News

B’z LIVE-GYM 2008 “ACTION” is out now on DVD and Blu-ray! Tak and Koshi have released a message for their fans concerning the long awaited home video release of this LIVE-GYM tour. Among pre-orders of upcoming releases, this home video release was ranked 2nd with only NEWS’ home video release of their “LIVE TOUR 2012~Utsukushii Koi ni suru yo~”  tour gathering more pre-orders. Now, without further ado, here’s the message from Tak and Koshi!

Action Daimaou(Devil)!
Tak

–NOTE: This is actually a joke by Tak. He is referencing an anime show from the 70s called “Hakushon Daimaou”(link). Japanese people pronounce ACTION as “akushon” which almost sounds like “hakushon”.

When I rewatch the footage of our Action Tour now, my body is getting exhausted once again. Please enjoy watching a Live-Gym soaked with sweat!
Koshi Inaba

Tak Matsumoto News

While Tak Matsumoto’s “Strings Of My Soul” has been available on iTunes by the time it went on sale in the U.S. and in Europe, “Live Life” from the very album has now been released as a digital exclusive single. It is available for purchase on iTunes internationally and contains two tracks: An instrumental version of “Live Life” and the regular album version of the song.

Live Life is one of the new tracks on Tak’s album and features English lyrics sung by Sam Drysdale. The lyrics for the song are available in the wiki: http://bzwiki.offthelock.com/Live_Life_(Lyrics)

Grab it on iTunes here.

News

Tak Matsumoto’s critically acclaimed Strings Of My Soul album has received the Golden Disc Award for “Instrumental Album of the Year” at the 27th annual Golden Disc Awards in Japan. The album contains Tak’s selection of songs he considers his finest works and show the true nature of his sound.

Furthermore, Japanese music magazine PLAYER has published its 2012 readers’ poll in the latest issue. Check out the ratings below. You can find last year’s readers’ poll here.

Category “Best Artist”: B’z ranked 4th (5th in 2011, 5th in 2010, 3rd in 2009)
Category “Best Album”: Strings Of My Soul ranked 5th
Category “Best Live Performance”: B’z ranked 3rd
Catagory “Best Vocalist”: Koshi Inaba ranked 3rd (1st in 2009, 2010, 2011)
Category “Best Guitarist”: Tak Matsumoto ranked 2nd (2nd in 2011, 1st in 2010, 3rd in 2009)
Category “Best Drummer”: Shane Gaalaas ranked 13th (16th in 2011, 8th in 2010, 9th in 2009)
Category “Best Bassist”: Barry Sparks ranked 9th (6th in 2011)
Category “Other Musician”: Takanobu Masuda ranked 3rd

Feature

With this being the 25th anniversary year for B’z, we have decided to run a series of retrospectives throughout the year celebrating the band’s achievements and accomplishments. Essentially, we will be providing extensive write-ups on certain B’z albums, singles, tours, and related subjects on a regular basis for the entire year. All articles pertaining to this feature will also be simultaneously archived in the B’z Wiki for posterity.

Today, it’s a look back at the band’s first double A-side single that spawned two of their most beloved early singles: “Mienai Chikara ~INVISIBLE ONE~/MOVE“!

Should you prefer to read this article in Wiki form, you can do so right here!

Mienai Chikara ~INVISIBLE ONE~/MOVE

Mienai Chikara ~INVISIBLE ONE~/MOVE (ミエナイチカラ, Invisible Power) is the nineteenth single by B’z and their first double A-side, released on March 6, 1996. Tak stated that with the songs in question and the tie-up promotions attached to them, it made the most sense to couple the two songs as a double A-side. It remained the band’s only double A-side single until “Ichibu to Zenbu/DIVE” was released in 2009.

Although this would be a non-album single, both tracks would be collected on future compilation albums. “Mienai Chikara ~INVISIBLE ONE~” was voted for inclusion on the band’s first fan-selected best of album B’z The Best “Treasure” and would also be included on the first of the band’s two 20th anniversary collections, B’z The Best “ULTRA Pleasure”. In 2000, “MOVE” would be included on the remixes and re-recordings album B’z The “Mixture”, although it was in its original, unaltered form. Later, in 2008, the song was nearly voted onto B’z The Best “ULTRA Treasure” where it finished fortieth in the voting.

Both of the songs that made up the single were performed during B’z LIVE-GYM ’96 “Spirit LOOSE”, where “Mienai Chikara ~INVISIBLE ONE~” was used to close out all dates on the tour. The two songs would be included sporadically in setlists over the years, including a revival of “MOVE” for LIVE-GYM 2010 “Ain’t No Magic” and “Mienai Chikara ~INVISIBLE ONE~” seeing its North American premiere during LIVE-GYM 2012 -Into Free-.

