is a Japanese musician, who debuted as the lead vocalist and songwriter of the band

Queen Bee A queen bee is typically an adult, mated female (gyne) that lives in a colony or hive of honey bees. With fully developed reproductive organs, the queen is usually the mother of most, if not all, of the bees in the beehive. Queens are developed ...

in 2009, and the band

Gokumontō Ikka is a Japanese band that formed in 2013. The band is a supergroup formed of Avu-chan from Queen Bee, Ryosuke Nagaoka from Tokyo Jihen, KenKen from Rize and drummer Tatsuya Nakamura from Blankey Jet City. Biography In February 2013, Avu-chan ...

in 2015. As a producer and songwriter, Avu-chan uses the name , and has written songs for Meg,

Rina Satō is a Japanese voice actress with hundreds of television and video game productions, many multi-year, and is active in film and as a singer as well. She won the Best Lead Actress Award at the 8th Seiyu Awards. Satō has been appearing since 2003 ...

, Ai Shinozaki,

Hey! Say! JUMP Hey! Say! JUMP (HSJ or JUMP) is an eight-member Japanese boy band under the Japanese talent agency Johnny & Associates. The group is split into two sub-groups: Hey! Say! BEST and Hey! Say! 7. In Japan they sold more than 10 million physical co ...

and

LiSA Lisa or LISA may refer to: People People with the mononym * Lisa Lisa (born 1967), American actress and lead singer of the Cult Jam * Lisa (Japanese musician, born 1974), stylized "LISA", Japanese singer and producer * Lisa Komine (born 1978), J ...

Biography

Expressing interest in music since middle school and inspired by the Japanese pop/electronic group

Perfume Perfume (, ; french: parfum) is a mixture of fragrant essential oils or aroma compounds (fragrances), fixatives and solvents, usually in liquid form, used to give the human body, animals, food, objects, and living-spaces an agreeable scent. Th ...

, Avu-chan formed the band

in 2009 with classmates in

Kobe Kobe ( , ; officially , ) is the capital city of Hyōgo Prefecture Japan. With a population around 1.5 million, Kobe is Japan's seventh-largest city and the third-largest port city after Tokyo and Yokohama. It is located in Kansai region, whic ...

Hyōgo Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located in the Kansai region of Honshu. Hyōgo Prefecture has a population of 5,469,762 () and has a geographic area of . Hyōgo Prefecture borders Kyoto Prefecture to the east, Osaka Prefecture to the southeast, an ...

. They started performing at their school's

cultural festivals A festival is an event ordinarily celebrated by a community and centering on some characteristic aspect or aspects of that community and its religion or cultures. It is often marked as a local or national holiday, Melā, mela, or Muslim holida ...

and gained considerable popularity doing so, after which Queen Bee went on to perform at

live house A live house (ライブハウス) is a Japanese live music club – a music venue featuring live music. The term is a Japanese coinage ( wasei eigo) and is mainly used in East Asia. It most frequently refers to smaller venues, which may double as ...

s in the

Kansai region The or the , lies in the southern-central region of Japan's main island Honshū. The region includes the prefectures of Nara, Wakayama, Kyoto, Osaka, Hyōgo and Shiga, often also Mie, sometimes Fukui, Tokushima and Tottori. The metropolita ...

. The band made their first major concert appearance at the

Fuji Rock Festival is an annual rock festival held in Naeba Ski Resort, in Niigata Prefecture, Japan. The three-day event, organized by Smash Japan, features more than 200 Japanese and international musicians, making it the largest outdoor music event in Japa ...

in July 2010, where they performed as a part of the very selective "Rookie a Go-Go" section, sometimes called the "road to success" for new artists. Having released their debut album ''Witch Hunt'' independently in March 2011, the band signed to Sony Music Associated Records, and in September of the same year released their second album ''Peacock''. The band was called the "Japanese ''

Hedwig Hedwig may refer to: People and fictional characters * Hedwig (name), a list of people and fictional characters with the given name * Grzegorz Hedwig (born 1988), Polish slalom canoeist * Johann Hedwig, (1730–1799), German botanist * Romanus Adol ...

''" during their debut, as the gender identities of the members remain a secret. Not long after signing a contract with Sony Music, Queen Bee found early success with their song "Desco", which was featured in the romantic comedy film ''

Moteki is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Mitsurō Kubo. It was serialized in ''Evening'' magazine from 2008 to 2010, with its chapters collected into four ''tankōbon'' volumes by Kodansha. It was adapted into a Japanese televi ...

'' (2011), where the band had also made a cameo. In 2013, Avu-chan had to pause all band activities, explaining the decision with burnout and technical inexperience. Unsure whether to return home or stay in Tokyo, Avu-chan decided to continue pursuing music after being encouraged by a staff member at Avu-chan's record label, who insisted that Queen Bee's signing was not a fluke. Around this time, Avu-chan asked an acquaintance, a former Blankey Jet City drummer

Tatsuya Nakamura is a Japanese musician, drummer and actor. After performing with several prominent punk rock bands, Nakamura rose to fame as drummer of Blankey Jet City from 1987 to 2000. In 1996, he founded his solo project Losalios, where he performs every ...

