Sakura is the youngest child in the Sakurazawa family. His older brother is around 10 years his senior, and his sister is one year older than him. This made him closer to his sister than to his brother, as he tells us in the IS book interview.

When Sakura was a child, he was rather frail and delicate, and people often mistook him for a girl... however, he had quite a twisted temper. He recalls being a "destruction demon", not being at ease with himself until he broke something (usually, his brother's belongings). His older brother was very nice to him, but also very strict. Sakura remembers him as an important influence in his musical career.

The first instrument Sakura learnt to play was the piano, and he continues to play it even to this day.

When he was chuugaku (Junior High) he used to listen to Duran Duran and other New wave (New Romantic) bands, and he gradually became interested in playing music. He tried to play guitar at first, but he didn't know the basic chords and thus couldn't play it right, so he moved on to bass guitar (when you play bass guitar you pluck string by string, you don't play chords, that's why.)
He practiced bass at home for about a year, but he changed to drums.

When he was in High school he was already playing drums and brass section; and he played for 3 different school bands. He also started working as a roadie for other bands.

After graduating from high school, he entered Music School and took acoustic classes. But money became a big concern (uh... I can relate to that) and he started playing drums professionaly for a living at the age of 19, as well as working as roadie for Dead End. However, he couldn't find a band that he felt at ease with, so he became a sessionist and played with several bands. (Harem Q -with which he realeased a CD-, Di+Kusse, etc.). In January 1993 (when he was 23) Tetsu sees him play during a concert, and likes Sakura's style, so he invites him to join L'Arc en ciel. In the beginning neither Sakura nor the rest of the band were too sure about how good this decision would be, but Pero (the first l'arc en ciel drummer) having left l'arc en ciel after a concert in december 1992 had put them in a very awkward position because they already had a contract to record an album, but they no longer had a drummer. Tetsu thought he'd give it a try and see what happened.

In an interview laruku gave around that time Tetsu said taking Sakura in the band was a little bit of a bet, that he didn't know what would happen but he was willing to take the chance (Sakura joined L'Arc en Ciel very fast, and they didn't know him too well... so in many ways, it was sort of a gamble). Fortunately, things went very well, and that very same year, laruku recorded their first album "Dune" successfully.

Sakura said that for the first time he felt happy in a band, and even if he was a little dubitative in the beginning as to what would happen, he also thought that since they were all around the same age, and they all listened to and liked the same kind of music, it might work. (and it did!!)

Hyde rememberes in the beginning he thought Sakura was a little scary, and difficult to approach, but as time went by and they started to play together he found out Sakura was a very sweet person and easy to talk to.
Ken said in those years that they had gotten along from the beginning, talking a lot and joking a lot. (yeah... they have a very similar sense of humor).

Sakura played his first concert with L'Arc en Ciel in March 1993 it was called "Guilty Live", and Dune was released in April that year, reaching N°1 position in Indies Oricon chart.

Setlist
1. shutting from the sky
2. Voice
3. Be destined
4. tsuioku no joukei
5. Entichers
6. yasouka
7. flood of tears
8. dune
9. taste of love
10. as if in a dream
11. ushinawareta nagame

After this, they never played "I'm in pain" or "No truth" again. That was probably a sign of their evolution, and how sure they were about their new formation, without having to rely on their past ones.

*~*End of part 1 *~*