The Yellow Monkey
Japanese musical group; rock band
The Yellow Monkey, sometimes abbreviated as Yemon (Japanese: イエモン, Hepburn: Iemon), is a Japanese rock band originally active from 1988 to 2001, before officially disbanding in 2004. They announced their reformation in 2016.
The band's name was derived from the ethnic slur that Japanese people look like monkeys, and that Asian people are said to be "yellow" in skin color. The Yellow Monkey is considered an important Japanese rock group, having achieved major success selling 10 million records, including 6.2 million singles. The group has had three consecutive number one albums, 18 top ten singles and in 2003 were ranked number 81 on HMV's list of the 100 most important Japanese pop acts. Outside Japan the band is best known for their song "Tactics", one of the many ending themes of the Rurouni Kenshin anime.
History
1988–1994: The Beginning
The Yellow Monkey has its roots in 1988, formed by Kazuya Yoshii when his previous band Urgh Police disbanded. When fellow heavy metal band Murbas disbanded, Yoshii switched from bass to guitar and recruited their bassist Youichi Hirose because he liked his personality and playing style. Similarly, drummer Eiji Kikuchi joined when his band Killer May disbanded. After vocalist Kenichi Matsuo (ex-Shock) left due to musical differences, they recruited Eiji's older brother Hideaki (also formerly of Killer May) as lead guitarist.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “The Yellow Monkey” as japanese musical group; rock band. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
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The subject matters to the general reference register because the source frames it as japanese musical group; rock band. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 30, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1444916. VIAF identifies the subject as 254515113. 2 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1988, 2001, 2004 and 2016.
Overview language is designed for orientation and should not be treated as a substitute for the evidence cited beneath it. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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This entry incorporates text from “The Yellow Monkey” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.