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Releases: Albums

Darker Than Darkness -Style 93-

release date: June 23, 1993
company: Victor/Invitation
formats: CD (VICL-149)
initial price: ¥3000
goodies: first copies sold included either a poster or "B-T Rare-Mix CD" (8cm and limited to 1000 copies)

digital remaster info: September 19, 2002 (VICL-60988; cover image) for ¥2415 (first copies sold included sticker)

remaster reissue info: September 5, 2007 (VICL-62548 for ¥2520)

Tracklisting

Kirameki No Naka De... (Sakurai/Imai)
Deep Slow (Sakurai/Imai)
Yuuwaku (Sakurai/Hoshino)
Ao No Sekai (Sakurai/Imai)
Kamikaze (Imai/Imai)
Zero (Sakurai/Imai)
Dress (Sakurai/Hoshino)
Lion (Sakurai/Imai)
Madman Blues -Minashigo No Yuuutsu- (Imai/Imai)
Die (Sakurai/Imai)
*Not T Dise**
*Kirameki No Naka De**
*D-T-D (Sakurai/Imai)

*hidden bonus tracks

2002 digital remaster first pressing extra tracks:
Dress (Aux Send Mix)
Die (live)
**digital remaster does not include hidden tracks Not T Dise and Kirameki No Naka De

Credits

Atsushi Sakurai: vocals
Hisashi Imai: guitars
Hidehiko Hoshino: guitars, piano, synthesizers
Yutaka Higuchi: bass
Toll Yagami: drums, percussion

additional musicians:
Rie Hamada: backing vocals on "Dress"
Kazutoshi Yokoyama: manipulate on "Dress" and "Kirameki No Naka De..."

all songs arranged by Buck-Tick
produced by Buck-Tick
executive producers: Osamu Takagi, Takafumi Muraki
director: Junichi Tanaka
recording and mixing engineer: Hitoshi Hiruma
recording engineers: Shigetoshi Naitoh, Takahiro Uchida
assistant engineers: Hirohito Fujishima, Katsumi Moriya
guitar sound technician: Hiroshi Yamane
drum tuner: Yukihiko Sugimoto
drum tuner and roadie: Shigeo Azami
chief manager: Yoshihiko Masuoka
managers: Hajime Shimokawa, Hitoshi Ojima
chief promotor: Naoki Toyoshima
artist & relations: Masatoshi Ohoka
artist management: Shaking Hands
recorded at Sound Sky Studio February 20-April 30, 1993
art direction & design: Ken Sakaguchi
photography: M. Hasui
stylist: Tomoharu Yagi
hair & make-up: Takayuki Tanizaki
coordinators: Masahiro Tomioka, Tsutomu Kizawa
product managers: Kenji Nakao, Yuichiro Soshi
special thanks to: ? Konishi (Sound Sky Kawana), Akira Sekiguchi, ? Oba, Takashi Furuya , ? Kawajima (Radic), Yutaka Kusano (Fernandes), Kouichiro Shiratsuchi (Greco), Tetsuo ? (Bow's Guitar Gallery), Maki Fujii, Hook Up, Akio Matsuki (Ishibashi Gakki), Takashi Harashima, Shigeru Nakano, everyone from The Mad Capsule Market's, Jupita, LAV, Hiro (The Star Club), Trans World, Canopus, Buck-Tick club, Fernandes, Ludwig, Greco

[this page was last updated on Monday, 03-Mar-2008 13:23:23 PST]

Notes

Ranked #2 on the album chart. 210,000 copies sold.

The singles released from this album were "Dress" and "Die".

This is the first album whose cover art does not feature a photo of a member of the band.

This is the first album that Hide played keyboards on.

"Madman Blues -Minashigo No Yuuutsu- " is the first song that Hisashi sings lead vocals on. Atsushi only sings backing vocals on this song.

Though Atsushi is not credited as playing saxophone on the album, he did play a bit during the tour that followed.

This is the first album Buck-Tick recorded at Sound Sky Studio. Previously they had only used that studio for mixing.

Tracks 11-74, 76-83, and 85-92 are blank. The bonus tracks are #75, #84, and #93. They are uncredited in the liner notes but their titles were revelead in a magazine at the time. This may be the first time a Japanese CD has had "bonus tracks". In fact, this idea was so new to Japan at the time of it's release that 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! Personally I think that the long silence followed by fuzz makes D-T-D (Darker Than Darkness) feel like you're receiving it from some secret transmission.

During the intro for "Ao No Sekai", Atsushi says, "Ao No Sekai he youkoso", which means "Welcome to the Blue World".

This is the first time the liner note credits are completely in Japanese. My skills at reading people's names are crap but thankfully Buck-Tick tends to stick with the same staff members for a few albums. (Even one who grows up in Japan may have difficulty reading someone's name as sometimes the reading of kanji is a rare way, which is why applications and business cards have kana on top, or how to read the kanji.)

Hitoshi Ojima is credited as a manager. He was a former classmate of Hide and U-ta and started off as a roadie. He was the road manager for the Shock Tour in 1988.

It's my personal opinion that U-ta really came into his own as a bassist on this album. His bass lines are much more mature and versatile than previous albums.