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ZEAL LINK Personal Interview - Mally

Text: Shimizu Motoko

As the tight supporting backbone of the sound on stage, Mally attracts the viewers’ gaze with her passionate performance. However, behind it all, there lies a calm analytical self, and an honesty that absorbs everything around her. Here, an overview of the lifetime of a girl who says, “I’m bad at lying. I can’t hide my true feelings.“

– When you were younger, what kind of child were you? Looking at your image now, I’m imagining a very lively older sister type. I guess so (laughs). As a kid I was born after three older brothers, so the friends that I played with were mostly boys. To kids, a difference of three years is overwhelmingly strong, so even when playing video games, I’d compete like crazy, thinking "I never want to lose to my brothers!” My competitive personality now is something that I think came from that too. – You didn’t have female friends? I did. Only, even when I played with dolls I was never given Licca-chan but instead minor characters, and long ago, one time I lost Izumi-chan’s dress, and I was so scared, like, “What if she came back in the middle of the night to attack me!?” After that I kept my hands off dolls. I’ve hated scary stories and stuff all my life…. I had a weirdly strong imagination back then, probably. – It seems like you were strongly empathetic, or very strongly sensitive to many things. Did you also start playing instruments through your brother’s influence? No, when I was in elementary school I was interested in brass band, and “because I was tall” I started playing trombone. I’ve always been the type to be really freaking serious in everything I’ve been told to do, so I had a lot of fun honing my skills, thinking how do I get more precise!? I hated talking in front of people but I ended up loving performing, so in marching band I played trombone like whoosh! like how guitar players do that aggressive spinning move. – Ohh. That’s passed on until now.

People say that trombone players consist of outgoing, attention-grabbing people, so I started to feel influenced by them. In the end, I continued trombone in elementary, middle and high school for 8 years, and especially since I went to a middle school well known for its music program, I had the opportunity to play many different instruments. In the midst of basses, drums, keyboards, marimbas, bells….. I was drawn to the big instruments (laughs). I played drums for a bit, and when I performed the theme song of FI, “TRUTH,” I became quite popular! But while I’d had an interest in it then, at the time trombone was still my first choice so I didn’t really start to really play. But after entering high school, I started being invited to play into bands more, and my childhood friend Naoto was there too. – Last time when I had a chat with Naoto, she told me that you played some weird games together in the middle of the forest when you were kids. Yes (laughs). For a long time, I’d braid leaves and make instruments, I liked making things from nature for some reason. With Naoto, who I’d known before I changed schools, we’d rip the plants, take branches…… we’d play around like that. And we were in the same school in middle school and she knew I played the drums, and even though she’d invited me, for some reason she decided to bring me along to meet another drummer who she was considering for her band, and at first we didn’t know what was going on (laughs). Even then I thought, “I don’t want to lose to them!” and in the end I became the drummer. – Around then, did you have any particular interest towards rock or “visual kei”? No. In brass band it was classical or J-POP, ethnic music, musicals… we were exposed to all sorts of music, but talking about forming a band who played visual kei music was… to be honest, I don’t really like the signature “visual kei” voice. Except, I hated pushing things aside just because I didn’t like them, so when I tried to listen to it I found bands that I thought were pretty good or had good arrangements. For example Naoto’s favourite band Raphael had songs where I thought, “Above all else the singing voice is really good!” and when I was covering the song, I just couldn’t get the phrase right, and I liked them so much I introduced twin pedals early on so that I could play it better (laughs). Just like I don’t like continuing to dislike the things I dislike, I also don’t like not being able to do something whenever I fail to do it. – Hearing what you’re saying, you seem like a very straightforward person. Whether it is the tasks that you’ve been given or the influence you receive from others, and how you absorb what’s around you, you face everything head on. Especially during that time, I absorbed everything around me but I was just frantic. Because in the beginning when I first started playing drums in a band I was so frantic, I couldn’t charm anybody with my playing. One time in a band we performed with, there was a drummer who had been so focused on their drumming that they kept their head down the whole time. One of my seniors who had been watching with me told me, “Mally, when you play you look just like that.” I was so upset hearing that, I went to the bathroom to cry. ー Really!? I can’t imagine that from your emotional performance now! That’s why, after that I started to watch and absorb more drummers in their performances. Among the ones who gave me the deepest impression was Nero from MERRY, so definitely, I was the most drawn to flashy, energetic drummers. When I felt seriously like I was a member of the band, I started to feel a tickle of desire in myself to want to stand out. That being said, even when I drum with reckless strength, people around me would tell me that the instrument doesn’t sound that strong, so I had to find a balance between drumming with the movement of my hands as well as keeping the strength that I would drum from my arms that I had since the beginning. ー Especially in exist†trace’s case, at the start all of the visual kei bands around you consisted of only men, so wasn’t there even more of a sense that the power not to lose to them was important?

