Still, in the 90s, the group had superfans who were super-famous: George Martin scored a solo album for Yoshiki, the Emperor of Japan requested an original composition from Yoshiki, and David Lynch got in touch too. “Through the internet, people stared knowing our band. “20 or 30 years ago, the world wasn’t ready for a band like us coming from Asia,” Yoshiki believes. Yoshiki and vocalist Toshi formed X Japan (then called X) in 1982, and their subsequent recognition has been mostly limited to Japan. It’s the richest, fullest story I’ve grappled with so far.” “I’ve never been around such a pyrotechnically enormous experience. Kijak agrees, adding, “Then your audiences sees that freedom, and that starts to fuck with society, because they realise, ‘Oh, we actually have permission to scream and dye our hair and be different and break down barriers.’” A music doc pro, Kijak’s past subjects include the Rolling Stones and Scott Walker, but it’s X Japan – and their stage show – that’s struck him the most. I couldn’t express myself.” Shortly after, his mother bought him a drum kit. “I didn’t know what to do,” Yoshiki recalls. When Yoshiki was 10, his father committed suicide, which he discovered upon returning home and witnessing a body on the floor.
We also wanted to mess up people’s minds through music. “At that time, in Japan, it was almost a crime. “We had blonde, spiky hair,” Yoshiki explains. It dates back to the 80s, when the group struck a chord by disrupting their country’s conservative society. Here in London, Kijak is asking Yoshiki about the origins of X Japan’s slogan “Psychedelic Violence Crime of Visual Shock”. Other ailments include a deformed neck bone (too much head banging), tendonitis and carpal tunnel. Sometimes he collapses on stage from lack of oxygen. When Yoshiki hits the sticks, his right arm aches on the piano, it’s his left that stings. “Pain has been my friend, my enemy, my lover,” the drummer and main songwriter declares in the film. Directed by Stephen Kijak, the rock doc is a pounding intro to X Japan’s stadium-ready prog riffs, their multi-coloured sparkling hairdos, and, of course, tortured bandleader Yoshiki.
That’s set to change with the release of We Are X.
Yet to casual listeners outside of Asia, they’re an unknown entity. They split for 10 years when their singer was brainwashed by a cult. Unlike, say, Babymetal, their glorious sound is tinged with tragedy. The speed metal group, famed for their visual kei aesthetic, have sold 30 million albums, established a diehard fanbase, and are Japan’s very own Nirvana. X Japan are Japan’s biggest, loudest secret.
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