The Black Mages
The Black Mages nearly didn't happen. In 2002, composers Kenichiro Fukui and Tsuyoshi Sekito had been quietly arranging Nobuo Uematsu's Final Fantasy music in a hard rock style, and they wanted the legendary composer himself to join them. Uematsu declined at first. He was busy with composing duties and trying to build his own music production label, Smile Please. But Fukui and Sekito made one request: come play a single live performance with us as a keyboardist. They refused to start a band if Uematsu wasn't part of it.
Uematsu agreed to the one-off show. Standing at the keyboard before a crowd of cheering fans, he felt what he later described as a "mix of stage fright and excitement, with all the crowds cheering, the audience paying full attention". That feeling changed his mind. He joined. The three video game composers from Square and Square Enix became a band, and within a year they had six members and an album on the way.
The name came from an employee at Square Enix named Mr. Matsushita, who chose the English phrase "The Black Mages" deliberately. In Japanese, they reasoned, it "wouldn't stand out." Square Enix retained ownership of the name, which carried a practical consequence: the band could only play Final Fantasy music and original pieces, since the trademark prevented them from arranging music from game series the company didn't own.
On the 19th of February 2003, The Black Mages released their debut album, simply titled The Black Mages. Uematsu produced it himself. The trio arranged and sequenced ten battle themes from across the Final Fantasy series, shaping them into a hybrid of hard rock and progressive metal built on what critics called "blazing synthesizers and guitars." The album reached No. 43 on the Japan Oricon charts.
Critics at RPGFan called it "addicting" and "powerful," though reviewer Andy Byus found fault with the overuse of synthesizers compared to live instruments, and felt some arrangements stayed too close to the originals. The arrangement of "Dancing Mad" drew particular criticism on this point. Square Enix Music Online was more uniformly positive, praising both the musicianship and the arrangement work of Sekito and Fukui, while noting many songs followed a similar structural pattern.
The second album, The Black Mages II: The Skies Above, arrived on the 22nd of December 2004 through Universal Music Group. By then the band had grown to six members, and real drums replaced the sequenced drums of the debut. The album ventured beyond battle themes, adding vocal tracks performed by Kazco Hamano and Tomoaki Watanabe. One track, "Blue Blast - Winning the Rainbow," was an original piece written for Japanese K-1 fighter Takehiro Murahama. The spoken line "Maybe I'm a Lion" was delivered by Alexander O. Smith, a Square Enix translator and close friend of guitarist Michio Okamiya.
The third album, The Black Mages III: Darkness and Starlight, came out on the 19th of March 2008, released through Uematsu's own Dog Ear Records label. Running ten tracks over 60 minutes and 40 seconds, it leaned into symphonic metal and rock opera territory. One track, "Life - in memory of KEITEN -", was composed by Uematsu for Yoshitaka Tagawa, a boy he had met who died of leukemia. Square Enix Music Online called it "a masterpiece" and "The Black Mages' finest effort to date."
"Flame Demon Monster Gaspard" was The Black Mages' first appearance outside their own albums. The track appeared on Dark Chronicle Premium Arrange, released on the 21st of April 2004 by Team Entertainment, an album of arranged music from the video game Dark Chronicle originally composed by Tomohito Nishiura.
Their most prominent outside contribution came through the animated film Final Fantasy VII Advent Children. The band performed "Advent: One-Winged Angel" alongside orchestration conducted by Koji Haijima. The piece arranged Uematsu's original "One-Winged Angel" from Final Fantasy VII, with the arrangement credited to Shiro Hamaguchi. The track appeared on both the film and its soundtrack album.
A third outside track, initially titled "Last Battle -THE BLACK MAGES Ver.-", appeared on the soundtrack album for the Nintendo DS version of Final Fantasy III. When that same recording was later included on the Darkness and Starlight album, it was re-titled "KURAYAMINOKUMO" (Cloud of Darkness), making the track one of the few pieces to appear under two different names across two separate releases.
The Black Mages never toured. Their live appearances were promotional and occasional, but each one was meticulously documented. The first concert, on the 26th of April 2003 at the Shibuya-AX concert hall in Shibuya, Tokyo, introduced a track called "Matoya's Cave" that would later appear on their second album. During band introductions that night, Okamiya played the Chocobo theme and Uematsu played the opening riff of Deep Purple's "Smoke on the Water." A DVD of the show went exclusively to Uematsu fanclub members.