A promotional video for “Mienai Chikara ~INVISIBLE ONE~” was filmed through the first chorus, but was canceled and shelved when the band found the concept unclear. Instead, the promotional video featured behind-the-scenes footage from the “Spirit LOOSE” tour. The video aired for “MOVE” featured footage from the then-recent recording of “Real Thing Shakes” in Los Angeles. Concurrently, the two songs were both used in tie-in promotions. “Mienai Chikara ~INVISIBLE ONE~” served as an ending song to the anime “Hell Teacher Nube”, a first for the band, while “MOVE” was used in a commercial for one of Benesse Corporation’s “Shinkenzemi” junior high study course programs.

B’z made no television appearances for the single due to preparations for their upcoming tour, but did grant several magazine interviews to promote the release. The double A-side single moved 715,000 copies in its first week on shelves, making it the fifth fasting-selling B’z single to date. It would later be given the Million certification by the Recording Industry Association of Japan with over 1.2 million in physical copies sold.

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Feature

With this being the 25th anniversary year for B’z, we have decided to run a series of retrospectives throughout the year celebrating the band’s achievements and accomplishments. Essentially, we will be providing extensive write-ups on certain B’z albums, singles, tours, and related subjects on a regular basis for the entire year. All articles pertaining to this feature will also be simultaneously archived in the B’z Wiki for posterity.

Today, we’re heading back to 1996 to revisit the only physical English single by the band! A pivotal track from the band that has been a karaoke staple in Japan since release: “Real Thing Shakes“!

Should you prefer to read this article in Wiki form, you can do so right here!

Real Thing Shakes

Real Thing Shakes is the twentieth single by B’z, released on May 15, 1996. The single is notable for many reasons, the chief of which being that it remains the only English single B’z has released and is also the band’s only one-track single. Upon release, the single was a massive success for the band with sales in excess of 600,000 copies in its first week on shelves. Additionally, the release also set a record for being the first English single by a Japanese artist to sell one million copies and, in doing so, secured the record for thirteen consecutive one-million selling releases. As of 2012, the record remains unbroken.

The release offered other firsts for B’z, with the cover being the first in which the band members were not pictured and also became the only B’z song to date not produced by Tak Matsumoto himself. The producer role instead went to Andy Johns, who had previously served as an engineer to both Led Zeppelin and the Rolling Stones. This was only one of many occasions in which B’z collaborated with Western engineers and musicians. At the time of recording, English renditions of “FUSHIDARA 100%” and “WILD ROAD” were also planned as Johns was quite impressed with the guitar riffs Tak had written. Neither was ever officially released. Footage of the recording process with Johns can be seen on both the 1998 official bootleg and the 2008 official bootleg.

“Real Thing Shakes” has only been collected on a Japanese-released B’z album on one occasion: 1998’s fan-selected compilation, B’z The Best “Treasure”, where it finished in 10th place. Ten years later in 2008, the song narrowly missed being included on the band’s 20th anniversary collection B’z The Best “ULTRA Treasure” when it finished 36th in the voting. In 2002, in order to promote the B’z and Aerosmith appearance at the 2002 FIFA World Cup International Day hosted jointly by Japan and South Korea, B’z released an album exclusively in Korea titled DEVIL that contained “Real Thing Shakes” as well as four other English tracks. The song was again given an international release when it was released in the United States on a compilation chosen by Japanese Boston Red Sox pitcher Daisuke Matsuzaka entitled Music from the Mound.

An original promotional video was shot for the single that mixed live performances of the song with original footage shot specifically for the occasion.

 
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Feature

Be With! Vol 95 Cover

After a short hiatus, we are now able to bring you the latest B’z interview to date! The interview was conducted right after their Pepsi PREMIUM LIVE in August last year. This issue covers a lot of behind the scenes information on the band’s debut English album, the involvement of drummer Shane Gaalaas in its production, and the band’s latest plans for their then-upcoming tour, B’z LIVE-GYM 2012 -Into Free-.

You can find the interview in our B’z wiki: http://bzwiki.offthelock.com/Be_With!_Vol._95_(September_2012)

The next issue, Be With! Vol. 96, is expected to ship in the upcoming weeks. The interview will most likely feature Tak and Koshi’s impressions of their North American tour. Look forward to it!

Don’t forget to stay hype.