Most metal bands that use a violin hire one for the record. Unlucky Morpheus has one in the lineup.
The Training
Jill is from Nagano Prefecture and was born on 17 February 1983. She started the violin at three. She went through the high school attached to Tokyo University of the Arts and then the university itself, widely regarded as the country’s top music school.
That is a classical education from start to finish. Alongside the band she has continued to play in orchestras and on anime soundtracks.
Before the Band
Her route into heavier music ran through two earlier projects. From 2007 she played in Rose Noire. From 2014 to 2018 she was part of Hollow Mellow.
She joined Unlucky Morpheus in 2015. She was the last of the six members to arrive. The lineup is Fuki on vocals, Shiren and Jinya on guitar, Hiroyuki Ogawa on bass, Fumiya Morishita on drums, and Jill on violin.
The Records
Her time in the band covers its rise from the fan-publishing scene to the charts. CHANGE OF GENERATION (2018) was the first Unlucky Morpheus album to chart in Japan. Unfinished (2020) and evolution (2022) followed, then Gate of Heaven on 26 November 2025 and Gate of Hell on 3 June 2026.
She is also on the side project. In May 2024, five members of the band recorded a melodic death metal album as Unholy Orpheus, what is DEATH?. The one member not on it was the singer. The violinist was.
That is a useful clue to how the band thinks about her instrument. When the band made a record without its singer, it kept the violin.
Why It Matters
Japanese metal has a small tradition of violinists in the front line, from Jill to Ayasa of East Of Eden. They share a background: years of classical training, then a decision to take it somewhere louder.
Start with CHANGE OF GENERATION, then Gate of Hell.
