Piko

Emerging from online video fame, the angel-voiced Piko fused J-Pop with visual kei through an extraordinary vocal span and androgynous appearance. His first major-label album landed inside Japan’s Top 10, while its successor posted nearly identical results. Born March 11, 1988, in Kobe, he started performing during high school, joining a band and the school’s keionbu light-music club. At his mother’s urging he posted several performances on Nico Nico Douga, adopting his pet dog’s name as his stage moniker. The uploads, chiefly covers of Vocaloid-produced tracks, quickly amassed millions of views. His range of at least three octaves enabled an uncannily accurate female timbre on many recordings, prompting first-time listeners to assume he was a woman and earning him the fan nickname “Ryouseirui,” meaning “both voice types.”

That internet traction prompted him to self-release the single “Thanatos,” which included Tissue Hime (“Tissue Princess”), along with the album Infinity; both titles charted well enough to attract major-label interest. In 2010 he joined Ki/oon, a Sony subsidiary that also housed L’Arc-en-Ciel, Art-School, and Sid. Unlike most J-Pop soloists, he was positioned toward visual-kei audiences via ornate costumes on artwork and music that blended rock with electronic elements such as pop-trance. The Ki/oon debut single “Story” bowed at number 10; in May 2011 the full-length 1Piko climbed to number eight. Almost a year later he issued the similarly strong 2Piko. Completing the circle, his voice later served as the model for a Vocaloid character, leading him to record an album of the same covers that launched his career.