ORICON WEB interview

Thanks to Eleonora, who translated part of the Oricon Web interview and posted it on the ARK (No.14755). I deleted most her own comments (they can be read on the ARK) and cleaned up the grammar.

What is your reaction to your recent work?

Hyde: Mah…I think as I’ve gotten older I want to make products that have meaning. Up till now, there were many that excavated the past from the images in songs, but recently messages like, "future," "I wish it were this way," "as much as possible," became strong. Before there were very abstract expressions, but recently it’s been a pleasure to put my thoughts into words. Obviously, without what I've already done, this musical expression and composition wouldn't have been possible. If I should debut now, without warning, and I was told, "Please make an album quickly," I wouldn't be able to do this kind of work…

Why do you want to give such a strong message and definite expression?

Hyde: Because I came to dislike the circulating mistake. Up till now I had this stance, "Portray the image you prefer." Obviously, though, even in WEB entries, people have quite different interpretations. "Certainly after reading they'll understand," I thought, but people would get stuck on one word only and come up with a totally different meaning. It's always felt like that. Though I aimed at skillfully communicating to people, sometimes I didn’t. However, explaining the meaning to every single person is hard and impossible. But, I don't want misunderstanding. Especially with this theme...As far as possible I made it easy to understand.

This theme, it's "faith" and "religion," isn't it?

Hyde: Yes. But thinking on it now, it's maybe "love and death." Love is something that enables you to surmount death, something that makes it possible to welcome death, seen by a different point of view. (Eleonora notes: by "different point of view" he means universal love and not simply passion)

Even with not wanting to give birth to misunderstandings, I think you took on a difficult theme.

Hyde: But that is like the core of it. Because, from the previous work, I came to think about peace. When I thought of what’s at the root of so many wars, I reached this point. If you are in Japan you don't feel it much, but globally religion is deeply rooted in people’s everyday lives, therefore, there are many accidents/events happening. When I thought about war, I reached this point.

Your long tour will end in autumn. For a solo tour it's a record length. What's behind your vitality?

Hyde: I've been a musician for long time. Probably the first thing is wanting to leave a mark. Though I don't always think so deeply, when I think, "Why am I doing it?" maybe it's because I want to leave a memory of me in people. Of course, it's what I've been doing up till now, but, even more, and especially because it's solo, I want to leave a mark in people's memories, something that is essentially me. In solo live you're able to close the distance with the audience. That's the best.