Unfortunately, the acoustic sound failed to bring in large record sales. Gackt returned to electric guitars and the occasional synthesized riff with his next three singles and the album DIABOLOS. Not only did his music change, but also his image as he began to adapt to a dark costume to better suit the heavy, dramatic singles he produced that year.
The look can probably be attributed to Gackt’s inclusion in the Square Enix video game Final Fantasy VII: Dirge of Cerberus, which was released in Japan in January 2006. Gackt provided the theme song with his first single of 2006, “REDEMPTION.” January 2006 also brought Gackt to Korea where he performed. While in Seoul, Gackt suddenly collapsed onstage in front of an audience of concerned fans. But with great resilience and grace, Gackt returned minutes later, attributing his poor health to over-exhaustion.
With twenty-four highly varied singles and eight unique albums, Gackt not only transcends musical genres from rock to pop to folk to heavy metal, but also comes as an unstoppable force of an entertainer. Though he is a musician first and foremost, acting, writing, modeling, and even dancing are hardly off limits. Ambition drove this once cynical rock critic to become one of the biggest acts in Japan today. While setting the bar for entertainers in Japan, Gackt has redefined the rock n’ roll star as almost limitlessly talented, articulate, and devoted to his music and fans. It is this attitude that will keep Gackt entertaining audiences for years to come.
Guitar : Chachamaru [support member]
Guitar, Violin : You [support member]
Keyboard : Igao [support member]
Drums : Toshi [support member]
Drums : Ryuichi [support member]
Bass : Ju-ken [support member]
PROFILE
At the beginning of his musical career, Gackt M.S. Camui didn’t want to become a rock star. In fact, he despised members of rock bands as incapable musician-wannabes with a talent for making senseless noise. Rock music contradicted every sense of order and finesse that his classical upbringing possessed, leaving the young Gackt completely disenchanted with the premise of popular rock music.
Fast-forward to today. Not only did Gackt step away from classical music and leap into the rock genre, but he also transformed himself into one of Japan’s most well-recognized and acclaimed pop-rock artists. Six original albums, twenty-four singles, numerous live and televised performances, and several media campaigns in his solo career alone have gained Gackt his celebrity status. With the full intention of having his music dominating the Asian pop scene, the name and image of Gackt has become synonymous with rock ‘n roll popularity.
BIOGRAPHY
Born into a musically inclined family in Okinawa, Gackt (whose birth name is unknown to the public) almost naturally shied away from the music that was popular in his childhood. His father, a classically trained trumpet player, urged him to begin studying the piano at the age of three. Up until he was about seven-years-old, Gackt enjoyed the lessons. But a rude awakening occurred when he almost drowned in the ocean, forcing him to determine the real reason why he played piano. He did not play for his own enjoyment, but was instead forced by his parents. At age eleven, he gladly quit.
Without piano in his life, prepubescent Gackt was unable to satiate his competitive nature. By fourteen, he returned to the piano, this time studying on his own accord with the motivation to be better than anyone else. Not only did he want to one-up his more skilled classmates, but he set it as his mission to surpass them by leaps and bounds. Gackt soon found himself picking up various brass instruments, becoming familiar enough to be able to play them as well.
Despite his growing classical range, Gackt remained unfamiliar with the music his peers enjoyed. His parents rarely let him watch television, hence limiting his exposure to the music outside what was played in their house. Though his father listened to enka in the car, Gackt’s parents hardly regarded anything other than classical, European music.
Thus, when exposed to rock-style drums in his Kyoto junior high school, Gackt was left dumbstruck. He soon became intrigued with the differences between the music he was familiar with and the bewildering, new genre he was about to discover. The often violent and intense style of rock overshadowed everything he knew about the refinement of classical music. He also found the idea of responsibility resting on four or five musicians who created a band drastically more appealing than the large, orchestral setting where an individual could easily get lost in a sea of sound.
Still, listening to the unpolished sounds of most bands left Gackt reluctant to accept rock as a legitimate genre. He decided that he wanted to bring his trained background into the scene as a drummer. During and right after his high school years, practice led to the joining of several unnamed bands, all of which Gackt found relatively unchallenging to his needs. He required an outlet that would provide him with musicians who could compete on his level and not drag him down into the realm of amateurs that he despised.
Gackt discovered this in YOU, a guitarist he observed at a Kyoto live house. Immediately, Gackt found himself convinced that there were people who played rock music and were talented, worthy musicians. After befriending YOU, Gackt suggested that the two of them form a band. Cains:Feel came into fruition with Gackt on drums and YOU on guitar. However, no vocalists impressed them on the level they required, leaving their options limited.
It was at this point that Gackt brought out the instrument that would later become his most famous: his voice. Coincidently, members of Cains:Feel enlisted Gackt as only a temporary vocalist. Since it was one of the few areas where he had not been properly trained, Gackt’s range was limited to a low register, contrasting those of the popular vocalists at that time. Despite the odds, Gackt worked on his voice, training it to reach higher notes yet still keeping its rich, baritone sound. He soon became the band’s permanent vocalist.
