Miya (musician)

Miya was born on July 26, 1979, in rural Ishioka, Ibaraki, Japan. He described the area around his parents' house as village-like, and said his grandfather's house had cows, pigs, and goats around it. With both parents music teachers, Miya practiced classical piano everyday from an early age and was taken to classical concerts, but did not particularly care for it. His first band was , where his stage name was written as . At 17, he played drums for a year. Having grown up playing the taiko drums at local festivals and having watched a lot of live videos of his favorite bands, he said he played pretty well right from the start, but felt he could better express himself with guitar. ==Career==

In high school, Miya formed Mucc in 1997 with vocalist Tatsuro, drummer Satochi, and bassist Hiro, whom he had been friends with since primary school. After graduating, they moved to Tokyo. He also determines their live setlists, and discusses with the engineers on how to mic everything for live performances. Antique, their debut EP, was released in 1999 by Misshitsu Neurose, an independent record label formed by Cali Gari guitarist Ao Sakurai. Mucc later signed to Danger Crue Records and established their own sublabel, Shu, for the 2002 release of their second album Hōmura Uta. However, the band made their major label debut on Universal with Zekū the following year. In 2009, they returned to being an indie band on Danger Crue, before signing to Sony for 2012's Shangri-La. With the end of 2017, Mucc returned to being an independent band on Danger Crue yet again. , 2009 At the end of 2003, Miya formed the rock band with Nezaki (La Vie En Rose), Tsuyoshi (Jully), and Yoshida (Three 9). They released the album Tokyo on May 25, 2005. Miya co-produced Girugamesh's 2007 self-titled album, in addition to providing backing vocals on two of its songs. Miya also works as a DJ under his real name and the stage name 1979. 1979 started in 2010 as a duo with Kei Yamamoto. He became interested in DJing when he saw the Disco Twins open for Yuksek and realized that DJs do not just provide something to dance to, they are also artists. He also organizes club events titled Mogwai, which feature fellow rock musicians acting as DJs. Miya provided guest guitar work on the title track of Roach's 2012 mini-album No Reason in the Pit, and co-mixed Tokyo Shoegazer's 2013 album Turnaround. Miya appears January 2015's Arise, the first solo album by Sid bassist Aki. He is also a member of , an X Japan cover band formed in 2015 with Dancho (Nogod), Yuu (Merry), Akane (ex-The Scanty), and Daisuke (Jupiter). In the group, Miya dresses up as Pata. In 2015, Miya organized the Commune concert event series at the request of the founder of Danger Crue Records, who asked him to capture the feeling of the old Danger Crue. Miya was a guest at X Japan's April 11, 2018, concert at Zepp DiverCity, where he joined the band onstage for "Kurenai". When X Japan guitarist Sugizo was having difficulties acquiring a visa to enter the US for the band's April 14, 2018, performance at Coachella, Miya was named as his possible stand-in. Sugizo ultimately made it to the concert, but Miya still joined them on stage for the song "X". Since 2019, Miya has periodically performed as a member of Kyono's backing band. Miya remixed Merry's song "Sheeple" for the limited edition of their April 2019 mini-album For Japanese Sheeple. He also mixed and mastered Otoloop's album Reimei no Ao, and arranged and produced the song "Suzanna no Junketsu" on Sixx's album ''Rollin' Life''. That year he also arranged the music and played guitar and bass for a promotional video for the Obaken Zombie Land haunted house at Sanrio Puroland. He was sound producer for the livestream of Arlequin's Cinematic Circus #001 concert on July 21, 2020, and was in charge of the audio mastering for the livestream of Dezert's Special Live 2020 "The Today" concert on November 23, 2020. Miya is a guitarist in the supergroup Petit Brabancon with Yukihiro, Kyo, antz (Tokyo Shoegazer), and Hirofumi Takamatsu (The Novembers). It was Yukihiro who suggested Miya join, because he needed someone more prolific in composing than himself and believed Miya would also match Kyo's style of loud music. Miya accepted after talking and drinking with Kyo and learning all that the two had in common, such as upbringings and music tastes. He started composing songs for Petit Brabancon in 2018, but the band was not publicly announced until late 2021. In 2021, Miya mastered the omnibus album Ibarakidai Bakuhatsu, which features numerous artists from his native Ibaraki Prefecture. Also for the album, Miya wrote, composed and arranged "Ibara" by 178R; a band consisting of him, Masashi Yamada (The Back Horn), Yuya Honda (Cock Roach), Satoshi Murata (Yagi Tsukai), and Kazi (Human Tail). He also wrote and arranged the song "Hello" for the rock band Gyroaxia from the Argonavis from BanG Dream! multimedia project, and mastered Zigzo's album Across the Horizon. In 2022, he recorded, mixed and mastered Disco Volante's album Identified Flying Object, and mixed and mastered Otoloop's album Unknown Bravers. The following year, Miya mastered Gibkiy Gibkiy Gibkiy's singles "Hedo" and "Oni -Re:master-". He wrote the lyrics to and arranged the song "Nebula", which was composed by his Mucc bandmate Yukke, for the September 2023 Ensemble Stars!! album Trip Volume 03: Double Face. Miya plays guitar on "Blood: 2.0" from Deadman's 2024 self-cover album Living Hell. ==Songwriting and musicianship==

Mucc is known for switching between music genres and styles frequently. Miya has said he personally likes bands that are ever-changing and play a wide variety of genres. Despite being a guitarist, Miya stated that he gives the instrument the least amount of thought. He has no particular connection to guitar, he just happened to choose it as the tool to express his music. After moving to Tokyo in the late 1990s, he started listening to Western music and became inspired by Slipknot and Korn. Miya said he does not write English lyrics because he does not understand the language and using them for their sounds alone would not be the same; "If the words I write don't have a soul, then they can't become a song". According to Aie of Deadman, Miya was one of many Ibaraki musicians who at one point imitated Cali Gari guitarist Ao Sakurai. He said while they allow him to play a large range of music, they do not work very well on downtunings. However, Mucc's album Shin Sekai (2022) has many guitar solos because he decided not to use any synthesizers on it. For the album, Miya said he would often use a modern approach to retro-sounding songs, and vice versa. He also said that his guitar is panned to the left, while Antz's guitar is heard from the right. ==Equipment==

Miya has a Fernandes TE-85 guitar with EMG pickups that he got in high school. Described as "the one you can't let go of", it has a custom paint job featuring moths. He has a Psychederhythm Jazzmaster Type that he uses to record all the time, but rarely uses on stage. It makes noise from simply touching the pickguard, so he put tape on it to prevent that. He has been using a Sugi DH500C EM/AT/SBK since Mucc's album Kyūtai (2009). Despite being semi-hollow, he said it has an orthodox six-string sound. When he needs an acoustic sound, Miya uses a Fender Acoustasonic Telecaster. However, Miya mainly uses seven-string guitars. He developed an EXL-7st with Dragonfly that he used as his main seven-string in Mucc until 2016. It has a Honduras mahogany back and flame maple top, with a maple neck and rosewood fingerboard, and had the volume knob removed because his hand hit it while playing. For Petite Brabancon, he uses Mesa Boogie Dual Rectifire amps. The cabinets feature the artwork created by Takato Yamamoto for the cover of Myakuhaku. He stated that he made Kemper profiles of all the expensive amps that L'Arc-en-Ciel guitarist Ken uses, such as Magnatone and Friedman. He has used a Boss SE-70 multi-effector since junior high school. ==Discography==