Bad Managers and Marvelous Bands

Published November 5th

Before becoming acquainted with Eurobeat and Trance music due to my involvement in gyaru, I was in love with the sparse amount of Jrock and Jpop music that I could get my hands on. It was a hard time back then as resources were limited for Japanese music online.

 Malice Mizer was one of the bands I fell in love with as their outfits were quite majestic and the vocals of the frontman, GACKT, were captivating. Though their songs have continued to entice listeners, they had long since disbanded; Malice Mizer later disbanded and the former frontman, GACKT, embarked on his solo career in 1999. 

During the early 2000s, I found myself in a public library on the southside of Chicago looking up lyrics to my favorite songs and later using the computers at high school to do so. I had learned at the time with the limited translated resources and knowledge available that people were upset with GACKT for leaving Malice Mizer. Not all bands last and not all band members stay throughout the entirety of their group's existence (Malice Mizer having had several vocalists). From my findings, fans of the band seemed upset that he seemed unreasonable with the matters of his band and that he left his bandmates behind.

Frustrations

Years later, I would read about the issues concerning the band as a business. It turned out that if GACKT was being "unreasonable", and that the feud between the remaining members of the band and GACKT wass stoked and possibly miscontrued, there was a reason for this. Besides some tension with the members, there was a manager/managing company for the band and their fan club that mismanaged funds and profits from their lives.  While the manager was living a life of luxury filled with luxury goods, the members struggled and weren't seeing the profits from their efforts and likenesses. 

On top of the squandered funds, Mana, the lead of the band, felt that they could not speak up due to their professional relationship and was being financially compensated. Other members stayed silent due to the manager's temper, afraid to make her upset despite her taking advantage of them financially. This silence and not sticking up for the band upset GACKT, causing his departure and frustration. 

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