INTERVIEW: X Japan’s Yoshiki talks new tour, new album, historic MSG gig

Throughout Japan and increasingly around the world, the name Yoshiki has come to represent a unique balance between classical music and heavy-metal showmanship. As drummer and songwriter for the legendary band X Japan, Yoshiki is a dedicated performer, someone who offers himself physically and emotionally to the music. This dedication was on display at X Japan’s recent Madison Square Garden gig, an historic night for all involved.

“I think the concert went well,” Yoshiki said recently during a phone interview. “The concert went very well. I think the crowd was amazing.”

X Japan decided to take a break after their last round of tour stops in 2010 and 2011. In order to get back in the groove, the members of the band, including lead singer Toshi and guitarists Pata, Heath and Sugizo, wanted to offer a slam-bang kickoff event. That was when the MSG show started to surface as a possibility. Yoshiki called it a starting-off point for a “new chapter, the new world tour.” Fans of the band probably noticed the many cameras working through their away around the most famous arena in the world, and that’s because X Japan plans to release a documentary showcasing the band’s unique story.

The MSG show was an emotional concert for Yoshiki. “Two members, two of the original members, passed away, so one member is Hide,” Yoshiki said. “He passed in 1998, and the other member, Taiji, he passed away in 2011. So it was always our dream to play something like Madison Square Garden, so I started thinking during the show — actually even before the show, a day before — thinking about … our history of our band. How do you get here or something like that. I almost like started crying even before the show. I wish those members were here besides our new members as well. The audience reaction and everything, I kind of became very emotional.”

Yoshiki’s acknowledgement of the tragedies surrounding the band was evident at the three-hour concert. Also obvious was his friendship with Toshi, the lead singer. “I met him back when I was 4 years old, when we were both 4 years old,” Yoshiki said of Toshi. “I started playing piano when I was 4 years old, and I started playing drums when I was 10. So Toshi and I were in the same brass band, so I think we started putting the band together when we were 10 years old.”

Yoshiki and Toshi were also the last to leave the stage at MSG, and perhaps they had memories of those early years in their mind. Yoshiki said they both grew up in the “countryside of Japan” with few rock bands around. From the start, the two musicians knew they wanted to find success around the world. They had aspirations of one day making it big in the United States. Yoshiki even recalled a memory when a junior high school teacher asked the class what they wanted to be when they grew up. Although the question resulted in several common answers, such as doctor or head of a corporation, a young Yoshiki told the teacher he wanted to be a “rock star.”

“I still remember that,” he added. “Toshi and I came to Tokyo and started looking for members. Then we met and got Pata, bass player called Taiji and another guitar player, Hide.”

X Japan’s early days, highlighted by their colorful clothes and gravity-defying hair styles, resulted in packed Tokyo clubs. Eventually filling 400-capacity venues led to larger opportunities, including playing Tokyo Dome with 50,000 fans in attendance.

The songwriting for the group falls mostly on Yoshiki’s shoulders, although he asks other members for their opinions. “So, first of all, I very, very [much] care about melody,” he said. “That’s the important thing for me, so I want to keep writing beautiful melody, but at the same time I really like heavy music style. So we combined that. Also the lyrics are very important.”

X Japan’s songs, Yoshiki said, have less to do with the all-too-common themes of “I love you” or “I want to be with you,” and more to do with life. This focus on life and its struggles dates back to the musician’s childhood. “I want to talk about more like life because when I was 10 years old, my father committed suicide,” Yoshiki said. “So I started thinking of life at such a young age. Why do we exist? What’s the reason we are living in this world?”

He added: “The lyrics I write can be double meaning. People can take it, they can translate whatever they want. It’s kind of ambiguous sometimes. Yes, yeah, even though I write sad lyrics, somehow we put a positive message into it. Music saved me. Again, when I lost my father … all I was doing was just playing piano, playing drums. … So music saved me, so I want to somehow save people through music as well.”

Because Yoshiki is trained in classical music, X Japan has always molded together heavy-metal anthems with softer ballads. At the MSG show, for example, Yoshiki played a selection from Tchaikovsky’s “Swan Lake,” bookended by his original arrangements.

“We are in the best shape ever over our almost 35-some years of history,” he said. “We’re completely getting along. … I’m not sure about physically, but mentally we’re in the best shape ever.”

So, for X Japan fans who have been hungry for details on upcoming projects, here’s what Yoshiki had to say: “We are aiming to finish the album by next spring, then release the album by next summer and start touring almost the same time. That could become earlier or little later, but that’s the plan at this moment.”

At the MSG show, there were five songs played that have not been officially released on an X Japan album or record. Those included “Jade” “Born to be Free” and “I.V.,” among others. In fact, it’s been many years since an entire album of new material has been released by the band.

“The album we’re working [on] I’d say 80-90 percent in English, and then we’re going to leave 10-20 percent intentionally in Japanese,” he said.

The type of show delivered at MSG is not something Yoshiki sees himself doing for the rest of his life, but he seems to be excited over this new “chapter” in X Japan’s long history.

“I don’t know how many years I can be playing like that,” he said. “But at the same time, the Madison Square Garden show was not the goal. It was just another chapter. I don’t know how many chapters we have left, but we’re going to that next era of X Japan.”

By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com

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