B’z

B'z (B'z (ビーズ Bīzu?) is a Japanese rock duo, consisting of guitarist, composer and producer Takahiro "Tak" Matsumoto (松本 孝弘 Matsumoto Takahiro?) and Koshi Inaba (稲葉 浩志 Inaba Kōshi?) as vocalist and lyricist.

B'z is one of the best-selling music artists in the world, having released 46 consecutive #1 singles, 24 #1 albums and sold more than 80 million records in Japan alone. Under the recommendation of Steve Vai, B'z became the first band from Asia to have their handprints and signatures put up in the Hollywood's RockWalk.

Tak Matsumoto, who was already a professional guitarist in band TM Network led by Tetsuya Komuro, had been extremely busy with various recording sessions and live performances. On 21 May 1988, Tak released his first solo album, Thousand Wave. He saw this as a finishing of a chapter as a solo guitarist, and began his search for band members. He later met vocalist Koshi Inaba, who would later start the band with him. At the time, Japan's music scene was loaded with many new bands being created. With all the digital sounds in mainstream music, the only sounds that they felt could not be expressed and replicated were the guitar and the human voice. As a result, they decided to keep it a two-man unit. On 21 September 1988, B'z, with their first album, B’z, and single, "Dakara Sono Te Wo Hanashite (だからその手を離して)", made their debut. Their music was very much a product of its times, with synthesizers and samplers sharing equal time with Tak's guitar, producing an experimental sound, very different from their well-known hard rock sound of today.

Instead of immediately performing live after a debut, as many Japanese bands were doing, B'z chose to have a clear vision of how they wanted to perform and decided to wait until they had enough material to play for at least 90 minutes. The two concentrated on recording, raising the quality of their music. Their efforts resulted in a second album, Off the Lock, released on 21 May 1989. With this second album came their first series of live performances known better to their fans as "Live-Gym". "Live-Gym #00" started in Nagoya, continuing into Osaka, and finishing in Tokyo. Tickets were sold out on the day they became available. On 21 October, their first mini album, Bad Communication was released. The title track was a blend of rock and dance music, and was still a classic to their "Live-Gyms." It was charted for 163 weeks on the Oricon Charts. Their first nationwide tour, B'z Live-Gym #001, finished with 16 shows around the country.

On 21 February 1990, the third album Break Through was released. To promote it, they started a tour with 22 shows nationwide. Their single "Taiyō no Komachi Angel", was released on 13 June and was able to peak at #1 on the Oricon Chart. Since the release of the single, each of their singles have since debut at #1 on the Oricon charts. Wicked Beat, their second mini album, was then released on 21 June. In contrast to the many promotional efforts for Break Through, Wicked Beat received little promotion and the duo went back to the studio and began recording. Their 4th album, Risky was released on 7 November and went platinum. Their "Risky" tour, totaling 49 performances, also started in November. Their first music video, Film Risky, was recorded in New York and London within 4 weeks, and was released on 16 December. With a barrage of releases, 1990 came to be the busiest year for B'z.