A second performance followed on the 3rd of November 2003 at Kanagawa University in Kanagawa, Japan. The show was free, part of the Kanagawa Jindai Festa. Uematsu had graduated from Kanagawa University, so for this concert all the band members wore the school's student uniform.
Promotion for the second album brought two concerts in January 2005 at Club Citta in Kawasaki and Namba Hatch in Osaka. These shows featured pianist Kenji Ito performing pieces from the SaGa series, and a group called muZik presenting seven techno and pop-style Final Fantasy arrangements. A DVD of the Kawasaki show reached fanclub members on the 1st of February 2006.
The third album's concert at Yokohama Blitz on the 9th of August 2008 marked a break from precedent: its DVD was released commercially in 2009, not limited to fanclub members. The set excluded "Life - in memory of KEITEN -" but added "Maybe I'm a Lion" and "Clash on the Big Bridge."
On the 16th of May 2005, The Black Mages played their first North American performance at the More Friends: Music from Final Fantasy event, held at the Gibson Amphitheatre in Los Angeles, California. They performed "The Rocking Grounds" and "Maybe I'm a Lion" and then joined the full orchestra for "Advent: One-Winged Angel" as the concert encore. A recorded album of the event was released by Square Enix on the 15th of February 2006.
The following year, on the 18th of February 2006, the band appeared at the Voices - Music from Final Fantasy concert in Yokohama, Japan, performing "Advent: One-Winged Angel" alongside the Prima Vista Philharmonic Orchestra. The song was played twice that night, once in the main program and again as an encore. A DVD of the Voices concert, which included an interview with Uematsu, was released on the 21st of June 2006.
On the 7th of July 2007, the band appeared at the Extra: Hyper Game Music Event at Shinkiba Studio Coast in Tokyo. They were last of thirteen acts at a six-hour event, closing the night with "Last Battle," "Those Who Fight Further," "Maybe I'm a Lion," and "Clash on the Big Bridge." Their performances that evening did not appear on the official concert album.
On the 7th of August 2010, Uematsu announced the band had formally disbanded. He gave no direct reason publicly, but in an April 2011 interview he pointed to the band's identity as a Square Enix entity: after he left Square Enix, The Black Mages could not play arrangements of his post-Square Enix compositions or pursue original work freely. By the time of disbanding, Okamiya and Hanyuda had also left Square Enix. Uematsu built his next group, the Earthbound Papas, specifically to exclude current Square Enix employees, allowing him to sidestep the trademark constraints that had defined and ultimately limited The Black Mages.
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Common questions
Who formed The Black Mages and when?
The Black Mages were formed in 2002 by Nobuo Uematsu, Kenichiro Fukui, and Tsuyoshi Sekito, all video game composers at Square and Square Enix. The band expanded to six members in 2003 with the addition of Keiji Kawamori, Michio Okamiya, and Arata Hanyuda.
Why did The Black Mages break up?
The Black Mages disbanded on the 7th of August 2010. In an April 2011 interview, Uematsu explained the main reason was that the band had been formed as a Square Enix entity, which prevented them from performing arrangements of music he composed after leaving Square Enix.
How many albums did The Black Mages release?
The Black Mages released three studio albums: The Black Mages in 2003, The Black Mages II: The Skies Above in 2004, and The Black Mages III: Darkness and Starlight in 2008. All three arranged Final Fantasy music in a hard rock and progressive metal style.
What chart position did The Black Mages debut album reach in Japan?
The Black Mages' self-titled debut album reached No. 43 on the Japan Oricon charts. It was released on the 19th of February 2003 by DigiCube and later re-released on the 10th of May 2004 by Square Enix.
Did The Black Mages ever perform outside Japan?
The Black Mages performed in North America for the first time on the 16th of May 2005 at the More Friends: Music from Final Fantasy event at the Gibson Amphitheatre in Los Angeles, California. That was their only known performance outside Japan.
What band did Nobuo Uematsu form after The Black Mages?
After The Black Mages disbanded, Uematsu formed the Earthbound Papas. He built the new band to exclude current Square Enix employees, which freed it from the trademark and licensing restrictions that had limited The Black Mages to Final Fantasy music.