| Eikichi Yazawa | |
| Background: | solo_singer |
| Birth Date: | 14 September 1949 |
| Origin: | Hiroshima, Hiroshima Prefecture, Japan |
| Genre: | Rock |
| Years Active: | 1972–present |
| Label: | Garuru Records (his indie label) |
| Website: | www.eikichiyazawa.com |
is a Japanese singer-songwriter, and a prominent figure in Japanese popular music.[1] Yoko Yazawa of The Generous is his daughter. He has been nicknamed as Ei-chan (永ちゃん), Boss or The King of Rock.
Eikichi Yazawa was born in Hiroshima, on September 14, 1949. His father was a bicycle shop owner but died of radiation sickness when Eikichi was in the 2nd grade of elementary school. His mother disappeared, leaving her husband and son behind when Eikichi was 3 years old. He was mainly raised by his paternal grandmother in poverty until he graduated high school. Being bullied in school, such as having a cake thrown at his face, he started to think and practice his philosophy of "being big,” which allowed him to survive the poverty and the bullying.
When he was in junior high school, he listened to music such as The Ventures and The Beatles, which led him to a career as a rock musician. He started to learn the guitar, and on New Year's Day of 1968, he composed his first song, I Love You, OK.
In 1968, three weeks after he graduated from high school, Yazawa left Hiroshima by train to Tokyo. But on the way, he experienced pain from sitting too long and decided to get off and start living in Yokohama.
Making ends meet by working a few jobs, he formed several bands: "The Base," "E-Set" and "Yamato" with changing members. All of these bands mainly played in the clubs of Yokohama. But after the breakup of "Yamato," Japanese musical trends switched to folk music, which led to several clubs closing one after another.
In the beginning of 1972, he started recruiting members for a new band by putting up posters in music stores. With new members, Johnny Okura (side guitar and side vocals) and Toshikatsu Uchiumi (lead guitar), he formed the band "Carol." Yazawa was the lead vocalist and bassist of the group. The band received wide recognition after their appearance on the October 1 episode of TV show "Live Young!" on Fuji TV. On December 20 of the same year, Carol released their debut single "Louisiana", produced by Mickey Curtis who saw their performance on the program. Mickey also introduced them to a drummer, You Okazaki, who later become a member of the band.
Carol's style was deeply influenced by The Beatles, especially when they were based in Liverpool. With their motorcycle jackets and pompadour hairstyle, and early rock ‘n’ roll style numbers, along with the cover versions of "Johnny B. Goode" and "You've Really Got a Hold on Me", the band gained notable popularity and greatly influenced Japanese popular music. Their biggest hit Funky Monkey Baby (released on June 25, 1973) became a standard of Japanese rock music.
Carol broke up in 1975 after their infamous final concert in Hibiya Open-Air Concert Hall, Tokyo. After the last song Last Chance was played, firecrackers accidentally exploded and burned down the stage. This event is referred to as the biggest "Hibiya Legend" in the history of this traditional hall.
In May 1975, Yazawa flew to the U.S. to start his solo career after signing with CBS Sony. His first solo album, I Love You, OK, was recorded at the A&M Studios in Los Angeles and produced by The Godfather soundtrack producer, Tom Mack. This album got generally unfavorable reviews because Yazawa switched his style of music. Thus, his first solo concert tour, E.YAZAWA Around Japan Part-1, ended disastrously, as Yazawa couldn't fill the venue in Sasebo city, Nagasaki, which only held 1,500 people. He made an oath to himself under the catchphrase of "Remember Sasebo" to become the biggest-selling rock artist in Japan. He continued to tour everywhere in Japan to show that Carol's former leader was now a solo artist.
On July 24, 1976, he finally went back to Hibiya Hall, under the name of The Star in Hibiya, with sold-out audiences and a new album, A Day. Backing him up at this concert was The Sadistics. His 33000 Miles Road Japan tour played 66 concerts and he steadily gained popularity as a superstar of Japanese rock.
After the remarkable success of his third album Open Your Heart, Yazawa played his first solo performance at Nippon Budokan on August 26, 1977 to a sold-out crowd of over 13,000 people. His live album, Super Live Nippon Budokan, which contains most of this concert, was released three months after the show. This album is often described as the best live album of Japanese rock.
1978 is regarded as one of the best years of Yazawa's career. Not only did his 4th album, Goldrush, which was later rated No. 5 on list of the "100 Greatest Japanese Rock Albums of All Time" of Rolling Stones Japan,[4] go to #1 in the Oricon charts, but his autobiography Nari-Agari (trans. Upstart) which was edited by video game designer and ad writer Shigesato Itoi, sold over a million copies. On August 28, he performed a concert in Korakuen Stadium in front of 50,000 attendees. He also ranked 1st of top-earning musicians by Japanese government, beating the Enka queen Hibari Misora. The following year, he performed at 96 venues, including Nagoya Stadium.
