ProfileName in Japanese: 土屋 アンナ
Birth name : Anna Marie Heider Tsuchiya ( 土屋)
AKA : ANNA, Anna-T
Instruments : Vocals
Born : March 11, 1984 (age 25)
Years Active : 2002 - 2004; 2005 - Present
Origin : Tokyo, Japan
Genres : J-pop, J-rock
Occupations : Singer, lyricist, actress, model
Labels : Mad Pray Records
Associated : Spin Aqua
acts : Josh Freese, Wes Borland
Anna Tsuchiya (土屋 アンナ) is a Japanese singer, lyricist, actress, and semi-retired model. Anna was born to a Japanese mother and a Russian-American father. She has a younger brother, Kenneth and an older sister, Angela, who is a model as well. n mid 2002, Tsuchiya joined with former Oblivion Dust member K.A.Z to form Spin Aqua. The duo released three singles, one album, and a video collection, but didn't fare well commercially. They later slipped into hiatus before permanently disbanding in 2004, due to Tsuchiya's pregnancy.
Tsuchiya was quiet musically until 2005, when she announced plans to go solo for the first time. She would write the lyrics to almost all of her songs in Japanese/English, having better command of an English accent than her peers. However she is not a fluent speaker of English. On August 24, 2005 she released her first mini-album, Taste My Beat under Avex's sub-label, Mad Pray Records. Then released her first single Change your life and the second single called Slap that Naughty Body / My Fate. She also released her first remix album, Taste My Xxxremixxxxxxx!!!!!!!! Beat Life! on the same day.
Her third single, Rose was used as the opening theme from the Nana anime, alongside fellow Avex artist OLIVIA Lufkin who would be singing the ending theme song. The hype brought from this release boosted Tsuchiya's music career a lot, as "Rose" managed to reach a position of #6 on Oricon charts (her first top 10 placement, and 21 placings above her next best placing product at the time).
Then, Tsuchiya made her first overseas appearance at the Japan Expo in Paris, France in July 2006. And to reinforce her growing popularity in Japan, Tsuchiya's debut studio album, Strip Me? was released shortly afterwards. The album features a growing number of commercial tie-up songs, which includes ones for Whiteen, Kirin, and Kosé Visée. She returned in early 2007 with a new single called "Kuroi Namida", which was used as the new ending theme song for the Nana anime. This was followed by the third Nana anime opening single, "Lucy" in early February which directly preceded a second full length album self-titled Anna Tsuchiya Inspi' Nana (Black Stones) which contains the singles from the show and some new songs; then a quasi-soundtrack album called Nana Best which includes some popular and some unreleased songs by both OLIVIA Lufkin and Tsuchiya from the TV series.
Both Lufkin's and Tsuchiya's songs from these albums were played at Shibuya AX in March 2007. Then, Tsuchiya did a called "world fes tour", starting in June 30 at Anime Expo 2007 in U.S., following in July 27 at Pentaport rock festival in Korea and in July 29 at Formoz Festival in Taiwan, then a summer tour in Japan, including a performance for second time at Summer Sonic Festival.
Among all that, she released the single Bubble Trip / Sweet Sweet Song in August 1. The single Cocoon was released on January 30th of 2008, and in June Tsuchiya released another single called Crazy World with the collaboration of the Japanese artist AI. She then released another single in September, called Virgin Cat, which was used to promote the show The L Word in Japan. A month later she followed up with her third full length album (second non-NANA related), NUDY SHOW!, which contained her singles from "Kuroi Namida" to "Virgin Cat". The latest is a remix album called Nudy xxxremixxxxxxx!!!!!!!! Show!.
