Diorama (Kenshi Yonezu album)

Yonezu first released music on the Internet using Vocaloid software, and uploaded videos to the video steaming website Nico Nico Douga from 2009 to 2011. Many of his songs were very popular on the site, including "Matryoshka" with 5,000,000 views and "Musunde Hiraite Rasetsu to Mukuro" with 3,000,000 views amassed by the release of Diorama. In 2010. Yonezu self-released two albums of Vocaloid songs, Hanataba to Suisō in February and Official Orange in November. Official Orange also featured a song where Yonezu used his own vocals, . In April 2010, Yonezu joined the dōjin animation collective , a group that he'd worked with since his "Clock Lock Works" video in November 2009. The group had worked on Yonezu's songs "Clock Lock Works," "World's End Umbrella," and . In March 2011, Yonezu and seven other musicians created Balloom, an independent music label for Internet musicians to widen their musical opportunities. Since the first meetings Yonezu had with the company, he intended to release music using his own voice and not Vocaloid software. == Writing and production ==

The album was sung, written, produced, arranged and mixed all by Yonezu himself. and the album took a year and a half to complete. Yonezu did not collaborate with other musicians on the album, as he felt at the time that he was not a good communicator. Yonezu drew all of the illustrations in the booklet himself, including the cover. == Promotion and release ==

On February 19, 2012, the song "Go Go Yūreisen" was uploaded to Nico Nico Douga and YouTube, and became the number one viewed video for the day on Nico Nico Douga on February 21. The song was released as a single on iTunes on March 21. This was followed by a video for the song "Vivi," released on March 15. Both songs and their illustration videos were played on music video channels. On March 28, Balloom began distributing free sampler CDs to stores such as Tower Records, HMV, Shinseido, Village Vanguard, Comic Toranoana, Animate and Wonder Goo. Free rental CDs were also released to Tsutaya on April 6. On April 5, an anime music video for "Koi to Byōnetsu" directed by Minakata Kenkyūjo was released. The video was featured on the album's DVD. On the day of release, Yonezu went to Nico Nico Douga event building Nico Nico Honsha for a signing session. On June 13, Yonezu made an appearance on the Tokyo FM radio show School of Lock! While live concerts were not performed at the time of release, in the concert for Yonezu's second album Yankee held on June 27, 2014 in Tokyo, Yonezu performed "Machi", "Dagashiya Shōbai", "Vivi", "Hikarabita Bus Hitotsu", and "Go Go Yūreisen". == Chart performance ==

The album debuted at number 6 on Oricon's albums chart, selling 25,000 copies. It returned to number one for two weeks in June 2012. After charting on Oricon's top 300 albums chart for 21 weeks, the album became the number 141 most sold album of 2012 in Japan with 48,000 copies. It is the most successful release on the Balloom label. == Critical reception ==

The album was received favourably by music reviewers, with both CDJournal and ''Rockin' On's Kotaro Matsumura calling the album a masterpiece. Yosuke Ito of Skream!'' praised the album's rock taste, strongly forged melody lines and the "word-play"-like catchiness. The album was one of the winners of the 5th CD Shop Awards, an award voted on by music store personnel. In October 2012, Dojin pianist Marasy covered "Go Go Yūreisen" on his debut album V-Box. == Track listing ==

Charts Sales Year-end charts ==Personnel==

Personnel details were sourced from Diorama's liner notes booklet. • Ameo – music video "Koi to Byōnetsu" director • Chobo Roku – music video "Koi to Byōnetsu" director • Gaph – art direction, design • Hiromichi "Tucky" Takiguchi – mastering • Tasuku – music video "Koi to Byōnetsu" director • Utsushita – music video "Koi to Byōnetsu" director • Kenshi Yonezu – all instruments, arranger, composer, booklet illustrator, music video illustrator ("Go Go Yūreisen," "Vivi") lyricist, mixer, vocals ==Release history==