- Album list
- Singer Intro
Yumiko Shiina (椎名 裕美子 Shiina Yumiko?, born November 25, 1978), known by her stage name Ringo Sheena[Note 1] (椎名 林檎 Shiina Ringo?), is a Japanese singer and songwriter. She is also the founder and lead vocalist of the band Tokyo Jihen.
She describes herself as 'Shinjuku-kei Jisaku-Jien-ya (新宿系自作自演屋 a Shinjuku-style writer-performer?)'. She was ranked number 36 in a list of Japan's top 100 musicians compiled by HMV in 2003.
Sheena released her first official single 'Kōfukuron' in May 1998, when she was 19 years old. She subsequently made singles 'Kabukichō no Joō' and 'Koko de Kiss Shite', the latter becoming her first hit.
This was followed by the release of her first album, Muzai Moratorium, in February 1999. The album was a major hit. 'Gips' was due to be the next single, but when Sheena had to cancel recording due to illness, 'Honnō' was released as the fourth single instead. Shina chose a hospital as the setting for the music video for 'Honnō'.
The fifth and sixth singles, 'Gips' and 'Tsumi to Batsu', were released at the same time to prevent overlap with the release of her second album, Shōso Strip, in March 2000.
Sheena had initially indicated that she would retire as 'Sheena Ringo' when she had released three albums. At the time the second album was released, she was among the top three Japanese female artists, along with Hikaru Utada and Ayumi Hamasaki, in terms of popularity and annual income. However, she was uncomfortable with being regarded as an icon, and wanted her career to branch out more from the mainstream. When she began to produce her third album under the tentative title 'Fushigi, Waizatsu, Ekisentorikku (不思議・猥雑・エキセントリック Wonder, Vulgar, Eccentric?)' she intended to make it her last solo album.
She released the single 'Mayonaka wa Junketsu' in March 2001, with the intention of including it on a third album. The music video was created in a retro-anime style that depicted Ringo as a sort of mid-'60s spy movie heroine. In 2002, she released a two-disc multilingual cover album Utaite Myōri: Sono Ichi. Since she felt that a cover album did not count as a bona fide album, she began to work on her third original album.
In 2003, she released her third album, titled Kalk Samen Kuri no Hana.[Note 2]
Towards the conclusion of her solo career, she released her final solo single, 'Ringo no Uta' ('Apple's Song'), which was adopted by the national children's song TV program Minna no Uta. This song had a summation of her career, and the music video included references to all of her previous videos.
In 2004, Sheena undertook the role of music director for the stage play KKP (Kentaro Kobayashi Produce) #004 Lens,[Note 3] which is based on the story of her short film Tanpen Kinema Hyaku-Iro Megane.
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