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Hideto "hide" Matsumoto (ªQ¥»¨q¤H) was born in 19th of December 1964, in Kanagawa, Yokosuka. His blood type is AB and he plays guitar. He was the member of Saver Tiger, X, X Japan, hide with Spread Beaver and Zilch. He also had solo works. He is undoubtfully one of the greatest guitarist in JRock history, and his voice is also unique and cannot be imitated.
When hide entered primary school, he was very fat weighted 80kg, almost a double of his classmates. hide was teased and expelled by his classmates, so he was determined to lose weight. During the process, he found that personal responsibility was more important than other's opinion, and that made him a bit egocentric, reluctant to express himself to others. hide's parent made him participate in many hobbies like piano, caligraphy and so on. They even brought hide to America for a month-long Home Stay in Primary 4 to make him more "international". However, hide did not enjoy his childhood much.
hide's love for Rock music began in Secondary 2, when he listened to Kiss, an European heavy metal band. In Secondary 3, hide bought his first guitar "Gibson", and his classmates called him "Gibson" then. Since then he spent most of his spare time listening to Kiss songs and playing the guitar, which made him even more self-closed. In high school, hide formed his first band "Saver Tiger", but it was banned by the school. So Saver Tiger went to Live Houses in Tokyo to practice and play publicly.
However, Saver Tiger was not going well. Members kept joining and leaving, and hide was too strict to other members. As hide was not a sociable person, the members lacked coordination and they always argued. Finally, Saber Tiger broke up and hide went to study in a costume school (PS, years later Saver Tiger reformed with new lineups and is still active right now). However, a call changed his life.
When hide was nearly graduated from costume school, he received a phone call from Yoshiki, leader of another Indies band "X", which was facing disolution due to member loss. Yoshiki asked hide to join X, and hide replied with only one word - "fine". When they met in the Live House for the first time, Yoshiki introduced himself first, "how do you do, I'm X's Yoshiki"; and hide replied, "I'm hide, how do you do". That was not dramatic at all, but it definitely changed hide's life dramatically.
X was formed in 1982 by Yoshiki and his schoolmate Toshi, but not until 1985 did they release their first single "I'll kill you". In February 1987, X had its formation settled down, with leader Yoshiki (drums), vocal Toshi, guitars hide and Pata, and bass Taiji.
Bass guitarist Taiji left the band on 31/1/92, and later Heath the new bass joined in. In August of 1992, Yoshiki suggested to change the name from X to "X Japan", aiming at international market. Although hide accepted the new name, but he thought X was not yet strong enough to expand out of Japan.
X Japan boomed in 90s and gained its position as one of the legendary rock bands in Japan. However, disagreement among members seemed to be deeper and deeper. Members concentrated in solo works instead of X Japan. Finally, tragic news broke out on 22/9/97: X Japan was disbanded. The claimed reason was that Toshi was treated unfairly, however, this may be just an example of their very disagreement.
After X Japan, hide focused on solo works. He wrote music and lryics for himself, and sang his songs with his cool weird voice. On 22/5/96, hide opened his production company "LEMONed", which aimed at bringing up new potential rock bands and gathering fans of hide. At this time hide was focussing on two bands, namely, "hide with Spread Beaver" and "Zilch".
The upcoming year was going to be very busy for him and his future looked brighter than ever. On May 2nd,1998, however, to the disbelief of everyone who knew him, hide was found dead in his apartment, hanged from his bathroom door with a towel. Many were hospitalized for fainting, attempting suicide and tens of thousands of grieved fans came to say goodbye during his public funerals.
With previous recordings, demo tapes and hide’s brother (who lent his voice for two unrecorded songs), Spread Beaver finished hide’s last project, Ja,Zoo. A very emotional tour then started with the legendary guitarist playing and singing on a giant screen and countless guest appearances. Despite the absence of the adulated star, every representation of the show sold out. A memorial museum was inaugurated by the Prime Minister of Japan in 2000. It is two stories high and over two thousand square meters of miscellaneous belongings, pictures, a small concert hall and a chapel.
More than 12,000 fans has visited the funeral held at the Honganji Temple in Tokyo's Tsukiji destrict on 7/5/98. Police arranged helicopers, boats and more than 100 officers to the temple. Moreover, 170 private security guards were hired to keep things in order. The line of fans stretched down the street for about a kilometer from the temple gates. Some of the fans felt sick after being crushed by the crowd, and some collapsed due to emotional sadness. There were 4 attempted suicides due to hide's death, in which 2 girls died. (Somewhere on the web said this: "At least one teenage fan killed herself in a copycat suicide. Another, in Korea, jumped out a window, wearing a bright orange shirt with the name "Hide" scrawled across the back.") On the funeral, Toshi and Yoshiki performed "Forever Love". Beside the X-Japan members, many musicians and JRockers attended, including LUNA SEA, GLAY, SHAZNA and Tetsuya Komuro.
