Taniuchi Shinya, Kagimoto Akira and Nakadoi Hiroki met as students at Caless Vocal and Dance School in Osaka. During this period, the trio formed the dance troupe Rhymix and conducted several street performances, although shortly after they changed their name to flow.
In June of that same year, Furuya Keita performed at the Kyuushuu/Okinawa Starlight Audition 2002 and was selected as one of winners of the event. Following his performance at the audition and subsequent win, Furuya joined flow as their fourth member. Following their coming together as a quartet, flow changed their name to Lead, which tied in with their desire to become one of the leading dance troupes in Japan.
Shortly after, Lead held their first performance as a quartet at Osaka Castle Park in front of 7,000 spectators, and that same summer they performed as the opening act for w-inds. on their national tour.
On July 31st 2002, Lead made their musical debut with the single Manatsu no Magic. With their second single, Show me the way, Lead received the “Newcomer Award” at the 44th Nippon Record Taishou. Their sixth single Night Deluxe won acclaim at the 46th Nippon Record Taishou and achieved a golden award. The following year, the quartet once again achieved a golden award for their eighth single, Atarashii kisetsu e.
In 2008, Lead released their first best-of album Lead Tracks ~listener’s choice~, which featured tracks requested by their fanbase across Japan, Korea, Taiwan and Hong Kong. The request form via their official site received over 105,000 votes and the album featured material from across their career.
In July, Kagimoto Akira was chosen to play the leading role in the Fuji Television drama “Taiyou to umi no kyoshitsu” and the members of Lead have recently become more active in the television industry.
Lead have become recognised as one of the pioneering dance/vocal groups within the Japanese music industry. Having made success with their musical and performing talents, they have now moved on to the television industry. Whatever the future may hold for the quartet, one can only hope that it will be as successful as their previous ventures.
Lead is a dance vocal group in which all four members share the duties of singing, dancing and rapping.
Whilst their music features heavy popular music influences, they also incorporate hip-hop into their work. Coupled with their energetic dance routines both in their music videos and live performances, it hardly seems surprising that Lead maintain as strong a fanbase today as when they first appeared on the scene.