Definitely. I was thinking only about how to become more like them, so I also tried to have their coolness as well. So in the beginning I tried to act like a pretty boy, but I started feeling like it was a bit off, so the result of the shift is my current style. When I express my true emotions, as long as it could move your heart or make you feel sympathy…. was what started to become my thoughts when I stood on stage, and when I started doing that, one girl told me, “All this time I’ve always only thought negative, sad things, but after seeing Mally, I was able to be more positive” in a message. And then I realized, “Oh, so I’m not doing anything wrong.” I want to be able to make more people feel that, so I do what I do now.

ー That’s a natural result for someone as empathetic as you, but of course there isn’t really a “right answer” for being in a band. You had been devoted to precision in brass band, so there must be difficulties for you in that shift. There really is. A drummer’s standing and style in a band varies so much that I had difficulties understanding what kind of drummer I was, and in times like that I’m deciding to face them head on. Before I would reveal my emotions too much, and when I played really sad songs, I would start crying during a live……. which isn’t really something you should do. When drummers let their emotions out, songs collapse, and that was something I engraved into my mind, so how should I balance expressing my emotions with a solid base of calmness? That became something I began to think really deeply about. ー The drums are the backbone of the sound, and you have to grasp the member’s conditions and support them, so however flashy you have to be, there’s definitely a part where you have to stay calm as well. Behind a powerful performance, being able to be aware of that is very important. Now that you mention it, in an ensemble with other instruments, the trombone also has the duty of regulation. I was always thinking about the comfort of being able to be in rhythm with the sounds all around me, so it may have been that trombone training that got me into the drumming life…… because I’m not really an artistic human being.

ー I think you’re the type of person who’s very straightforward and proper, and who does well in general society. By what you said I may be street smart (laughs). But that’s why I came to the drums, a position that has to pay attention to all of its surroundings, and that’s why from now on I want to keep that perceptiveness while I play in a band. After signing with this company, something that they always tell me is “If the drums are good, the band is good,” so of course I want to always keep improving as a drummer, and my personal goal is “Eternally in second place, but all-around winner.” So of course if you only get one vote, I wouldn’t have it, but if you could vote twice, then I’d be the overall winner; I want to be a character that can be loved by everyone. And anyway it’s because my motto is “Keep moving before you have the time to feel bad.” When I feel bad, I go rehearse on the drums, or I go to the gym to muscle train, I go and fill out all the parts of me that are missing! ー That sounds very much like you. So finally, on March 16th your mini album “THIS IS NOW” will be released, and I must say, that is a very bold title. That’s the maximum “NOW” that we can show of this band, exist†trace, and it’s a release that has accumulated all of our thoughts of how we want to keep going as a band. This wasn’t an album that we penned in time for a release, but rather an album that we nourished with our audience at lives, whose heat we wanted to package as a sound; that’s the kind of name it is. The tempo is quick, and even as a drummer the titular song tests my limits most of all, and the album is packed with challenges like its hard rock beat and its delicateness, so straight after the release, we want to share the passion that we have now with the audience of Nagoya at our oneman. Nagoya’s audience is very passionate, and we want to attack Nagoya after Tokyo, the centre of our Tokyo-Nagoya-Osaka tour. ー I’m looking forward to it. And the same as I asked Omi two issues ago, and Naoto last issue: do you have any advice for girls who want to join a band? I think it’s really important to challenge yourself. I had said this earlier, but there’s no such thing as impossible. Because it’s critical that you make even impossible things possible, then if there is music that you really want to play then you have to believe in that and move forward, and from there on, make things that you’ve grabbed ahold of things that you will cherish and have fun with. You’ll have to have the drive and the resolution for it, but I want exist†trace to be a band that you can see and think “Ahh, I want to be like that,” so don’t hesitate to come see us play. And if that actually happens, then I’ll try my best while I think to myself, “I refuse to lose!”, so for my rivals in the future, I’m waiting for you!!

Read our other exist†trace personal interviews here:

Omi (ZEAL LINK December 2015)

Naoto (ZEAL LINK January 2016)

Jyou & miko (MASSIVE Vol. 22)

#exist†trace #mally #interview

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