Anna Tsuchiya

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Anna Tsuchiya (土屋 アンナ Tsuchiya An'na, born March 11, 1984) is an american Japanese singer, actress, and semi-retired model. Along with Jun Hasegawa and Jessica Michibata, she is considered one of the 2000s most successful mixed-race models in Japan. Since 2005, she is primarily known as a singer. She has written and recorded some of her music in English.

Anna provided Nana Osaki's singing voice in the Nana anime. She performed many of the openings and endings, including "Rose," "Lucy," and "Kuroi Namida."

Biography

Early life

Tsuchiya was born in Tokyo to a Japanese mother and an American father of Polish descent from Buffalo, New York. In her earliest years, she spoke English and Japanese. Tsuchiya's parents divorced when she was seven. She has an older sister, Angela.

Modeling career

Tsuchiya's modeling career began at the age of fourteen after her older sister Angela, a former fashion model, suggested it. She entered her sister's former agency, and was picked up by an agent who specialized in magazine-modeling, and her first jobs consisted of modeling for an open collection in Kobe and for Japanese Seventeen in 1998. Demand for her grew, and by 2002, she was doing television ads for Uniqlo and Edwin.

Tsuchiya retired from modeling at 18. She has said that she realized she could no longer compete with "gifted ones" like Emi Suzuki. She remains in demand for fashion and lifestyle magazines like Kera, Soup, and Zipper.

Music career

In mid-2002, she form with K.A.Z a punk-rock duo Spin Aqua. Spin Aqua released three singles, one album, and a video collection, without commercial success. In 2004, Tsuchiya became pregnant, and the group disbanded.

In 2005, Tsuchiya announced plans to begin a solo career. On August 24 of that year, she released her first mini-album, Taste My Beat on Avex Group's sub-label, Mad Pray Records.[18] Her first single was "Change Your Life", followed by a second single entitled "Slap that Naughty Body" / "My Fate". After these releases, Tsuchiya released her first remix album, Taste My Xxxremixxxxxxx!!!!!!!! Beat Life!. Her third single, "Rose" was used as the opening theme for Nana. This boosted Tsuchiya's music career, as "Rose" reached No. 6 on the Oricon charts and become her first Top Ten Hit.

In early 2007, after a short hiatus, she returned to the music scene with a new single called "Kuroi Namida". This song would also be featured in the Nana anime. This was followed by the third Nana anime opening single, "Lucy" in early February. This would also directly precede a second full-length Nana album, titled Anna Tsuchiya Inspi' Nana (Black Stones) which contained singles from the show and new songs. A quasi-soundtrack album called Nana Best was then released, which included popular and unreleased songs by both her and Olivia Lufkin from the TV series. In March 2007, both Lufkin's and Tsuchiya's songs from these albums were played at Shibuya AX in Tokyo in March 2007.

The single "Cocoon" was released on January 30, 2008, followed in June by the single "Crazy World" which was a collaboration with the Japanese EMI Music recording artist AI. Tsuchiya released a third single in September 2008, "Virgin Cat", which was used to promote the show The L Word in Japan. In October 2008, she released her third full length album, the sexually explicit Nudy Show!. In May 2010, Tsuchiya's remix of her Nudy Show! album was released titled Nudy xxxremixxxxxxx!!!!!!!! Show!. On November 23, 2011 she released "Switch On!" her thirteenth single. It is the opening theme for the Kamen Rider Series Kamen Rider Fourze. She decided to record the song because her son was a fan of the previous series Kamen Rider OOO. She herself watched earlier versions while growing up. On August 22, 2012 she released another Kamen Rider single: Voyagers, the theme song to Kamen Rider Fourze the Movie: Space, Here We Come!.

Acting career

Tsuchiya made her acting debut in 2004 in Novala Takemoto's adapted runaway hit Kamikaze Girls as the girl biker punk yankī "Ichigo Shirayuri." This role brought her both immediate attention and critical success, with Tsuchiya winning several awards in Japan.

Tsuchiya's success in acting continued with various movie performances and appearances in dramas such as Katsuhito Ishii's The Taste of Tea which played at Cannes, the 2007 live-action remake of Dororo and as the voice of Lindsay Lohan's character "Maggie Peyton" in the Japanese dub of Herbie: Fully Loaded. In February 2007's Sakuran she played the rebellious but beautiful courtesan Kiyoha in a live action adaptation of the manga. Her latest performance in a film is starring in the live-action adaptation of the manga The Legend of Kamui.

Personal life

In 2004, Tsuchiya announced her engagement to model and actor Joshua Niimura. On November 19, 2004, Tsuchiya gave birth to their first child, a son named Sky (澄海 Sukai). In July 2006, it was announced that Tsuchiya and Niimura had divorced. In May 2008, Niimura died of heart failure at the age of 25.

In September 2009, Tsuchiya wrote on her blog that she was pregnant and had married her long-time stylist, Yamato Kikuchi, three years her senior. The two had begun dating in 2007. On March 26, 2010, Tsuchiya gave birth to her second son, Simba (心羽).

Media

Discography

Filmography

Films