The role of vocalist and frontman of Cains:Feel seemed to suit Gackt’s ambitions only temporarily. In 1995, at the age of 22, he was invited to Tokyo by Mana. The guitarist of Malice Mizer expressed interest in having Gackt join the band as vocalist. Intrigued by Mana’s style and the possibility of reaching a wider audience through this already fairly well-known band in the indies scene, Gackt eagerly joined. The expectations for Malice Mizer outweighed Gackt’s inhibitions towards joining a band that relied heavily on image.
At the first live with Gackt as vocalist in October 1995, Malice Mizer sold out the 600 seat AIR WEST venue in Shibuya, Tokyo. Starting in November of that same year, the band had its first one-man show called Sans retour Voyage. Following a string of independent singles and the album Voyage, Malice Mizer jumped onto the major scene with the single “Bel Air ~ Kuuhaku no toki no naka de ~” on July 19, 1997. The single was met with astounding popularity, stealing the number 20 spot on the Oricon Singles Chart for that week.
Arguably, Malice Mizer’s greatest success with Gackt as vocalist came with the release of their first major album, merveilles. At number 2 on the Oricon Album Chart, merveilles fueled the launch of Malice Mizer as a band that would break the boundary between visual kei style and popular music of Japan in the late 1990’s. The album inspired the merveilles ~shuuen to kisu~ tour, which ended in the famous Yokohama Arena in July of 1998.
Before long, Gackt felt that he had reached the success he had aspired to as a young musician. He became a well-recognized face in Malice Mizer, adding to the mix of characters as the tall, suave prince to counter Mana’s Victorian-style lady. Adoring fans anxious to see extravagant costumes and raunchy pantomimes made up the majority of the audience. Malice Mizer was the commercially successful band that countless visual kei artists sought to be.
But success came with a dark side for Gackt. While his voice reached thousands of people, his music did not. The majority of creative control over Malice Mizer was in Mana’s hands, which included most of the musical composition. Though Gackt wrote lyrics, the single “Le Ciel” was the only song over which he had complete control. Self-doubt began to creep up on the band as Gackt thirsted for more influence on decisions concerning Malice Mizer. While the two guitarists Mana and Közi found it necessary to stay true to their particular style, Gackt wanted to go in a different direction. He noted the waning of visual kei’s popularity, and the poster child of the genre would not be spared.
The clash between band members soon led Gackt to announce his interest in a solo career, which later led to his official departure from Malice Mizer on January 19, 1999. Removing himself from both the pressures of people in the Japanese music business and fans, Gackt decided to record his first solo album in Los Angeles, CA. A few weeks before the album’s release, a special Easter Live was held in order to debut the album’s title song “Mizerable.” Though he stressed that his endeavors were part of a solo project, Gackt appeared on stage with members of what would later be called GacktJOB: Masa (guitar), Ren (bass), and another ex-Cains:Feel member, YOU (guitar).
By the time Mizerable was released on May 12, 1999, word had spread that Gackt’s solo career would break expectations about the former vocalist of one of Japan’s most famous visual kei bands. It left its mark on the Oricon Album Chart with its highest ranking at number 2, starting a trend for all of Gackt’s original albums to reach the top ten. A video containing the “Mizerable” P.V. and behind-the-scenes clips soon followed. Gackt, sporting an eighteenth century European inspired jacket, held true to his visual roots in the P.V.
That soon changed, however, with the release of the single “Vanilla” on August 11 of that year. Abandoning the violin for a brass section, Gackt stretched his imagination to create a sound unlike anything he had ever performed before. The rhythm guitar beat like a racing pulse, supporting the raunchy, unsubtle lyrics. Not only was Gackt separating his style from that of Malice Mizer, but also from the conservative, classical genre of his childhood piano lessons.
With the fresh success of Mizerable and “Vanilla,” Gackt greeted the new millennium with a string of singles: “Mirror,” “Oasis,” and “sekirei ~seki ray~.” At just over a year old, Gackt’s solo career produced his first original album, MARS, on April 26. The album soon inspired a cross-country tour the day after its release until July 1. Advertisements on the newly opened official homepage entitled Dears spurred audiences to flock to the various locations across Japan. Appearing with GacktJOB members Masa, Ren, and You, Gackt introduced two new components of his “family:” Yukihiro “Chachamaru” Fujimura on guitar and Toshi on drums. Gackt had finally achieved the vision of music that he composed and performed reaching countless individuals in Japan and abroad.
Gackt hardly stopped there. Rounding out the year 2000, Gackt released two more singles and video footage of the tour’s final performance entitled MARS ~ Sora kara no houmonsha kaisou. In December, his first PLATINUM BOX was released. The special item included P.V.s, behind-the-scenes clips, and a CD of the audio from the concert. PLATINUM BOX ~I~ and the PLATINUM BOX sets to follow show fans Gackt’s devotion to giving something a little extra that most artists ignore. Musicianship is not enough for Gackt; he wants to please the fans, giving them the satisfaction that he is an artist who cares.
