TMG I

TMG I is the first album by the group B'z guitarist Tak Matsumoto assembled with musicians from outside Japan. Eric Martin of Mr. Big sings, Jack Blades of Night Ranger plays bass and sings harmony, Brian Tichy drums on most of the record and Cindy Blackman on three tracks. Matsumoto produced it, and Vermillion Records released it on June 23, 2004. It reached No. 1 on the Oricon weekly albums chart and was certified Gold by the RIAJ. The opening “Oh Japan ~Our Time Is Now~,” also the advance single, raises a direct address to Japan on a wide chorus and includes a rap from Matsumoto himself. Blades takes the lead vocal on “Everything Passes Away,” while “I Know You by Heart” and “Two of a Kind” tie Martin's burnished voice straight to Matsumoto's singing guitar lines. “Red, White and Bullet Blues” and “Train, Train” push blues and American rock textures forward, widening the range of a fourteen-song, fifty-eight-minute record. What marks the album is where the guitar sits: in the riffs that shape each song and in the melodies beside the vocal, rather than in sheer speed. A nine-date national tour, Dodge the Bullet, followed from July to September 2004 and was issued as a video release that December. The record still stands as a case of Japanese rock and international hard rock meeting on equal terms.