
Japanese pop-rock duo Puffy AmiYumi will preview music from its new album, "Honeycreeper," during a five-date tour of the West Coast next month.
The outing, dubbed the "Honeysweeper Tour," is set to launch Nov. 11 in Vancouver and then move on to Seattle, San Francisco, Los Angeles and Anaheim, CA. Details are listed below.
The group, fronted by vocalists Ami Onuki and Yumi Yoshimura, collaborated with artists including Pink on "Honeycreeper," which surfaced in Japan last month. A US release date has yet to be announced.
"Honeycreeper" is Puffy AmiYumi's 10th album, following last year's "Splurge," which features guest contributions from Jon Spencer, The Offspring frontman Dexter Holland and producer Butch Walker (Avril Lavigne, Pink).
The duo has become something of a cultural phenomenon, achieving superstar status in Japan, where they've had a series of successful TV programs and a line of products ranging from action figures to shoes. In the US, Puffy AmiYumi is probably best known for its animated cartoon series, "Hi Hi Puffy AmiYumi," which began in 2004 and ran on Cartoon Network through late last year.
Yoshimura said the cartoon was a great vehicle to introduce the band's music to a new audience.
"When we toured after the Cartoon Network show started, so many little kids came to our show," she told LiveDaily in an interview last year. "We always wanted as many people as possible to listen to the music."
The ladies are currently getting face time on the fall GAP advertising campaign, which was shot by celebrity photographer Annie Leibovitz.
Onuki and Yoshimura were strangers until a record label and management company brought them together in 1995. They have since sold millions of records in Japan and have become fashion icons.
In their home country, the pair is known simply as Puffy. They were forced to add "AmiYumi" to their name in the US to avoid legal difficulties with Sean "Puffy" Combs.