LiSA’s real name is Risa Oribe, but like many artists, she is simply known by her stage name these days. She started to learn piano when she was just three years old and then continued to study singing and dance through all of her school-aged years. She had already decided in primary school that she wanted to become a singer someday, and formed her first band in junior high school that covered other artists of the time like Avril Lavigne.

In high school, LiSA formed another cover band called Chucky, this time with a more indie rock sound. She chose Chucky over the more usual life choice of going to university, but when it became apparent that the band was not going anywhere, LiSA headed to Tokyo to push her singing career forward in the big city.

In Tokyo, LiSA formed another band, this one called Love is Same All. That’s actually when she started to use her stage name as well, with “LiSA” being an acronym for the band’s name as well as sounding like her real first name. She continued to push her music career with Love is Same All - but she didn’t get any real traction until she made a breakthrough in the anime industry!

LiSA has an incredible discography when it comes to anime music. She made her real debut in the music world AND the anime world through Angel Beats!, where she performed as part of the fictional duo band Girls Dead Monster in the story. Girls Dead Monster released three singles and an album in 2010. From there, LiSA continued into anime fame with “Oath Sign,” an opening for Fate/Zero, which reached number five on the Oricon weekly charts. She also started to become a guest at anime conventions around the globe around this time, including Anime Festival Asia and Anime Expo.

“Oath Sign” gained LiSA enough notoriety that she was asked to do the first opening for Sword Art Online, and released Crossing Field, which also reached number five on the charts. LiSA started to gain even more international fame with Crossing Field, and soon became involved in Mekakucity Actors covering two Kagerou Project songs. By 2014, her songs “Shirushi” and “No More Time Machine” were used as ending themes for Sword Art Online II. Around this time, LiSA also made her movie debut as a voice actor in the Japanese dub of Minions!

Back to the anime world, LiSA continued to gain fame with “Catch the Moment,” (Sword Art Online the Movie: Ordinal Scale), “Datte Atashi no Hero” (My Hero Academia), and “Ash” (Fate/Apocrypha). Fast-forward to just year, and LiSA was producing the opening and ending music for one of today’s biggest anime around the world - Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba. Her songs for that anime are “Gurenge” and “From the Edge.” Her most recent anime song has been the ending for Sword Art Online: Alicization called “Unlasting.”

And that doesn’t even mention some of the smaller anime LiSA has also done the music for! Plus, do you know OLDCODEX? They’re another big anisong band. And as of January 2020, LiSA and the vocalist for OLDCODEX, Ta_2, are officially married! Talk about an anisong power couple.