Kenshi Yonezu

Kenshi Yonezu was born on March 10, 1991, in the rural part of Tokushima.[3] As a child, Yonezu found it difficult to communicate with other people, especially his father. Yonezu typically felt that his mother understood him. He was diagnosed with high-functioning autism after the age of 20.[4][5]

Yonezu's first foray into music was in 2006 during his second year of junior high school, where he formed a band with his friend Hiroshi Nakajima, called Late Rabbit Edda, to play for the school culture festival.[6][7][8][9] He worked as the vocalist, songwriter and occasional guitarist, while Nakajima was the guitarist. In late 2007, he set up a website for the band, posting song lyrics and short novels.[10] Yonezu wrote songs for the band, and between April 2008 and March 2009 uploaded 24 original songs to video sharing website Nico Nico Douga using the name Hachi.[2] None of the songs were widely viewed, with the greatest, "Beelzebub", receiving only 23,000 views.[11] Yonezu created his blog in this period, and called it Tekitō Edda (適当EDDA).[12][13]

Yonezu moved to Osaka after high school, and started attending a fine arts school.[14] While a student there, he started uploading songs using Vocaloid software Hatsune Miku instead, which were increasingly popular. His 2009 song "Musunde Hiraite Rasetsu to Mukuro" (結ンデ開イテ羅刹ト骸) was his first song to receive over 1,000,000 views on the site.[15] Though Yonezu had uploaded over 30 songs sung by himself, he deleted them when his Vocaloid songs became more popular.[6] Yonezu renamed his blog Denshi-chō Hachibangai (電子帖八番, "Electronic Notebook 8th Avenue"), and it was one of five blogs awarded the Diamond Award at the 2009 WebMoney Awards.[16]

In December 2009, Yonezu's song "Clock Lock Works" was featured on an Exit Tunes compilation album, Supernova, the first time a song of his appeared on an album. In January, "Musunde Hiraite Rasetsu to Mukuro" was featured on Vocalolegend feat. Hatsune Miku, Exit Tunes' second Oricon top 10 compilation album.[17] Yonezu released two self-produced albums in 2010: Hanataba to Suisō in February, and Official Orange in November. In 2010 and 2011, Yonezu's songs were featured on many Exit Tunes albums, including Vocalonexus feat. Hatsune Miku, which was the second Vocaloid album to reach number one on Oricon's albums chart.[18] His songs were featured on the games Hatsune Miku: Project DIVA Extend (2011) and Hatsune Miku: Project DIVA F (2012), and in the Hatsune Miku concert Miku no Hi Dankanshasai (2012), which became the first number one DVD/Blu-ray for a virtual singer.[19] On Hachi's Nico Nico account, seven of his songs have been viewed more than 1,000,000 times,[20] including the song "Matryoshka", which had reached 5,000,000 views by 2012.[21]

In April 2010, Yonezu joined the animation collective Minakata Kenkyūjo (南方研究所, "Minakata Laboratory"), a group that he had worked with since his "Clock Lock Works" video in November 2009.[22] On January 23, 2011, Yonezu uploaded his final Hachi Vocaloid video for approximately three years.[20]

Late Rabbit Edda remained active until 2010. They were renamed Ernst Eckman and added a drummer called Sumimoto to their lineup. As Ernst Eckman, they released a single song on MySpace, "Oborozuki to Sono Kōan" (オボロヅキとその考案, "Crescent Moon and that Plan").[23] Yonezu began to feel that he did not work well with other people, and decided to work alone on Vocaloid songs exclusively, giving up on being a part of a band.[24]

In March 2011, Yonezu and seven other musicians created Balloom, an independent music label for Internet musicians to widen their musical opportunities.[25] His debut album released in 2012, Diorama, debuted at number 6 and sold over 45,000 copies,[3][26] becoming the biggest release on the label to date. The album was one of the winners of the 5th CD Shop Awards, an award voted on by music store personnel.[27] Yonezu was picked up as a major label artist under Universal Sigma and debuted in May 2013 with the single "Santa Maria".[28] He made the shift in order to work with musicians doing similar things as him.[29]

On October 28, 2013, Yonezu released his first Vocaloid song in two and a half years, "Donut Hole" (ドーナツホール, Dōnatsu Hōru), using a live band and the vocal Gumi.[30] Kenshi Yonezu released his second album, Yankee, on April 23, 2014,[31] followed by the first concert in his career on June 27.[32] Yonezu's song "Eine Kleine" was written for Tokyo Metro to be used in its 2014 commercial campaign.[33]

Yonezu continued to rise in popularity with the release of albums Bremen in 2015 and Bootleg in 2017. Driven by hit singles "Uchiage Hanabi", "Loser", "Orion", and "Peace Sign", Bootleg won Album of the Year at the 60th Japan Record Awards and shot Yonezu to national stardom.[34]

On December 31, 2018, Yonezu made his live television debut on the 69th NHK Kōhaku Uta Gassen, an annual year-end extravaganza and one of Japan's most prestigious music programs. He performed his 2018 hit "Lemon" live from his native Tokushima, marking the first time a segment of the Kōhaku Uta Gassen was broadcast from Tokushima Prefecture.[35] The songs "Uchiage Hanabi" and "Paprika", both produced by Yonezu, were also performed at the event.[36]

In 2019, Yonezu wrote the song "Machigaisagashi" for singer Masaki Suda; it won Best Pop Video at the 2019 MTV Video Music Awards Japan. When Billboard Japan published its year-end charts, "Uma to Shika" and "Machigaisagashi" ranked fifth and sixth respectively.[37] Yonezu won the Special Award at the 61st Japan Record Awards held on December 30, and "Paprika" won the Grand Prix. Yonezu held his first overseas concerts in China and Taiwan in 2019.[38]

Yonezu co-wrote the song "Kite" for Japanese boy band Arashi, which served as the theme song for NHK's coverage of the 2020 Summer Olympics. On August 7, 2020, he performed during Fortnite's Party Royale, singing songs from his latest album Stray Sheep (2020), which had been released two days prior.[39] In December, he became one of five recipients of the Special Achievement Award at the 62nd Japan Record Awards.[40] In 2022, Yonezu released "Kick Back", which was used as the opening theme song for the anime series Chainsaw Man.[41] The following year, Yonezu performed "Spinning Globe" as the theme song for Hayao Miyazaki's film How Do You Live?.[42]