Despite his success, he experienced an "emptiness" by being on top and getting everything he wanted. In 1980, Yazawa signed a contract with Warner Pioneer (now Warner Music Japan) and moved to the West Coast of the United States. He tried to overcome the emptiness by conquering a new land.
Yazawa moved to Los Angeles and started to find musicians to record his new album. In 1981, he released his first English album Yazawa. This album was produced by Bobby LaKind of the Doobie Brothers, and Paul Barrere of Little Feat. The musicians included John McFee, Patrick Simmons, Keith Knudsen, Cornelius Bumpus, Willie Weeks, Richard Hayward, Kenny Gradney, and Mark Jordan. He also released the album Rising Sun for the Japanese market.
In 1982, he released the single Rockin’ My Heart and his second English album, YAZAWA It's Just Rock’n’Roll, produced by Bobby and John McFee. Rockin’ My Heart was recommended by Billboard magazine in its February 19, 1983 issue. He also released the album P.M.9 for the Japanese market. In September, he began his P.M.9 1982 E.YAZAWA Concert Tour with John McFee, Richie Zito, Dennis Belfield, Keith Knudsen, Mark Jordan, and Bobby LaKind. This tour included two Budokan concerts. John and Keith would be long term musicians of Yazawa's concerts until 1996.
The next few years included Yazawa releasing an album in Japanese, 1984's E’, which was the first of his albums produced by Andrew Gold. In 1985, he sang at Live Aid and his performance of the song Take It Time was broadcast worldwide. During this period, Yazawa's music style could almost be described as AOR, under the influence of his American friends. Unfortunately, Yazawa's marketing in the U.S. was non-existent because Warner Pioneer didn't advertise or commit other resources for the album. It just distributed the album through Elektra/Asylum, which didn't have to advertise Yazawa's music at all. Yazawa realized this and decided to sign with EMI Music Japan and headed back to his home country. In 1987 he released his last album in English, Flash in Japan, only in America. (It was later released in Japan in 1999). During that year's Rock’n’Roll Knight 2 tour, bassist George Hawkins joined Yazawa's band and he would play with for Yazawa's until 2016.
In 1988, Yazawa's first album on EMI, Kyohansha (translated: Accomplice), was released. This album was recorded in London, with U.K. musicians such as Jaz Lochrie, Alan Murphy, Micky Moody, and Jimmy Copley. He played 76 concerts this year, with the last one being his first at the Tokyo Dome. The following year, he held two additional concerts there as well. On the tour of 1990, Rock’n’Roll Army, Keyboardist Guy Allison joined. He is still part of the band.
1991's album, Don't Wanna Stop, was a new challenge for him. Half of the album was recorded in London by producer George McFarlane, and the other half was produced in L.A. by Andrew Gold.
In 1992, he started to appear in the advertisement of Suntory's brand-new canned coffee product, Boss. It was a very surprising commercial because he played an unfortunate worker, breaking the impression of rock music charisma. During this period, Yazawa continually appeared in media. In 1994, he starred in the drama Ari Yo Saraba (translated: Goodbye, Ants) as a high school biology teacher. In this drama, he sings both the opening theme and the ending theme.
In 1995, 20 years after his solo debut, Yazawa held the concert tour called Just Tonight, which included several stadium or dome concerts (Yokohama Stadium, Hankyu Nishinomiya Stadium, Fukuoka Dome). This concert's back-up band (John McFee, Bruce Gowdy, George Hawkins, Keith Knudsen, Guy Allison) is referred to as the best of Yazawa's concerts.
He tried something new in 1996 by recording his completely new album live in front of his fans. This event, Open Recording Gig, was released on VHS and DVD along with the recorded album, Maria.In 1997, he was invited to "Songs and Visions", the rock festival held in Wembley Stadium as the special guest and representative of Asia, alongside Rod Stewart, Jon Bon Jovi, Chaka Kahn, and Robert Palmer. He sang "Don't Be Cruel" solo, snd "Heartbreak Hotel" and "Hey Jude" with other musicians.
In 1998, Yazawa was swindled out of about 3.5 billion yen (approx. $35 million U.S.) for a huge building construction project in Australia. It took him several years to pay off the debt.
He also starred in the movie, Ojuken (translated: Entrance Exam) as a corporate-owned marathon runner. On September 15, 1999, the day after his 50th birthday, he held an anniversary concert called Tonight the Night! in Yokohama International Stadium, with a capacity of 70,000, keeping the promise he made in his book Nari-Agari. Many people believe that this concert was the best performance of his career as well as the best concert in the history of Japanese rock music.
