2009
This year the band releases a new album and tours. In all, they play a couple more shows than they have in recent years, making 2009 have the most amount of live shows since 1993.
On January 14, "Galaxy", the second single from the new upcoming album was released. The song's lyrics were written by Atsushi and music by Hisashi. The artwork featured the band dressed in black with black make-up around their eyes, an opposite mirror of the previous single "Heaven". As the B-side was also a track from the upcoming album, this makes the album Memento Mori the only album where despite having multiple singles, all of the songs are from the album.
The band appeared on the television show "Wednesday J-Pop" on February 11 and performed "Montage". During the interview, they talked about Pork Sautes, U-ta's side project from the 90s, and even played an audio clip. It's interesting to note that Hisashi's expression makes it seem that it was the first he had heard of it.
On February 18, the album Memento Mori was released. On the same day, there was a special concert held at Akasaka Blitz for contest winners of those who purchased the "Heaven" and "Galaxy" singles.
On April 25, Buck-Tick was one of the bands performing at the Arabaki Rock Fest held at Eco Camp Michinoku in Miyagi prefecture. It rained during the festival. The festival took place on April 25 and 26 with many artists on the line-up. Buck-Tick performed on the first day and other bands included SA, 9mm Parabellum Bullet, Taiji Sato Band, Jitterin' Jinn, The Back Horn, Flower Companyz, Eastern Youth, etc. The second day included Acidman, Ogre You Asshole, Soil & "Pimp" Sessions, The Telephones, Panorama Steel Orchestra, Hige, The Pillows, Polysics, Lazy Guns Brisky, etc.
On April 3, Buck-Tick kicked off Tour 2009 Memento Mori which had a run of 25 dates. The tour began in Kawaguchi, Saitama and ended in Tokyo on July 2. That last show in Tokyo was recorded and a live video was released at the end of the year. On September 11, they continued the touring of the album with Tour Memento Mori -Rebirth- for 17 dates. That tour began in Kanagawa and ended in Okinawa. There were 3 Fish Tank fan club only dates intermixed, including the very first day. Buck-Tick prefers not to credit the fan club only shows as part of the tour but I do. Hence, the band would actually credit that the tour began on September 12 in Kanagawa.
You may notice that during this tour, one of the venues is listed as formerly known as because a corporation had secured naming rights to the venue for a years. This practice started in Japan perhaps around 1-2 years prior and gradually increased. Therefore, it is more and more common to see the former name of a venue listed as the name has the potential to change every few years.
Hisashi posts his first entry on his official blog, Hisashi-kki ~ Hisashi Teki Chou Nichijouki, on June 9. Hisashi-kki is a play on the Japanese word for diary, "nikki". The subtitle translates to "Hisashi related chronicles of super everyday memories". The blog is free on the band's website. Hisashi posts about what music he's listening to, photos of Buck-Tick in the studio or at concerts, photos of the sky and flowers, little art things he's purchased, artist/title of songs used as background music at Buck-Tick concerts, etc. (His household also has the most adorable dogs, if you like dogs, that is.)
On July 1, Buck-Tick again appeared on the television show "Wednesday J-Pop".
On September 11, the book Tour 2009 Memento Mori Pix was released, which as the title suggests, contained photos from the Memento Mori Tour in 2009.
Buck-Tick were one of the artists performing at the Inazuma Rock Festival on September 20 in Karasuma Hantou Shibafu Hiroba in Kusatsu City, Shiga. This was the first time Buck-Tick have ever performed in Shiga prefecture. The festival took place on September 19 and 20. On the first day, the bands included Unison Square Garden, 175R, Fumidou, Home Made Kazoku, Uverworld, and Abingdon Boys School. On the second day, the other bands besides Buck-Tick included 369, Lindberg, Seamo, Tetsu (Tetsuya of L'Arc~en~Ciel), and T.M. Revolution.
On October 18, Atsushi appeared on the FM802 radio show "Redniqs" hosted by Hiroaki Asai. He was on the segment called "Red Zone".
Former bassist of Boøwy Tsunematsu Matsui released the album Horizon ~20th Anniversary~ on October 21. It was to commemorate the 20th anniversary of Tsunematsu going solo. It contained some Boøwy cover songs as well as new song and several guest musicians. U-ta appears during the chorus for "Working Man".
On December 23, the live video Memento Mori 090702 was released. It was also available on Blu-ray, a first for the band.
The annual The Day In Question concert was held on December 29 at Nippon Budokan.
Continuing the count of prefectures played, this year the band played these prefectures for the first time: Shiga. After finally playing in Shiga, the band now has played the Kansai region in its entirety. This is the first time the band can claim that they've finally played an entire region since 1988.