Komuro can't go wrong

When you have hit upon a winning formula, it would be stupid not to build on it and expand your horizons. And Japanese musician Tetsuya Komuro is nobody's fool. Komuro - the man with the platinum touch so far as the music industry is concerned - has become to the Japanese music scene what Stock, Aitken and Waterman were to the international scene a few years ago. He knows what the public wants and he gives it to them. So far, he has given it some of the best-selling music acts with groups such as TRF, Globe, H-Jungle, Hitomi, Tomomi Kahara and teenage sensation Namie Amuro. Together, as part of the TK [Tetsuya Komuro] Family, they have sold more than a billion units. Now Komuro has decided to add one more unit to his growing family. At Midem Asia 97 last week, Komuro proudly introduced his new 'baby', a six-member rock band called No! Galers. The band consists of leader Cozy Kubo (vocals-keyboards-guitar), lead vocalist Hiroshi Hiruma, Ken Kimura (guitar), Kazuhiro Matsuo (guitar), Ataru Sumiyoshi (bass guitar) and Syuichi Nakano (drums), who have all been working as session players for other artists, including Komuro's TRF and Namie Amuro. Komuro and Kubo have known each other for 10 years. Kubo jokingly refers to Komuro as his 'music encyclopaedia'. According to Kubo, No! Galers stands for 'no guarantees' or 'no money', whichever way one looks at it. 'At the beginning not many people knew of us, so we were playing for no payment and had no money. So there were no guarantees and we were poor,' Kubo said, through an interpreter. The band was formed in 1995 and released three singles - A Toast to Pitiful Me , The Sun Behind Me , and No! Galers - before taking a break. Their inclusion in TK Family marks their re-emergence, resulted in a new single, It's Heavy Tonight (Red Moon ). No! Galers also marks a departure in music style for Komuro. The man known as the godfather of Japanese music has churned out successful techno-dance numbers with TRF and Namie Amuro. The 39-year-old started his musical career in 1983 when he formed TM Network with vocalist Takashi Utunomiya and guitarist Naoto Kine. Between his TM Network releases, Komuro worked on several successful soundtrack albums and quickly carved a niche for himself in the electronic music world. In 1990 the band changed its name to TMN. By now Komuro was in great demand as a producer by top artists such as Rie Miyazawa, Miho Nakayama and Akina Nakamori Two years later Komuro decided to experiment with techno-rave unit TRF (Tetsuya Komuro Rave Factory), showing the foresight that has made him a powerful musical influence on Japanese youth. TRF took off like a rocket and was soon sweeping up the charts with hits such as Boy Meets Girl and Crazy Gonna Crazy . By 1994, TMN had had enough and the members said goodbye with their last album Night Of The Knife and a concert at the Tokyo Dome attended by more than 104,000 fans. A year later, Komuro signed teenage dance queen Namie Amuro - the top-selling Japanese artist last year - and started yet another band, Globe. Fixing his vision on a cross between 2 Unlimited and Capella, Komuro roped in ex-model and rapper Marc Panther and female singer Keiko. The only change between Globe and his other acts is that Komuro is front-of-stage with Globe. 'After finding members for the group, I ran through many scenarios in my head. I was already giving my best to TRF, and I did not want any duplication in Globe, so I was running up against a wall. All of a sudden the sky cleared before me. I decided to join the group myself. I wanted to be a member because deep down I am still a musician,' he said. 'After setting up there was still lots of work to do. First there is the sound of Tetsuya Komuro. The media have made up labels like 'Komuro Sound' and 'Komuro Style' [I have never used these terms myself], and I guess Globe will become the centre of this sound. I wanted to make Globe's music into something like a genre, a 100 per cent T Komuro brand.' He has obviously succeeded. Since their inception, Globe has sold an astounding four million copies in Japan alone, breaking all sales records in the country. With No! Galers, however, Komuro will have a different aim: to win over the secondary-school students who form a key part of the music-listening public. With TRF and Globe, the target audience has been university students. Whatever the success of No! Galers, fans can be assured Komuro will always be on the lookout for new ways to win his family new and wider audiences. And, if it just means giving the people what they want, Komuro will have no problem with that at all.