In 1999 and 2000, Yazawa held 3 concerts each year in the U.S. These are the only tour that held outside of Japan.
In 2002, 30th anniversary of his debut, Yazawa tried a few new challenges. First, he held first acoustic tour Voice in 22 cities, besides the normal rock-style concert tour. Second, he performed at Tokyo Stadium at the first time, as his special concert, The Day.
In 2003, he sang "When You Wish Upon a Star", in the Tokyo Disney Sea during the parade is going on, no notice in advance. In this year, Yazawa also appeared at the domestic rock festival for the first time. In this year's tour, he invited Czech National Symphony Orchestra to hold Rock Opera, under the concept of "fusion of rock and classical music".In December 2005, Yazawa ran a sold-out Japan tour of "live houses" (Japanese-English for a live-music club) as a part of his "back to roots" approach to his 30th anniversary as a solo artist, following the breakup of rock band Carol in 1975. 'Ei-chan' delighted fans with a rendition of "Whiskey Coke," a hit from that year (and a Karaoke library mainstay), as well as numbers from his 2005 album, Only One.
The tour of 2006 is the continuance of Rock Opera, called New Standard -Rock Opera 2-. In this tour, with Czech National Symphony Orchestra, he played some orchestrated version of songs, including epic version of his popular ballad, "Tokyo". He also played jazz version of the songs in the Blue Note Tokyo, traditional jazz club.
On December 16, 2007, Yazawa achieved 100th concert at Nippon Budokan for the first time. On this day, he appeared in the same clothes as the first Budokan concert. In addition, he chose "Come on Baby" as the opening number, just like the first Budokan live started. John McFee, George Hawkins, and Guy Allison joined as the special guest in this historical concert.
On September 19, 2009, 5 days after the day of his 60th birthday, he held the concert in Tokyo Dome, for the first time in 20 years. Kyosuke Himuro, Hiroto Kōmoto, and Masatoshi Mashima joined as special guests to sing "Kuroku Nuritsubuse (lit. fill it with darkness)" with Yazawa.And on September 1, 2012, he hold the concert called Blue Sky, in Yokohama International Stadium (now as Nissan Stadium) to commemorate his 40th anniversary of his debut. In this live, former Carol guitarist Toshikatsu Uchiumi appeared as a guest to play a few Carol hits, including "Funky Monkey Baby", and their debut single "Louisiana".
From 2013 to 2016, Yazawa reduced the number of concerts on his annual tour. He mainly held the concerts in large cities like Tokyo, Osaka, Fukuoka, Nagoya. Instead of this reduction, he formed the band called Z's with young musicians and hold the live in the provincial cities like Miyazaki, Shizuoka, Akita, and so on.
In the Christmas of 2013, he started to have the dinner show called Dreamer in Grand Hyatt Tokyo. This show held in the Christmas season of 2014, 2016, and 2019. The version of Christmas day of 2016 is released in Blu-ray and DVD on the following year.
On September 5, 2015, Rock in Dome, his 5th Tokyo Dome concert is held. The dome was filled with a full crowd of over 50,000 audiences. For this concert, he filmed the video work of riding the motorcycle at the California area.
In 2017, he resumed large-scale live tour, Traveling Bus 2017. This tour is named after 1977 concert tour Traveling Bus, which includes 1st Budokan live. This tour's band including Geoff Dugmore, Jeff Kollman, Guy Allison, and Snake Davis.
In 2018, because his age is turning into 69 (the number 69 can be read as "rock" in Japanese), the tour called Stay Rock is held in 5 cities, which includes his first concert in Kyocera Dome Osaka. The toured finished in Tokyo Dome on September 15, 2018. This live is aired on television.
Two concerts in 2019 tour Rock Must Go On were canceled because of Yazawa's throat ache. That was his first time to cancel his concert. He successfully came back on the live in Sendai, and the tour was concluded in Osaka-jō Hall. He planned the extra concerts of this tour in 2020 but canceled due to Coronavirus pandemic. During the pandemic, he distributed three unreleased live on streaming service.Yazawa has been back on stage in the autumn of 2021. In this tour I'm Back!! -Rock is Unstoppable-, he held 31 concerts in 23 cities, including 4 concerts in Nippon Budokan.
In the year of 2022, half-century anniversary of his debut, Yazawa continues his activities. In July, the rock festival organized by Yazawa himself is held. And on August 27, he started the 50th anniversary stadium and dome tour My Way from the Japan National Stadium. NHK reported this live's rehearsal, calling him as "King of Rock". That was first concert held in this place with audiences (idol group Arashi taped the concert without audiences in 2020). The tour will continue in Fukuoka Dome on September 17, Kyocera Dome Osaka on September 24.
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