Tetsuya Ogawa (born October 3, 1969, at Osaka in Kansai, Japan), known professionally as tetsu, is the leader and bassist of the Japanese rock band L'Arc~en~Ciel. He also does backup vocals and has composed many of the band's songs, including 'Link', 'READY STEADY GO', 'finale', 'Driver's High', "Stay Away," and 'Pieces'. In the band, his name is 'tetsu' (All in lower case).

Since 2001, he had solo work under the name 'TETSU69' (Number 69 is his birth year). As of 26 November 2006 he changed his solo name to 'tetsu'.

In 2007, Tetsu and 22-year-old actress Ayana Sakai got married.

Playing Style

Tetsu is renowned for his melodic style of bass playing. Many of L'Arc~en~Ciel's songs involve Tetsu playing counter melodies with ken (guitarist of L'Arc~en~Ciel) while still holding a groove with the drums. Tetsu's composing can be seen as more 'poppish' as compared to ken's who has a heavier and sometimes bluesy approach. He frequently uses slides, hammer-ons, and pull-offs in his playing.

Tetsu plays with a pick most of the time, but uses fingerstyle occasionally when the song calls for it, such as in 'winter fall' and 'jojoushi'. In a few songs Tetsu can be heard using the slap style of playing such as in the Laruku song 'THE NEPENTHES' and 'twinkle, twinkle'. Tetsu has also used distortion such as in the song 'Stay Away.' Tetsu has also been known to play briefly with a banana, "Munkimpo-kun", (which he whips to the audience afterwards) prior to the beginning of a song (usually 'Stay Away') in some concerts.

Tetsu primarily plays a 5 string bass since L'Arc~en~Ciel's 15th anniversary, but is known to occasionally use 6 strings in L'Arc~en~Ciel songs such as Neo Universe, Time Goes on,Get out from the Shell where Tetsu plays lead melody.But in Perfect Blue he use a 6 string baritone guitar (similar with electric guitar but tuned one octave lower). Tetsu also performs a Guitar / Bass Double Neck on the song Trust.

Even though Tetsu is endorsed by ESP Guitars and has several models, he has used his Zon bass for most of his recording works. Tetsu is an avid collector of basses and guitars. He owns over 120 basses and more than 20 guitars.

Other Side Projects

Creature Creature [formed in 2005]

Vocal. MORRIE [ex Dead-End]
Bass. tetsu
Guitar. MINORU [(Murohime Shin) ex THE MAD CAPSULE MARKETS, DIE IN CRIES, BLOODY IMITATION SOCIETY]

Released three singles on June 19, 2006:
『Red』
『風の塔』 (Kaze no tou) music by tetsu
『パラダイス』 (PARADISE) music by MORRIE and tetsu

Creature Creature released their first album on August 30, 2006, called 'Light & Lust'.

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Top 10 World's Best Bassists

1) Cliff Burton (Metallica)
2) Flea (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
3) Tetsuya Ogawa (L’arc en ciel)
5) Geddy Lee (Rush)
6) Toshiya (Dir en grey)
7) John Entwistle (The Who)
8) Steve Harris (Iron Maiden)
9) P-nut (311)
10) Ross Valory