, if the two could create something together, to which he immediately agreed and introduced Avu-chan to bassist

KenKen KenKen and KenDoku are trademarked names for a style of arithmetic and logic puzzle invented in 2004 by Japanese math teacher Tetsuya Miyamoto,

of the band

Rize Rize (Greek language, Greek: ρίζα, Laz language, Laz: რიზინი, Georgian language, Georgian: რიზე, , Ottoman Turkish: ريزه) is the capital city of Rize Province in the eastern part of the Black Sea Region of Turkey. Rize ...

. After spending some time in the studio, the three were later joined by guitarist

Ryosuke Nagaoka , is a Japanese musician, and singer and guitar player for the band Petrolz. Under the stage name , he was the second guitarist for Ringo Sheena's band Tokyo Jihen from 2005 until 2012. In 2013, Nagoka joined the band Gokumontō Ikka, a project i ...

from

Tokyo Jihen , also known as Tokyo Incidents, is a Japanese rock band formed by Ringo Sheena, after leaving her solo career. The band's debut single " Gunjō Biyori" was released in September 2004, and they ended activities in February 2012. The band sold 2. ...

, whose presence Avu-chan described as "essential", as it gave a sense of unpredictability to the group. The newly formed

supergroup Supergroup or super group may refer to: * Supergroup (music), a music group formed by artists who are already notable or respected in their fields * Supergroup (physics), a generalization of groups, used in the study of supersymmetry * Supergroup ...

, now known as

, made their debut performance at the

Rising Sun Rock Festival Rising Sun Rock Festival is an annual rock festival held in Ishikari, Hokkaido, Japan. The two-day event is organized by WESS. It chiefly features Japanese rock and indie Indie is a short form of "independence" or "independent"; it may refer to: ...

in August 2013. Only touring and releasing demos online at first, the band then released their first

extended play An extended play record, usually referred to as an EP, is a musical recording that contains more tracks than a single but fewer than an album or LP record.

''Jitsuroku! Gokumontō Ikka'' during their November 2015 tour. During the hiatus, Avu-chan also collaborated with singer

Mariko Gotō (born February 22, 1982 in Izumiōtsu, Osaka) is a Japanese singer, lyricist, composer and actress. Her career started in the early 2000s with the band , where she served as vocalist and guitarist. After it broke up in 2003, she joined punk jaz ...

for '' Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon: The 20th Anniversary Memorial Tribute'' in 2014, performing a cover of "Ai no Senshi". Queen Bee reformed in February 2014 after a one-year hiatus. The band's comeback single, "Venus", was used as the theme song for the drama ''

Spooky Romantics is a Japanese comedy television drama series broadcast on TV Tokyo. It premiered on January 9, 2015 and ended on March 28, 2015. Cast *Kumiko Asō *Maki Sakai *Tamaki Ogawa Tamaki may refer to: New Zealand *Tāmaki, a suburb of Auckland to the ...

'' (2015), which preceded their fourth album ''Kirei'' (2015). In the same year, Avu-chan collaborated with a South Korean boyband

Supernova A supernova is a powerful and luminous explosion of a star. It has the plural form supernovae or supernovas, and is abbreviated SN or SNe. This transient astronomical event occurs during the last evolutionary stages of a massive star or when ...

, writing and performing on the leading track "Jesus", from their sub-unit Funky Galaxy's debut extended play. In 2016, Queen Bee and Gokumontō Ikka released a split single, "Kinsei" / "Shibō Yūgi". The packaging for the limited edition of the split single was styled to resemble

PlayStation is a video gaming brand that consists of five home video game consoles, two handhelds, a media center, and a smartphone, as well as an online service and multiple magazines. The brand is produced by Sony Interactive Entertainment, a divisi ...

fighting game A fighting game, also known as a versus fighting game, is a video game genre, genre of video game that involves combat between two or more players. Fighting game combat often features mechanics such as Blocking (martial arts), blocking, grappli ...

s, with the cover art illustrated by

Kinu Nishimura is a Japanese video game and anime concept artist and illustrator. Currently freelance, she is best known for her character design and promotional art for Capcom's fighting games during the 1990s. Career Kinu Nishimura began working at Capcom ...

, whose work on the '' Darkstalkers'' series has been considered a longtime favorite by Avu-chan. In 2017, Avu-chan debuted as a stage actress with a production of ''

The Rocky Horror Show ''The Rocky Horror Show'' is a musical with music, lyrics and book by Richard O'Brien. A humorous tribute to the science fiction and horror B movies of the 1930s through to the early 1960s, the musical tells the story of a newly engaged couple ...

