Double Dealer was initially formed as an informal get-together of well known musicians from famous Japanese bands. The past two years has however seen this formation grow into a firm and surprisingly successful group in its own right.

It came about in the following way: On an especially inspiring evening in 1998, the Asian melodic metal elite, in the form of Saber Tiger and Concerto Moon gave a concert in Tokyo. At the end of it, not only the fans in the ´Meguro Rock  May Kann` concert hall were ecstatic, but it saw the beginning of a deep friendship between the musicians of both bands.

A year later singer Takao Ozaki suprised everyone by leaving Concerto Moon. Their guitarist, Norifumi Shima, whose idols are Ritchie Blackmore, Uli Roth und Yngwie Malmsteen decided shortly after to record a solo album. Shima was born in 1970 and began playing piano when he was 4 years old. He began playing guitar when he was 13 and polished his technique, which is primarily influenced by the melodic and the classical. Since 1975 he had played in numerous bands. In 1994 he became the guitarist of Crystal Clear, with whom he stayed for three years before forming the band Concerto Moon together with Zenith singer, Takao Ozaki.

During his search for a suitable singer for his solo project, Norifumi was able to talk the Saber Tiger vocalist, Takenori Shimoyama, whose voice had always fascinated him, into joining him. Shimoyama, who lists his idols as Ronnie James Dio, Ian Gillan and David Coverdale, was born in 1965 in Sapporo City in Hokkaido. He learned to play guitar but changed to vocals when he was 19. His first band was called Androgenus and later he formed his own combo, Mold Dust. He began working with the Saber Tiger musicians in 1996 and officially joined the band a year later. It was with Saber Tiger that Shimoyama released the album, Brain Drain.

Shimoyama and Norifumi originally planned to work together for just two songs, but they soon discovered astounding similarities in their dreams, likes and dislikes. Shima's solo album project soon turned into a kind of Shima & Shimoyama project which was soon renamed Double Dealer. Another Saber Tiger musician, in the form of drummer Yoshio Isoda, soon joined Double Dealer and with bass player Kohsaku Mitani and keyboarder Toshiyuki Koike two colleagues from Concerto Moon were also hired. Mitani had been playing in Concerto Moon since 1996, Koike joined him two years later.

Between 25th. February until 5th. April 2000 Double Dealer worked in the ´Bazooka Studio 450` with engineer Yasuhide Okuyama on their self-titled debut album, which was personally produced by Norifumi Shima himself. As additional guest guitarist they invited their compatriot Akira Kajiyama, known for his work on Holy Man, the solo album of former Deep Purple/Rainbow/Malmsteen vocalist, Joe Lynn Turner, to play the bonus instrumental track, ´Fire Drake`.

Helpful support in the choir parts was obtained from Manabu Takaya and Tatsuya Nakamura from another befriended band, Blindman.
The album was released in Japan in Summer 2000 and received positive reviews from the press. The country's most important metal magazine, BURRN gave it 93 out of 100 points and paved the way for the concerts which Double Dealer subsequently gave in Tokyo, Nagoya and Osaka. The band's reputation spread to Europe and finally, in November 2000, the band was able to leave a huge impression in France.

Double Dealer had received extremely positive reviews in Europe last year as well as exciting previews of their second album entitled Deride At The Top. Continuing in the same style as their debut work, Double Dealer's new output displays an exciting mixture of hard-kicking guitar riffs from band leader Norifumi Shima, agile rhythms, heavy organ playing and great song lines from frontmann Takenori Shimoyama. Deride At The Top consists of twelve tracks, including the brilliant ´Time To Die`, the new version of the Concerto Moon classic. All songs of the highest compositional and technical standards which are enhanced by an attractive videoclip of the song ´Draw The Curtain` in MPEG format for both PC and Mac.


Source: http://www.limb-music.de/