Biography
Luna Sea emerged as the leading visual kei outfit of the 1990s, on par with X-Japan, whose two members discovered the younger group in 1990 and maintained a mentor-protégé bond with them even after X-Japan itself disbanded in the mid-1990s. Rooted in 1980s hard rock, Luna Sea nevertheless pursued an adaptable and at times almost progressive songwriting style, while the more restrained material they unveiled later in their career proved equally compelling.
The quintet came together in 1989 under the original name Lunacy. High-school friends guitarist Shinobu "Inoran" Inoue and bassist Jun "J" Onose linked up with guitarist and violinist Yasuhiro "Sugizo" Sugihara and drummer Shinya Yamada, both ex-members of Pinocchio, during idle stretches of their college years in the Tokyo vicinity; vocalist Ryuichi Kawamura, formerly of Slaughter, completed the lineup. The band began performing in small clubs and issued three demo recordings before the close of the year. They adopted the Luna Sea name in 1990, by which point they already commanded a sizable Tokyo following. Hideto Matsumoto, lead guitarist of X-Japan, attended one of their shows and facilitated their signing to the niche visual kei imprint Extasy Records owned by X-Japan drummer Yoshiki Hayashi, who produced the self-titled debut album that appeared in 1991—the only Luna Sea release that failed to chart on Oricon. A completely sold-out 1992 tour earned them a contract with Universal, after which their commercial ascent accelerated: Image (1992) reached number nine, Eden (1993) climbed to number five, and Mother (1994), recorded in seclusion and regarded by many fans as the band’s artistic peak, finished just one position shy of the summit.
Following a year-long recording hiatus in 1995, the group secured consecutive number-one albums with Style (1996), Shine (1998), and the Singles compilation (1997). Signs of strain nevertheless surfaced. Each member had already spent a year on solo projects before Shine’s release, and the album’s stylistic shift prompted some devoted listeners, perhaps unfairly, to accuse the band of “going pop.” Inoran supplied the theme song “Breathe” for Disney’s 1997 animated film Mulan, and the subsequent tour received support from the studio. Those dates were followed by the band’s first performances outside Japan—in Taipei, Hong Kong, and Shanghai—before a massive Tokyo concert that proceeded despite a storm damaging part of the stage the night before; more than 100,000 fans attended, and the members arrived via helicopter in Beatles-style fashion.
A live album, Never Sold Out, appeared in 1999. Although Inoran’s “Sweetest Coma Again” was chosen for the Japanese soundtrack of the James Bond film The World Is Not Enough, the next studio album, Lunacy (2000), peaked at number three rather than number one and proved to be the final release by the original lineup. In 2000 the members announced that Luna Sea would “drop the curtain,” a phrasing that avoided the word “split” yet signaled a disbandment; the farewell was preceded by the chart-topping best-of collection Period and two sold-out nights at Tokyo Dome. All five musicians remained active afterward, forming new bands such as Fake? and Tourbillon and collaborating with artists including Nanase Aikawa and Miyavi (Yamada) as well as Gackt and Yoshiki of X-Japan (Sugizo, in the supergroup S.K.I.N.).
Luna Sea staged a one-off reunion concert in 2007 that sold out in five minutes. They officially re-formed in 2010 and embarked on an extensive world tour. Their eighth album, A Will—the first in thirteen years—arrived in 2013. The following year they marked their 25th anniversary with a series of special shows. Luv was released in 2017 and Cross in 2019; the latter marked the band’s first collaboration with a Western producer, Steve Lillywhite, best known for his work with U2.
The quintet came together in 1989 under the original name Lunacy. High-school friends guitarist Shinobu "Inoran" Inoue and bassist Jun "J" Onose linked up with guitarist and violinist Yasuhiro "Sugizo" Sugihara and drummer Shinya Yamada, both ex-members of Pinocchio, during idle stretches of their college years in the Tokyo vicinity; vocalist Ryuichi Kawamura, formerly of Slaughter, completed the lineup. The band began performing in small clubs and issued three demo recordings before the close of the year. They adopted the Luna Sea name in 1990, by which point they already commanded a sizable Tokyo following. Hideto Matsumoto, lead guitarist of X-Japan, attended one of their shows and facilitated their signing to the niche visual kei imprint Extasy Records owned by X-Japan drummer Yoshiki Hayashi, who produced the self-titled debut album that appeared in 1991—the only Luna Sea release that failed to chart on Oricon. A completely sold-out 1992 tour earned them a contract with Universal, after which their commercial ascent accelerated: Image (1992) reached number nine, Eden (1993) climbed to number five, and Mother (1994), recorded in seclusion and regarded by many fans as the band’s artistic peak, finished just one position shy of the summit.
Following a year-long recording hiatus in 1995, the group secured consecutive number-one albums with Style (1996), Shine (1998), and the Singles compilation (1997). Signs of strain nevertheless surfaced. Each member had already spent a year on solo projects before Shine’s release, and the album’s stylistic shift prompted some devoted listeners, perhaps unfairly, to accuse the band of “going pop.” Inoran supplied the theme song “Breathe” for Disney’s 1997 animated film Mulan, and the subsequent tour received support from the studio. Those dates were followed by the band’s first performances outside Japan—in Taipei, Hong Kong, and Shanghai—before a massive Tokyo concert that proceeded despite a storm damaging part of the stage the night before; more than 100,000 fans attended, and the members arrived via helicopter in Beatles-style fashion.
A live album, Never Sold Out, appeared in 1999. Although Inoran’s “Sweetest Coma Again” was chosen for the Japanese soundtrack of the James Bond film The World Is Not Enough, the next studio album, Lunacy (2000), peaked at number three rather than number one and proved to be the final release by the original lineup. In 2000 the members announced that Luna Sea would “drop the curtain,” a phrasing that avoided the word “split” yet signaled a disbandment; the farewell was preceded by the chart-topping best-of collection Period and two sold-out nights at Tokyo Dome. All five musicians remained active afterward, forming new bands such as Fake? and Tourbillon and collaborating with artists including Nanase Aikawa and Miyavi (Yamada) as well as Gackt and Yoshiki of X-Japan (Sugizo, in the supergroup S.K.I.N.).
Luna Sea staged a one-off reunion concert in 2007 that sold out in five minutes. They officially re-formed in 2010 and embarked on an extensive world tour. Their eighth album, A Will—the first in thirteen years—arrived in 2013. The following year they marked their 25th anniversary with a series of special shows. Luv was released in 2017 and Cross in 2019; the latter marked the band’s first collaboration with a Western producer, Steve Lillywhite, best known for his work with U2.
Albums
Singles
