Fire Bomber Explained

Fire Bomber
Background:	group_or_band
Years Active:	-present (irregularly)
Associated Acts:	Yoshiki Fukuyama, Chie Kajiura
Current Members:	Basara Nekki Mylene Flare Jenius Ray Lovelock Veffidas Feaze
Past Members:	unknown female singer

Fire Bomber is a fictional rock band from the anime series Macross 7 (and related projects such as Macross 7 Trash, Macross 7 Encore, and Macross Dynamite 7). In real life, Fire Bomber's music was performed by Yoshiki Fukuyama (the singing voice and guitar of Basara), Chie Kajiura (the singing voice of Mylene), and occasionally by Tomo Sakurai (the acting spokesperson of Mylene).

The four band members are among the main characters of Macross 7, whose narrative significantly focuses on their adventures (particularly on those of the two lead vocalists Basara Nekki and Mylene Flare Jenius). The band members sing on stage as well as in space, where they occasionally engage in combat in their mecha. In the fictional world of Macross, Fire Bomber was pivotal in defeating the alien Protodeviln after discovering that their music was the only thing capable of affecting them. ^{[1] [2] [3] [4] [5]}

Three of their songs were also featured in the 2008 series Macross Frontier, as S.M.S. Skull Leader Ozma Lee is a fan of the band. In the second Macross Frontier movie, Ranka Lee and other SMS members acted as the cover band of Fire Bomber (titled "Lovely Bomber") as part of a diversion to free Sheryl Nome from prison.

Fictional line-up

• Basara Nekki – Lead vocals, guitar
• Mylene Flare Jenius – Bass, co-lead vocals
• Ray Lovelock – Keytar
• Veffidas Feaze – Drums

Real line-up

• Vocals – Yoshiki Fukuyama and Nobutoshi Hayashi (Basara Nekki)
• Vocals – Chie Kajiura and Tomo Sakurai (Mylene Jenius)
• Bass – Yukio Sugi
• Drums – Kazuo Sitay
• Guitars – Yoshiki Fukuyama
• Guitars – Haruhiko Mera
• Guitars – Masaki Suzuki
• Keyboards – Seiji Tanaka

Discography

• LET'S FIRE!!. The first Macross 7/Fire Bomber album was released. It contains the tracks played in the first half of the TV series in more or less the order in which they appear in the episodes.^[6]
• SECOND FIRE!. The second Fire Bomber CD. Contains the songs played in the second half of the series, including the two "Let's Bomber!" video songs. ^[7]
• DYNAMITE FIRE!! The Dynamite OVA song album. Songs are in more or less the order in which they appear in the series, though there are several that are never sung in the OVA at all. ^[8]
• RADIO FIRE!!. This CD contains the complete radio program from all the radio broadcasts from Elma's radio and the Zola public radio in the Dynamite OVA. Most of the tracks on this CD are drama tracks. There are also different versions of Fire Bomber songs and songs by other artists.^[9]
• LIVE FIRE!! (1995). A recording CD of Fire Bomber live in concert. The tracks are mostly sung by the voice actor of Basara (Hayashi Nobutoushi) and Mylene (Sakurai Tomo), not their singing voices from the anime.^{[10] [11]}
• KARA-OK FIRE!!. Karaoke album of most of the songs that appear in the TV series. Contains duet and guitar karaoke bonus tracks at the end for Planet Dance.^[12]
• ACOUSTIC FIRE!! The songs on this acoustic album are not quite the acoustic versions found in the anime itself. There's more instrumentation, though little enough to be called "acoustic." The album also has a more "country American" feel to it, since it was recorded in the USA. ^[13]
• ULTRA FIRE!! "Best of" Fire Bomber album. ^[14]
• GALAXY NETWORK CHART 1. A "real" Macross universe album containing tracks from what is probably a single week of the Galaxy Network Chart's top 10 ratings of bands from all over the galaxy. Note that Fire Bomber has five of the ten spots.^[15]
• GALAXY NETWORK CHART 2 As above.^[16]
• MYLENE JENIUS SINGS LYNN MINMAY (1995) Two female vocalists of Macross join forces in this album. Mylene sings Minmay's most famous songs including Ai Oboeteimasu ka? (Do You Remember Love?), the version of which appears in Fleet of the Strongest Women. The singer is not Chie Kajiura, Mylene's series singing voice, but is instead her voice actress Sakurai Tomo.^{[17] [18]}
• ENGLISH FIRE. All the songs on this album have been redone in English by the band Fire Bomber American. Instead of simply being English versions of Fire Bomber songs, the makers of Macross have created an English version of the band Fire Bomber. In the Macross universe, Fire Bomber American is a band on the English-speaking fleet Macross 11 that claims that the Macross 7 Fire Bomber is a rip-off of it. The singers for this band are also different.^[19] According to the fictional Macross continuity Lynn Kaifun, a character from the first TV series from 1982 (who was Lynn Minmay's cousin and also her former manager) is the creator and manager of Fire Bomber American.
• BEST COLLECTION (not an official release) ^[20]
• OTHER FIRE!! (not an official release)
• MEMORIAL CD (not an official release)
• SEVENTH MOON SINGLE ^[21]
• MY FRIENDS SINGLE ^[22]
• HEART AND SOUL SINGLE ^[23]
• DYNAMITE EXPLOSION SINGLE^[24]
• FUKUYAMA FIRE. On May 24, 2005, 10 years after Macross 7 aired in Japan, Yoshiki Fukuyama (singing voice for Basara) released a tribute album (Fukuyama Fire - A Tribute To Nekki Basara) in which he sings the most popular Macross 7 songs with new arrangements plus a new song.
  • Tracklist:
    1. Holy Lonely Light
    2. New Frontier
    3. totsugeki Love Heart
    4. Dynamite Explosion (live version)
    5. Remember 16
    6. yume no michi(live version)
    7. Submarine Street
    8. Planet Dance
    9. Light the Light
    10. na mo na ki hate no machi de
    11. Heart & Soul
    12. Starlight Dream (live version)
    13. Angel Voice
    14. Like A Fire (new song)
• RE.FIRE. Fifteen years after Macross 7 first aired in Japan, Fire Bomber released its newest album, "RE.FIRE" in Japan on October 14, 2009. This new album brings 10 newly made songs, and two new versions of the hit songs "Love It" and "Totsugeki Love Heart".
  1. Bullet Soul
  2. Burning Fire
  3. Daemon
  4. Love It (2060A.D version)
  5. Big bang
  6. Ready Go
  7. Song of Eternity
  8. Stardust Highway
  9. Plastics
  10. Totsugeki Love Heart(2060A.D version)
  11. Magic Rhapsody
  12. Waiting For You

