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| Birth Name(s) : Amuro, Namie |
Date of Birth: N/A |
| Status:
Single
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Partner:
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| Profession:
Singer |
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Full Namie Amuro Biography
Namie Amuro (安室奈美恵, Amuro Namie?, born September 20, 1977) is a Japanese pop singer and occasional songwriter. In the Japanese press she was referred to as the "Queen of J-pop" before Ayumi Hamasaki eclipsed her popularity in the mainstream pop scene. She is still considered the Queen of J-pop, but with Hamasaki as the Empress of J-pop. She was noted in her early years for her Westernized dance music and popularized fashion whose followers came to be nicknamed Amurā (Amurer in English).
Debuting in 1992 as part of the quintet Super Monkey's, she later debuted solo in 1995 to phenomenal success with producer Tetsuya Komuro. Severing her ties with Komuro in 2001, Amuro has reestablished herself as a R&B artist. Her latest album, PLAY (2007) debuted at #1. She has nine #1 singles, five of which have sold over a million copies. Namie Amuro is one of the most popular and infuential Japanese singers and since her solo debut in 1995, she has sold over 27 millions records.
Namie Amuro was born in Naha City, Okinawa, Japan. She is the daughter of Emiko Taira who is Japanese-Italian. Emiko's father's ethnic identity is Japanese. Amuro's parents divorced when she was a toddler; Amuro is the last of three children her mother had with her biological father before their divorce.
Amuro's official solo debut single released only days after her first and final album with the Super Monkey's.
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After the departure of Arakaki, Reina Miyauchi and Ritsuko Matsuda replaced her in the group. Back as a quintet the group released the single, "Try Me ~Watashi wo Shinjite~" in January of 1995. A cover of the Eurobeat song "Try Me" by Italian singer Annerly Gordon, the single peaked at #8 in April and was the beginning of her rise to super stardom. Following the success of "Try Me" the group with the newly realized popularity of their lead singer, released the single "Taiyou no Season" in April solely as Namie Amuro. The following month, the remaining members of the Super Monkey's debuted as the group, MAX, on the avex trax label. After a final single and their first album together released in October of that year, the group stopped recording music together. Amuro followed MAX and signed to avex trax releasing the single, "Body Feels Exit" under the wing of super producer Tetsuya Komuro. Komuro actually approached Amuro in 1993 after seeing a commercial the group had starred in. It was through producer Max Matsuura who had produced all of the Super Monkey's final singles that Amuro switched labels and came to be produced by Komuro.
At the end of 1996, she was nominated for, and won the Grand Prix Award, the highest honor at the Japan Record Awards, (Japan's equivalent to the Grammy's Best Song Award.) for her hit "Don't wanna cry". She is the youngest artist to have won the award.
In the fall, Amuro shocked Japan when she announced at a press conference that she was married to Masaharu Maruyama, known as Sam, and was three months pregnant. Sam was already a familiar name to the public as part of the popular group, TRF. At the end of the year she would win the Grand Prix Award again for "Can You Celebrate?" and make her final appearance on Kouhaku Uta Gassen (Kouhaku singing contest) before beginning her one year leave of absence .
After taking a hiatus for the majority of 1998 to have her child, Amuro returned to the music scene with the single "I Have Never Seen" (1998). She made her first televised appearance on Kouhaku Uta Gassen days later performing a tearful rendition of her hit Can You Celebrate? (1997). On the first week of the Oricon year, the new single debuted at the top position.
In May, Amuro had both professional and personal gains. Following a three year split from her former husband SAM, she took back full custody of their child, Haruto. They had previously agreed that SAM would be the child's sole guardian. At the end of the month, she performed at the MTV Video Music Awards Japan for the fourth consecutive year in a row and this year, clinched two awards. She took home the award for "Best R&B Video" as well as a special award for most impressive performance in Asia becoming the first artist to take home awards four years in a row at the MTV Video Music Awards Japan. She took home the "Inspiration Award Japan" in 2002, Best Collaboration in 2003, "Best R&B Video" for 2004, and 2005 as well as "Most Impressive Asian Artist" in 2005. Between these two events, she announced the release of her sixth original studio album, entitled Queen of Hip-Pop. |
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