One way to appease the public was to reinvent his music yet again. Gackt’s eighth single, “Kimi no tameni dekiru koto,” and second album, REBIRTH, gave a taste of his pop-rock side. But he went even further with “ANOTHER WORLD,” released on September 5, 2001. Gackt’s highest grossing single proved his previous notions that visual kei was out of style, and that it was time to embrace the world of pop.
2001 also saw the rise of Gackt the marketing mogul. While he had already participated in a television advertisement for the Kirin brand beverage FIRE in September of 2000, Gackt appeared in commercials for neue MEN’s cologne, e-ma brand candies, and the Konami video game Metal Gear Solid 2 by the end of 2001. To add on to his busy schedule, Gackt became a regular guest on the television variety show Domoto Kyoudai in mid-April, taking a brief break for his latest tour Requiem et Reminiscence.
On December 16, 2001, Gackt began a holiday tradition by releasing the single “12Gatsu no Love Song,” the video of which chronicled the expression of unity people displayed just a few months after the September 11 attacks on New York City. The single has spurred several revamps as Gackt rearranges the music and/or rewrites the lyrics in a different language each consecutive year. Other than the original Japanese, the single has been written in English (“December Love Song”), Mandarin Chinese (“Shi Er Yue De Qing Ge”), and Korean.
By 2002, Gackt’s fame had reached beyond Japanese borders. While he continued with more single releases, commercials, television appearances, and the third album MOON, Gackt was invited to perform in China at a diplomatic commemoration concert. Along with several other Japanese and Chinese artists, Gackt appeared live and on television on September 22, his music reaching the ears of countless individuals across Asia.
Soon after the success in China, Gackt returned to Japan for his next tour, Kagen no Tsuki. But it wasn’t Gackt’s music that peaked the public’s interest at that point. At the end of 2002, he announced the future release of the film MOON CHILD. As both star and co-writer, Gackt stretched his talents into new territory. Not only did the movie command the attention of Gackt fans, but also the fans of his co-stars: fellow Japanese vocalist HYDE and Taiwanese actor Wang Leehom. Heavy campaigning and merchandising fueled the film’s cult following even before its release on April 19, 2003. The film was presented at film festivals abroad as well, later to be released in the United States on DVD by TLA Video.
Gackt continued to step outside the realm of music as he provided the voice for the anime New Fist of the North Star. Later on in the year, Gackt sported his martial arts abilities as the model for the main character in Taito and Sega’s Red Entertainment video game Bujingai. The game, which was released in Japan and the United States, not only featured Gackt’s body and voice, but also contained special, unlockable interviews with him in both versions.
Despite contributing to numerous other projects, Gackt continued to stay true to his love for music. Three original singles were released as he hit the road on his tour called Jougen no Tsuki. In December, a special Gackt Surprise Party Campaign began in which contestants would get one wish granted as long as they bought the singles “Last Song” and “Shi Er Yue De Qing Ge,” his fourth album CRESCENT, and PLATINUM BOX IV.
But what really made 2003 stand out as a pivotal year for Gackt was the publishing of his autobiography entitled Jihaku. The book gave fans and critics alike the true “confessions” of Gackt’s various life experiences. From his near-death drownings to leaving Malice Mizer to his taste in cars, Gackt revealed just enough of himself while still leaving some tidbits up to the reader’s imagination.
Just after the fifth anniversary of his solo career, Gackt released on February 25, 2004, a best-of album entitled THE SIXTH DAY. Unlike the singles collections of most artists, Gackt rerecorded fourteen tracks, making adjustments to the accompaniment and his own voice. THE SIXTH DAY & SEVENTH NIGHT tour followed, surprising fans with theatrical martial arts, masked dancers, and even a disappearing act. While on tour, Gackt released another set of rerecorded songs, SEVENTH NIGHT, this time making them entirely acoustic.
Continuing with the acoustic trend, Gackt produced his twentieth single “Arittake no ai de” and seventh album Love Letter in the winter of 2005. Unfortunately, the acoustic sound failed to bring in large record sales. Gackt returned to electric guitars and the occasional synthesized riff with his next three singles and the album DIABOLOS. Not only did his music change, but also his image as he began to adapt to a dark costume to better suit the heavy, dramatic singles he produced that year.
The look can probably be attributed to Gackt’s inclusion in the Square Enix video game Final Fantasy VII: Dirge of Cerberus, which was released in Japan in January 2006. Gackt provided the theme song with his first single of 2006, “REDEMPTION.” January 2006 also brought Gackt to Korea where he performed. While in Seoul, Gackt suddenly collapsed onstage in front of an audience of concerned fans. But with great resilience and grace, Gackt returned minutes later, attributing his poor health to over-exhaustion.
With twenty-four highly varied singles and eight unique albums, Gackt not only transcends musical genres from rock to pop to folk to heavy metal, but also comes as an unstoppable force of an entertainer. Though he is a musician first and foremost, acting, writing, modeling, and even dancing are hardly off limits. Ambition drove this once cynical rock critic to become one of the biggest acts in Japan today. While setting the bar for entertainers in Japan, Gackt has redefined the rock n’ roll star as almost limitlessly talented, articulate, and devoted to his music and fans. It is this attitude that will keep Gackt entertaining audiences for years to come.
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