Famous People in Japan


Mr. Children

Name Date of Birth Place of Birth
Sakurai Kazutoshi 8 March 1970 Tokyo
Tahara Kenichi 24 September 1969 Fukuoka
Nakagawa Keisuke 26 August 1969 Nagasaki
Suzuki Hideya 14 November 1969 Tokyo

Mr. Children is one of the most famous musical groups in Japan. Their songs are very popular especially among young people.

Mr. Children consists of four people: Sakurai Kazutoshi who is the vocalist, Tahara Kenichi, the guitarist, Nakagawa Keisuke, the bassist and Suzuki Hideya, the drummer. Kenichi, Keisuke and Hideya went to same junior high school. Then, Kenichi and Keisuke went to same high school where they met Kazutoshi.

They formed a band "The Walls" in 1988, then they changed their group's name into "Mr. Children" in 1989. They released their first album "Everything" and made their debut in 1992. In this year, they also released another album "Kind of Love" and two singles "Kimi ga Ita Natsu (I Stayed with You in That Summer)" and "Dakishimetai (I Want to Embrace You)" .

In 1993, they released two albums "Replay" and "Versus" and a single "Cross Road" . This single was the theme song of a drama. Many people heard their song on T. V. , so this song made a hit (more than one million singles were sold) and them famous. In 1995, their movie was releasedbut it was not a story but rather a film of their concert.

The next year, they were awarded the Nihon Record Taishou Grand Prize (which is awarded annually for the best selling song in Japan) for "Innocent World" which was released by them made a big hit (More than 1, 850,000 singles were sold) . Many people sang "Innocent World" when people went to Karaoke though this song was a little difficult to sing. Mr. Children released an album "Atomic Heart" in this year, too. More than two million albums were sold.

After that, they released many singles: "Tomorrow Never Knows","Everybody Goes" , "es" , "Seesaw Game" , "NA mo Naki Uta (No Title Poem)" and "Hana (The Flower)","Everything It's You". All of these songs were hits.

Now They have taken indefinite time off since May 1997. They have not appeard on television, magazine, or radio. On February 1998, they released "Nishi e Higashi e" that was a theme song of a drama. But that was not a true comeback. They will come back with their new work soon.

References: Mr. Children Sugao no melody (published by Rokusaisya)

Reported by: Miki Nakai
Data verified by: Daigo Iwai
Date of Report: July 1996
Updated by: Kayoko Ishihama, May 1998

Back to the main page