L'histoire

L'Arc⁓en⁓Ciel (jp: ラルク アン シエル; abbr. L'Arc, ラルク) is a rock band that formed in 1991 in Osaka, Japan. The original lineup consisted of tetsu (bass), hyde (vocals), ken (guitar), and sakura (drums). A real L'Arc superfreak might say "this is hiro and pero erasure" but nobody knows who they are.

L'Arc put out four albums in this configuration--DUNE (1993), Tierra (1994), heavenly (1995), and True (1996). I won't review them here, but in short, they're all pretty good and L'Arc unsurprisingly grew to be popular.

L'Arc circa 1993 (left), 1995 (center), spoiler alert for 1997! (right)

Unfortunately, sakura got busted for drugs (the rumor in English-speaking circles in the early 00s was heroin, but he served jail time for violating the Stimulants Control Law so do with that info what you will) which hurt the band's reputation, so he departed. They did some club shows under a different name, but still promoted as L'Arc⁓en⁓Ciel for a few months without a drummer as seen in the above image. Soon, yukihiro replaced sakura and L'Arc put out a beautiful masterpiece of an album, HEART.

L'Arc in 1999 with yukihiro

They blew the fuck up, peaking in popularity in 1999 when they simultaneously released banger albums, ark and ray. L'Arc sold millions of singles and albums and played massive shows with hundreds of thousands of attendees. The comparatively experimental REAL followed in 2000. The music videos (PVs) for those singles--LOVE FLIES, NEO UNIVERSE, and STAY AWAY--were notably weird. You'd think they were experimenting with a little of the devil's lettuce if it wasn't turbo illegal in Japan. ken and hyde both injured their ribs go-karting (?) and wore these cunty corsets for support during their REALIVE concerts.

aforementioned "corsets" can be seen in above blurry screenshot

I guess they got kind of sick of each other or something, went on hiatus, and embarked on solo projects around 2001. hyde released music as HYDE, tetsu as tetsu69, ken formed SONS OF ALL PUSSYS with sakura, and yukihiro formed acid android. L'Arc reconvened in 2004 and released SMILE, which contained Fullmetal Alchemist theme song READY STEADY GO which is what I pull out when people say they've never heard of L'Arc⁓en⁓Ciel, usually met with an "ohhhh." There was a big push to market Japanese music in the States at this time. L'Arc played at an anime convention in August 2004 and released SMILE through American Sony Music subsidiary Tofu Records. L'Arc released another absolute banger album AWAKE in 2005 and promptly went on hiatus again. In 2007, L'Arc was back at it with the disjointed KISS--an album on which half the songs were recorded while hyde had lingual braces and you can absolutely hear the difference in his pronunciation. L'Arc went on hiatus again until their 20th anniversary in 2011. They released BUTTERFLY in 2012 and embarked on a world tour. From 2012 to the present, the members have been primarily active as soloists or in other bands, putting out a few singles and occasionally performing together as a band in Japan.

album review speedrun any%

DUNE

(1993) A solid debut album, very 80s goth
favorite song(s): Taste of Love, As if in a dream
least favorite song: 失われた眺め

Tierra

(1994) Similar to DUNE, but more polished and airy
favorite song(s): In the Air, Wind of Gold, 眠りによせて
least favorite song: 瞳に映るもの

heavenly

(1995) Brighter but weaker than Tierra, jingly alternative pop-rock
favorite song(s): and She Said
least favorite song: C'est la Vie

True

(1996) Cutesy, commercial early 90s pop-rock
favorite song(s): Caress of Venus
least favorite song: I Wish

HEART

(1998) a SOLID pop-rock album of its time
favorite song(s): Singin' in the Rain, fate
least favorite song: Milky Way listen, I don't even really mind Milky Way--it just sounds like a song tetsuya was meant to sing, not hyde

Personal history

I got into L'Arc randomly through a show on the now-defunct International Channel called PopJapan.tv in early November 2004. L'Arc was one of the only rock bands featured and, in their interview clips, they gave bizarre answers, two of them wore sunglasses in a dimly lit room, and they didn't seem at all like they wanted to be there, which was intriguing and relatable to me: a moody, goth teenager. I pretty quickly developed a crush on hyde and became pretty insufferable about him for a few years. I've managed to collect almost all of their albums (I bought BUTTERFLY on iTunes) as well as a few singles, and still have some random pieces of merch in my possession (mostly stationary circa '98-'99). I attended their 2012 concert in New York, which was incredible. I can be seen pretty clearly during My Heart Draws a Dream in the live broadcast on WOWOW/DVD footage, as well as in the WORLD TOUR FINAL pamphlet.