DEZERT

DEZERT are a Japanese visual kei rock band formed in September 2011 around vocalist Chiaki and bassist Sacchan, with guitarist Miyako and drummer SORA completing the current four-piece. The band built its early following without large-scale promotion, relying instead on an intense live reputation and songs that placed human pain and darkness inside deliberately grotesque language and imagery. That abrasive identity made DEZERT a distinctive presence in the 2010s visual kei underground, but their music has never remained fixed in one form.

The line-up took its present shape in December 2015 when Miyako joined following the departure of guitarist Kira. Over the following years, DEZERT widened both their sound and ambitions. The rawness and heavy, nu-metal-leaning attack associated with their earlier work increasingly made room for melody and alternative rock, while the band moved from the live-house circuit towards larger venues. By 2019, they had undertaken their first nationwide hall tour and made their first appearance at ROCK IN JAPAN FESTIVAL, extending their reach beyond the visual kei scene.

That growth continued through the early 2020s. DEZERT played Hibiya Open-Air Concert Hall in 2022 and sold out LINE CUBE SHIBUYA in September 2023, where they announced their move to the majors and their first solo Nippon Budokan concert. ‘The Heart Tree’, released through Nippon Crown in January 2024, became their first major album, before the band reached Nippon Budokan that December. Rather than treating the venue as an endpoint, DEZERT followed it with their first 47-prefecture one-man tour from June 2025, concluding at Makuhari Messe Event Hall in March 2026.

DEZERT’s appeal lies in the tension between heaviness and accessibility. Chiaki’s writing can be confrontational, bleak, or vulnerable, while the band move between distorted rhythmic weight, alternative-rock melody, and songs built for communal release in a live setting. Composition has also become less centred on a single member over time, giving the modern catalogue a broader internal voice without sanding away the volatility that defined DEZERT’s earlier work.

As DEZERT mark their 15th anniversary in 2026, they are operating on a larger scale while retaining the independent-minded stance that has followed them since formation. Anniversary hall and live-house tours run through the year, while their self-titled second major album ‘DEZERT’ arrives in October, bringing together the heavy, melodic, and emotionally direct sides the band have developed across their career.