Toshiya [bass]

Toshiya (born on March 31, 1977 in Nagano) is a Japanese musician and the bassist of Dir en grey. He has been with the band since its inception in 1997, although he was not in La:Sadie's, as the other four previously had been. Unlike fellow band members Kaoru and Die, Toshiya has only composed a handful of Dir en grey's songs, such as "Erode" and "Bottom of the Death Valley". Unsurprisingly, his compositions tend to have a distinct, bass-driven sound.
Near the beginning of the band's career, Toshiya was endorsed by Killer Guitars in Japan. During this period he primarily used guitars with the company's Kumovi body and later his signature-series bass, the Beelze, which is similar to a reverse version of a typical Rickenbacker guitar. These signatures had a verse written by Toshiya on the headstock instead of the standard Killer logo. The third model he used from Killer was a custom bass called the 3epo.

Toshiya is currently endorsed by ESP Guitars in Japan, who provides most of his basses, picks, and straps. His endorsement began with P-bass style guitars, used for most of the bands songs, and Lakland 5-string guitars used for low-tuned songs such as "Obscure". He now primarily uses his signature-series basses from the ESP Custom Shop called the RU-Drive, which is a copy of the Gibson RD body shape. Replicas of the discontinued Beelze series were once available through Killer, who still offers a non-signature version of it under the series name Simmony. ESP currently offers replicas of the 22-fret RU-Drive in both the ESP and Edwards artist series.