'', in the role of Columbia. The production toured Japan in late 2017. Queen Bee's sixth album ''Ten'' (2019) was released to commemorate the band's ten-year anniversary, and was also their first album to ever reach the top 10 on the

Oricon , established in 1999, is the holding company at the head of a Japanese corporate group that supplies statistics and information on music and the music industry in Japan and Western music. It started as, which was founded by Sōkō Koike in Nov ...

charts in Japan. It featured several tracks used as theme songs for

anime is Traditional animation, hand-drawn and computer animation, computer-generated animation originating from Japan. Outside of Japan and in English, ''anime'' refers specifically to animation produced in Japan. However, in Japan and in Japane ...

, such as "Half" in ''

Tokyo Ghoul is a Japanese dark fantasy manga series written and illustrated by Sui Ishida. It was serialized in Shueisha's ''seinen'' manga magazine ''Weekly Young Jump'' between September 2011 and September 2014, and was collected in four ...

:re'', and "Fire" in ''

Dororo is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by the manga artist Osamu Tezuka. Tezuka's childhood memory of his friends pronouncing as ''dororo'' inspired the title of the series. ''Dororo'' was first serialized in Shogakukan's ''W ...

''. In 2019, Avu-chan returned to the stage, now in the role of Yitzhak in a Japanese production of '' Hedwig and the Angry Inch''. In late 2020, Avu-chan produced the song " Ōkami Seinen" for an anonymous boyband called Honey Bee, who were later revealed to be

, and in 2021, collaborated with the singer

on the song "GL", from her 10th anniversary mini-album ''

Ladybug Coccinellidae () is a widespread family of small beetles ranging in size from . They are commonly known as ladybugs in North America and ladybirds in Great Britain. Some entomologists prefer the names ladybird beetles or lady beetles as they ...

''. In 2022, Avu-chan starred in the

Masaaki Yuasa is a Japanese director, screenwriter, and animator affiliated with Science SARU, a Japanese animation studio which he co-founded with producer Eunyoung Choi in 2013. Yuasa previously served as president of Science SARU, but stepped down from th ...

-directed animated film ''

Inu-Oh is a 2021 Japanese animated musical film directed by Masaaki Yuasa and produced by Science SARU. Based upon the novel ''Tales of the Heike: Inu-Oh'' by Hideo Furukawa, the film is set in 14th century Japan and centers on the friendship betwee ...

'' as the title character.

Personal life

Avu-chan identifies with gender aspects of both men and women. In school, Avu-chan related to characters who had non-traditional experiences of gender in films, such as Hedwig from '' Hedwig and the Angry Inch'' (2001) and the character of Angel in ''

Rent Rent may refer to: Economics *Renting, an agreement where a payment is made for the temporary use of a good, service or property *Economic rent, any payment in excess of the cost of production *Rent-seeking, attempting to increase one's share of e ...

'' (2005). Avu-chan does not like people who categorize others by gender and racial labels. Avu-chan's official website biography written in 2012 used she/her pronouns, as well as an article with

MTV MTV (Originally an initialism of Music Television) is an American cable channel that launched on August 1, 1981. Based in New York City, it serves as the flagship property of the MTV Entertainment Group, part of Paramount Media Networks, a di ...

from 2015, however as of 2019 the biography was updated to no longer use pronouns. Often, Japanese language sources will use the

Japanese pronoun Japanese may refer to: * Something from or related to Japan, an island country in East Asia * Japanese language, spoken mainly in Japan * Japanese people, the ethnic group that identifies with Japan through ancestry or culture ** Japanese diaspo ...

(the equivalent of she/her). Avu-chan based the Queen Bee song "Half" (the ending theme song for the anime '' Tokyo Ghoul:re'' (2018)) on childhood experiences in Japan, when people questioned Avu-chan's ethnic background. As a child, Avu-chan wondered why people felt the need to ask about heritage and identity, and did not like the word ''

hāfu is a Japanese language term used to refer to a person ethnically half Japanese and half non-Japanese. A loanword from English, the term literally means "half," a reference to the individual's non-Japanese heritage. The word can also be used to ...

'' ("half" the Japanese term for mixed race children), as Avu-chan did not feel like "half" of something. Avu-chan's younger sister is Queen Bee drummer Ruri-chan. Avu-chan identifies as a

Buddhist Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religion or philosophical tradition based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. It originated in northern India as a -movement in the 5th century BCE, and ...

Discography

Queen Bee

*''Witch Hunt'' (2011) *''Peacock'' (2011) *''Snake Princess'' (2012) *''Kirei'' (2015) *''Q'' (2017) *''Ten'' (2019) *''BL'' (2020)

Gokumontō Ikka

*''Jitsuroku! Gokumontō Ikka'' (2015)

Guest appearances

Songwriting credits

Bibliography

Filmography

Film

Television

Theater

Web

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Avu-chan 21st-century Japanese actors 21st-century Japanese singers Japanese Buddhists Japanese rock musicians Japanese singer-songwriters Japanese musical theatre actors Japanese music video directors LGBT musicians from Japan LGBT songwriters LGBT Buddhists Living people Musicians from Hyōgo Prefecture Non-binary musicians Year of birth missing (living people) 21st-century LGBT people