Songs

Songs	Composer	Lyrics	Debut	Vocals	Albums
Seventh Moon	Atsutaka Kawachi	K. Inojo	Episode 1 (opening theme)	Yoshiki Fukuyama
Planet Dance	Sudou Hideki	K. Inojo	Episode 1	Yoshiki Fukuyama and Chie Kajiura (Duet Version)
My Friends	Miki Kawano	M. Meg	Episode 1 (Ending Theme)	Chie Kajiura
Totsugeki Love Heart	Kawauchi Atsutaka	K. Inojo	Episode 1	Yoshiki Fukuyama
My Soul For You	Yoshiki Fukuyama	K. Inojo	Episode 2 (acoustic), full version: Episode 3	Yoshiki Fukuyama
Sweet Fantasy	Ootsuki	M. Meg	Episode 10	Chie Kajiura
Remember Sixteen	Kawauchi Atsutaka	K. Inojo	Episode 17	Yoshiki Fukuyama and Chie Kajiura
Holy Lonely Light	Sudou Hideki	K. Inojo	Episode 21	Yoshiki Fukuyama and Chie Kajiura (Duet Version)
Submarine Street	Shun'ya Fukuda	K. Inojo	Episode 29	Yoshiki Fukuyama
Power to the Dream	Yoshiki Fukuyama	K. Inojo	Episode 32	Yoshiki Fukuyama
Try Again	Yoshiki Fukuyama	K. Inojo	Episode 40	Yoshiki Fukuyama
Light The Light	K. Inojo	TSUKASA	Episode 41	Yoshiki Fukuyama and Chie Kajiura (Single/Duet Version)
Angel Voice	Yoko Kanno	K. Inojo	Macross Dynamite 7	Yoshiki Fukuyama
Feel Universe			Macross Dynamite 7	Yoshiki Fukuyama
Dynamite Explosion			Macross Dynamite 7 (Opening Theme)	Yoshiki Fukuyama
New Frontier			Macross Dynamite 7	Yoshiki Fukuyama
Parade			Macross Dynamite 7 (Ending Theme)	Yoshiki Fukuyama
Burning Fire		indy	Macross Ultimate Frontier (Opening Theme)	Yoshiki Fukuyama

