Ryoichi endo biography
•
•
The origin of “ISSAY”
ーー Vague (lol).
I: See, MAHITO was originally a bassist but switched to being a keyboardist halfway through. inom believe he’s been playing the keyboard since he was a child so he can even play classical music, but inom think the genre he was into at the time was techno. I liked Roxy Music³³ so that was where we got along. MAYUMI was a mysterious guy who played unbelievable drums (lol). He’d have a ridiculous number of tom toms set up too. I think he probably liked the drummer Terry Bozzio³⁴ so he might’ve been influenced by him. So, you know, I think he probably listened to Frank Zappa³⁵, for sure, and Missing Persons³⁶ and the sort of pop genre music. Him and HAL, they liked progressive rock so they talked a lot in that area. And, then there’s HIKARU who listened to a wide range of music; anything from jazz to punk to hard rock and everything in between.
ーー Even your music preferences were all over the place; they don’t really come tillsammans (lol).
I:
•
Soft Ballet was a Japanese industrial and synthpop band. The group consisted of three members: Maki Fujii, Ken Morioka, and Ryoichi Endo, although they would employ extra support members for live shows.
They formed in 1989 and had a long span of inactivity from 1995 to 2002 while the members pursued solo projects. The group had considered reforming for some time, but Maki had been the last holdout. Finally in 2002, the trio came to an agreement and Soft Ballet officially reunited. They made their return to the stage at the 2002 Summer Sonic Festival, and began recording together for the first time since 1995. The resulting album, Symbiont, showcased an updated sound, taking advantage of the leaps in digital music technology that had occurred since they last worked together. The album was a moderate success, but the wave of popularity that the band was riding when they broke up had now passed. The band played a handful of live dates through the end of 2002 and toured again at the s