supercell

supercell is a 11-member music group led by composer and lyricist Ryo which formed in 2007 initially as a doujin music group.

Band History

On December 2007, Ryo submitted his song "Melt" (メルト Meruto) to NicoNicoDouga using the Vocaloid singing synthesizer software, Hatsune Miku, for the vocals. This song was very well recieved, adding to the fact that Hatsune Miku's popularity was soaring high at that time, it garned 5 million views since then.

However, Ryo used an illustration of Miku drawn by 119 (pronounced Hikeshi) without permission. Hence prompting Ryo to contact 119 to apologize, 119 responded with a great interest on "Melt" and the both of them began working together, forming supercell in between.

Since then many members have joined supercell and by the time they made their debut, 11 members have joined.

In 2008, supercell's releases on of "Koi wa Sensou" (恋は戦争) on February 22, "World is Mine" (ワールドイズマイン Wārudo izu Main) on May 31, and "Black★Rock Shooter" (ブラック★ロックシューター Burakku Rokku Shūtā?) on June 13 were all well recieved; each gained over million views. Later on, Ryo composed the song "Kibou no Neiro" (キボウノネイロ), released as a limited edition image song CD with the fifth volume of Shuu Shirase's light novel series Oto × Maho on July 15, 2008; the CD was only sold at Animate and Comic Toranoana. The CD sold at Animate had the song sung by Hatsune Miku, but the Toranoana version had it sung by the human vocalist Sari.

In August 2008, supercell released their the independent self-titled album supercell at Comiket74, containing majority of their previously released songs in NicoNicoDouga with some new songs. Afterwards, on October 2008, Ryo released his final submission on NicoNicoDouga before his major debut, "Hajimete no Koi ga Owaru Toki" (初めての恋が終わる時). This appearance is also popular, garnered over a million views, and stayed in the Daily Ranking of NicoNicoDouga for over 3 days.

By the time supercell has reached 12 people, 119 announced his temporally hiatus and left supercell. 11 people remained since then.

Major Debut

supercell made their major debut at 2009 with Sony Music Entertainment. Their first major release on the music market was the professional release of supercell album, with more songs included in, an artbook as well as a specially designed casing and a DVD containing PVs of 4 songs. This album sold more than 100,000 copies in a single year, which earned a Gold Disc reward by the Recording Industry Association of Japan.

supercell then released their first single debut, Kimi no Shiranai Monogatari (君の知らない物語) - the ending theme of Bakemonogatari anime series on August 12, 2009, which ranked No. 5 on Oricon's weekly singles chart. The single also included 2 new songs, Love & Roll and The Theme of Cencoroll, used in the short anime CENCOROLL. The single also marked their first single where Hatsune Miku is not used for their songs, instead using a real vocalist, Nagi.

On February 2010, supercell's second single "Sayonara Memories" was released. supercell's third single, "Utakata Hanabi/Hoshi ga Matataku Konna Yoru ni" (うたかた花火/星が瞬くこんな夜に), is a double A-side and was released on August 25, 2010. supercell also released a split single in collaboration with Kz of Livetune called "Kotchi Muite Baby/Yellow" (こっち向いて Baby/Yellow), which is the theme song of Hatsune Miku: Project Diva 2nd on July 14,2010 by Sony Music Direct. This album is the first release by Supercell to feature Hatsune Miku as the vocalist since their major debut album. Supercell produced the song "Hero" (ヒーロー) as a theme song to Shueisha's manga magazine Aoharu, a special edition version of Young Jump, which had its first issue on November 30, 2010.

In late 2010, Supercell joined INCS, a Shibuya, Tokyo-based company that establishes the major record label TamStar Records for musicians and artists who originally made their debut as dōjin music artists online. Other groups that joined including Livetune, Gom, Rapbit, and Nagi Yanagi. Supercell then collaborated on a compilation album titled TamStar Records Collection Vol. 0 which is released as a limited edition at Comiket 79 in December 2010. At the same time, TamStar Records released a remix album of supercell's debut album supercell as a tribute to the band titled "Stowaways".

On March 16, 2011. Supercell released their second studio album Today Is A Beautiful Day, which included songs from their major debut (Hatsune Miku songs excluded) and few more new songs. However, one of the most notable song would be Perfect Day which it's PV was entirely done in anime style, which is very rare for any music PVs out there.

Impact on pixiv

Among 11 members, huke, redjuice, Shirow Miwa, maque are the artist members of supercell, which they have posted their illustrations (which can be found in the booklet of their album) in pixiv, approximately weeks after the album's release. These illustrations were popular, and was in the pixiv ranking one day after the post, garnering around more than ten thousand views since then.

huke's illustration on the character Black★Rock Shooter was proven to be extremely popular, which prompted Ryo to compose a song based on that character. The success on both the illustration and the music has spawned an OVA anime of Black★Rock Shooter released on July 30th, 2010; And also a game release of Black★Rock Shooter, which will be released on August 25 2011. A browser game titled Puchitto Rock Shooter (ぷちっと★ロックシューター Puchitto Rokku Shūtā) was released on NicoNicoDouga at March 2011, with illustrations by CHANxCO.