Notes and References

1. Book: Suan, Stevie . Anime's Identity: Performativity and Form beyond Japan . 2021-11-09 . U of Minnesota Press . 978-1-4529-6606-9 . 9 . en.
2. Web site: THEM Anime Reviews 4.0 - Macross 7 . 2023-04-20 . www.themanime.org.
3. Book: Drazen, Patrick . Anime Explosion!: The What? Why? and Wow! of Japanese Animation, Revised and Updated Edition . 2014-04-01 . Stone Bridge Press . 978-1-61172-013-6 . 179 . en.
4. Book: Clements . Jonathan . The Anime Encyclopedia, 3rd Revised Edition: A Century of Japanese Animation . McCarthy . Helen . 2015-02-09 . Stone Bridge Press . 978-1-61172-909-2 . en.
5. Web site: Fire Bomber's Macross FB7 Film Theme Song Previewed . 2023-04-20 . Anime News Network . en.
6. Web site: [ totsugeki LOVE HEART! :: fire bomber - music ] . 2008-06-10 . 2009-01-19 . https://web.archive.org/web/20090119000232/http://seventhmoon.org/macross/fb/CDletsfire.html . dead .
7. Web site: [ totsugeki LOVE HEART! :: fire bomber - music ] . 2008-06-10 . 2009-01-19 . https://web.archive.org/web/20090119000515/http://seventhmoon.org/macross/fb/CDsecondfire.html . dead .
8. Web site: [ totsugeki LOVE HEART! :: fire bomber - music ] . 2008-06-10 . 2009-01-19 . https://web.archive.org/web/20090119000217/http://seventhmoon.org/macross/fb/CDdynamitefire.html . dead .
9. Web site: [ totsugeki LOVE HEART! :: fire bomber - music ] . 2008-06-10 . 2009-01-19 . https://web.archive.org/web/20090119000510/http://seventhmoon.org/macross/fb/CDradiofire.html . dead .
10. Web site: Archived copy . 2008-06-10 . 2008-05-13 . https://web.archive.org/web/20080513025738/http://oddimals.com/ss/cd1/macross/7_live.htm . dead .
11. Web site: [ totsugeki LOVE HEART! :: fire bomber - music ] . 2008-06-10 . 2009-01-11 . https://web.archive.org/web/20090111224854/http://www.seventhmoon.org/macross/fb/CDenglishfire.html . dead .
12. Web site: [ totsugeki LOVE HEART! :: fire bomber - music ] . 2008-06-10 . 2009-01-19 . https://web.archive.org/web/20090119000451/http://seventhmoon.org/macross/fb/CDkaraokefire.html . dead .
13. Web site: [ totsugeki LOVE HEART! :: fire bomber - music ] . 2008-06-10 . 2009-01-18 . https://web.archive.org/web/20090118225317/http://seventhmoon.org/macross/fb/CDacousticfire.html . dead .
14. Web site: [ totsugeki LOVE HEART! :: fire bomber - music ] . 2008-06-10 . 2009-01-18 . https://web.archive.org/web/20090118220519/http://seventhmoon.org/macross/fb/CDultrafire.html . dead .
15. Web site: [ totsugeki LOVE HEART! :: fire bomber - music ] . 2008-06-10 . 2009-01-19 . https://web.archive.org/web/20090119000227/http://seventhmoon.org/macross/fb/CDgalaxy1.html . dead .
16. Web site: [ totsugeki LOVE HEART! :: fire bomber - music ] . 2008-06-10 . 2009-01-19 . https://web.archive.org/web/20090119000446/http://seventhmoon.org/macross/fb/CDgalaxy2.html . dead .
17. Web site: Archived copy . 2008-06-10 . 2008-05-13 . https://web.archive.org/web/20080513025742/http://oddimals.com/ss/cd1/macross/7_sings.htm . dead .
18. Web site: [ totsugeki LOVE HEART! :: fire bomber - music ] . 2008-06-10 . 2009-01-19 . https://web.archive.org/web/20090119000502/http://seventhmoon.org/macross/fb/CDmylene.html . dead .
19. Web site: Fire Bomber American - Macross Compendium. macross.anime.net.
20. Web site: [ totsugeki LOVE HEART! :: fire bomber - music ] . 2008-06-10 . 2009-01-19 . https://web.archive.org/web/20090119000436/http://seventhmoon.org/macross/fb/CDbest.html . dead .
21. Web site: [ totsugeki LOVE HEART! :: fire bomber - music ] . 2008-06-10 . 2009-01-19 . https://web.archive.org/web/20090119000520/http://seventhmoon.org/macross/fb/CDseventhmoon.html . dead .
22. Web site: [ totsugeki LOVE HEART! :: fire bomber - music ] . 2008-06-10 . 2009-01-19 . https://web.archive.org/web/20090119000457/http://seventhmoon.org/macross/fb/CDmyfriends.html . dead .
23. Web site: [ totsugeki LOVE HEART! :: fire bomber - music ] . 2008-06-10 . 2009-01-18 . https://web.archive.org/web/20090118225323/http://seventhmoon.org/macross/fb/CDheart.html . dead .
24. Web site: [ totsugeki LOVE HEART! :: fire bomber - music ] . 2008-06-10 . 2009-01-19 . https://web.archive.org/web/20090119000441/http://seventhmoon.org/macross/fb/CDdynamite.html . dead .