JAM Project

JAM Project ("JAM" standing for "Japan Animationsong Makers") are a Japanese anison band founded on July 19, 2000 by anison singer Ichirou Mizuki. The band is composed of many vocal artists well known in the anime music industry. Aside from the many anime, tokusatsu, and video game theme songs the band has performed together, each member is famous for his or her own solo performances of Japanese theme songs. JAM Project is known to worldwide audiences for their theme music contributions to "Garo" and "One Punch Man."
History.
JAM Project was founded in 2000 by veteran singer Ichirou Mizuki, who sought to revitalize the fiery spirit of earlier anime songs. He recruited fellow veterans of that space, including Hironobu Kageyama and Masaaki Endoh, who remain members of the group.
The following year, JAM Project began a long association with the Super Robot Wars franchise, performing "Hagane no Messiah" for the PlayStation game "Super Robot Wars Alpha Gaiden. In 2002, Mizuki and Eizo Sakamoto stepped back from the group but three members would join. Masami Okui had released a number of albums and had performed openings for shows including "Slayers" and "Revolutionary Girl Utena." Hiroshi Kitadani, previously a member of the bands Stagger and Lapis Lazuli, entered the world of anime songs via "One Piece" and its first of several opening themes he has performed for the long-running series. Yoshiki Fukuyama, like Kageyama, Endoh and Mizuki, was a veteran of the anime world. In the 1990s, he was the singing voice of Basara Nekki in "Macross 7."
In 2005, the group began another long association with the "Garo" franchise, writing opening themes for nearly all iterations of the franchise, both anime and live-action. Kageyama voices Madou Ring Zaruba in every release of the show.
Since 2008, the group has performed internationally with regularity, in cities such as Baltimore, Washington, Rotterdam, Abu Dhabi and Paris, typically in conjunction with anime conventions.
In the summer of 2012, they teamed up with Animetal USA for a limited national concert tour called the . From 2011 to 2014, Japanese composer and conductor Takayuki Hattori served as orchestral arranger on several albums and tours.
In 2015, JAM Project celebrated its 15th anniversary with a series of concerts that contained 39 songs in its setlist chosen from all their previous albums, the most songs in any of their concerts to date. They also released a CD based on a new ultra-high quality (UHQ CD) standard containing re-arranged and re-recorded hits voted on by fans. The same year, the group exposed itself to a new audience through "THE HERO! ~Ikareru Kobushi ni Honō wo Tsukero~" (lit. "Set Fire To The Furious Fist)", their opening for the first season of "One-Punch Man." The music video, filmed in San Francisco, has accumulated more than 50 million views on YouTube.
In 2020, the group celebrated its 20th anniversary with the release of the album "The Age of Dragon Knights." JAM Project worked with prominent peers, including Yuki Kajiura, GRANRODEO, ALI PROJECT, angela and members of FLOW. The group also released "JAM Project 20th Anniversary Complete BOX," which includes all of the group's albums, a collection of its foreign-language recordings, Blu-rays of a concert and other footage, and a 300-page booklet.
The COVID-19 pandemic caused a planned tour to be scuttled. Kageyama, however, credited the unplanned break with rejuvenating the band's creative drive. That rebirth is the subject of the 2021 documentary "Get Over -- JAM Project the Movie."
The group's producer is Shunji Inoue, the president and CEO of Lantis.
Regular members.
THE MONSTERS.
JAM Project's alter-ego band introduced in 2013.