1993
After a few months rest from live shows, this year the band would ramp up the number of concerts held and were just a few short of matching the number of shows they played in 1990. However, they did not play any new prefectures this year.
Supposedly in April 1993, an imaginary band was formed by a group of celebrities, including U-ta. Details are sketchy and only came out in recent years. The group was called the Pork Sautes. It was a concept created and led by Atsushi Okuno (Rogue, Wild Wise Apes) and consisted of U-ta, Takashi Matsuo (DJ, narrator, etc has gone by the stage name Kitsch), Masanobu Katsumura (actor), Kenta Harada (musician, actor), and Kaori Kawamura (singer). Atsushi Okuno was to write the music and Masanobu Katsumura was to write the lyrics based on the concept of a restaurant menu. Later they were also joined by Hiromichi Nakano (fashion designer), Kazuhiko Kanayama (actor), and Miyoko Yoshimoto (actress, pop singer). In total they had 4 vocalists. Kenta Harada played guitar, U-ta played bass, and Maro Sakai played drums. (In September 2006, Masanobu Katsumura posted some details on his blog but the pictures are not clear. He stated that there were 2 gigs and they played 3 songs--first to commemorate his wedding and then 2 weeks later to commemorate Takashi Matsuo's wedding which was held at Blue Note. He states that two of the songs were "We Are Pork Sautes" and "Curry Rice". The third song will be discussed in the history for 1996. They may have played more shows and they also recorded material for a debut CD that never materialized.)
On May 20, an extensive tour began in Osaka for the upcoming album, which had not yet been released. Buck-Tick played a total of 59 shows for the Darker Than Darkness Tour, the most amount of shows they have ever done for a tour. Since then, they have done significantly shorter tours. The shows for this tour were spread apart a bit more than tours in the past to keep the tour from becoming too grueling. There were no shows in August and then the tour continued through November. (Giving them more chances to celebrate after the shows by drinking until noon, I suppose). During the tour, all the members wore the cross-like necklace that was sold as part of the tour merchandise. This little cross-like logo had been in use since the "5 For Japanese Babies" tour and evolved into this new version. (For more details on this and other logos and tour motifs, please see the section on Tours.)
On May 21, a single from the upcoming album was released. It was entitled "Dress" and has lyrics written by Atsushi and music by Hide. The B-side was "Rokugatsu No Okinawa", with the same songwriting credits. This makes it the band's first single where the A-side and B-side have the same songwriters. The band performed the single on the television show "Music Station" on June 4.
On June 23, the album Darker Than Darkness -Style 93- was released. It marked a few changes in Buck-Tick's musical style, album packaging (the first time the cover art did not feature a member of the band), and also what might be the first use of hidden "bonus tracks" in Japan. After the first 10 tracks, the CD does not stop, but continues on each track for a few seconds until it finally reaches tracks 75 and 84, which feature fuzz and distorted sounds, conjuring an image of receiving a secret transmission. On track 93 is a bonus song. These tracks are not listed in the liner notes. The bonus song is entitled "D-T-D" or "Darker Than Darkness", marking a return to Buck-Tick albums having a title track, even if the title wasn't credited in the album's liner notes! This was a bit strange at the time of it's release and there were reports of some fans returning the CDs to the stores they bought them from, claiming they were defective and demanding a new one. In fact, during one promotional event, Atsushi appeared on the "Gee! Zone" hosted by music journalist Tetsushi Ichikawa, who pressed Atsushi on why they would release an album with hidden tracks like this and not publish the lyrics. I feel like this appearance just emphasizes how this really goes against Japanese thinking at the time. On the same appearance, Atsushi had a reading with psychic Hiroyuki Ehara and apparently was crying because the psychic said his mother's presence was there and speaking through him.
This album was also the first time a member learned a new instrument. Hide plays piano and synthesizers on this one and during the tour Atsushi played a little saxophone during the extended jam section of "Victims of Love". This is also the last album with manager Joe Masuoka, who was their manager since they signed to a major label. Over the years, other people alongside Joe had been credited as managers and on Darker Than Darkness, Joe was credited as "chief manager". The other managers credited here are Hajime Shimokawa and Hitoshi Ojima. They would go on to continue managing the band for the next year or two until the great management office shake up, but more on that later.
On October 21, another single was released, "Die". The song's lyrics were written by Atsushi and the music by Hisashi. This single contained two B-sides, both were recorded live. This was the first time Buck-Tick released a single with more than one B-side and the first time they released live material in an audio format as three live videos were already available at this time but no live album had been released. (Technically, the "Just One More Kiss" cassette single had more tracks, but they were just instrumental versions so it doesn't really count.) The band performed the single on the television show "Music Station" on November 5. This is the performance where the guitarists decided to reveal the sham of sorts of 'live' music programs on Japan by playing sitars to show that the band's music was actually on tape. Years later when pressed by the fans, Hisashi commented that this wasn't so much on purpose as to more just have fun since they had issues with guitar sounds on the show in the past and decided not to play the guitar live. In fact, if you watch their very first performance on "Music Station" in 1988, you can see that Hisashi is indeed fidgeting with his guitar as the sound is not coming through in the beginning. "Music Station" is hosted by comedian Tamori and a rotating sidekick. Artists are briefly interviewed before performing but the interview was cut short due to screams from girls in the audience who kept calling out so Tamori turned and asked them what they are talking about, perhaps as a means to shut them up but also to grasp the comedic moment. Atsushi apologizes that he couldn't explain well (Atsushi, as per usual for B-T, was his awkward self during the interview) as they exit to get ready for the performance. Tamori appears to be fascinated with Atsushi and at one point couldn't focus when staring into Atsushi's eyes then jokes that he has fallen in love.
At the end of the year, there was a special concert broadcast on television for TVK called "Live Gaga Special" with Soft Ballet at Shibuya Koukaido. For the final song, Soft Ballet joined Buck-Tick to perform "Iconoclasm". As far as I know, the concert ran longer than the allotted time so the end of "Darker Than Darkness" was cut off. Then by special request they aired "Iconoclasm", which means that likely "Jupiter" never aired as it was played inbetween. During the broadcast, the bands were also interviewed by a host backstage (Yuichi Hirayama) while another host served as the newscaster in the main room, so to speak. One of the hosts commented that Atsushi's lyrics are like poetry and that's when I had the epiphany that she was correct, that they had truly moved away from using English just for the sake of being cool and the lyrics had a poem's spirit.
