On September 6th, 1993, I felt a stranger’s presence flow through me.

“The end of material civilization is near. Man will soon transcend the physical realm.

But when this day comes, many souls will be lost forever,” she announced and then swiftly disappeared. She has since visited me occasionally, and with her help I’ve witnessed stars align to form a cross, and a golden country filled with waves of tremendous rapture. She says I have a divine duty to impart through my music a sense of the waves of delight I have experienced, even if I can only reach one other person.

- Shizuka, 7/23/94

Few artists have left behind a legacy as enigmatic and captivating as Shizuka Miura. Amidst the Tokyo underground, she was a spectral figure, creating ghostly, childlike dolls and writing haunting, other-worldly songs. She formed Shizuka in 1992 with Maki Miura, known for his staggering guitar work in legendary groups Fushitsusha and Les Rallizes Dénudés. Their music bloomed with a fragile, yet explosive mystical power; an atmospheric alchemy of psychedelic rock, folk and noise with Shizuka’s ethereal vocals invoking loneliness, yearning and dark providence. Since her passing in 2010, the group has steadily gathered a cult following. 

Black Editions presents Shizuka's sole studio album, 1994’s Heavenly Persona, a monumental, transcendent work originally issued by P.S.F. Japan on CD in 1994; Now newly remastered and in its first ever vinyl edition on double LP with a laser etched fourth side. Presented in a deluxe tip-on tri-fold jacket with ink pigment foil stamping, gloss film laminate finish and printed inner sleeves and mounted booklet. It includes her extensive, heart wrenching final interview, translated for the first time to English alongside high-resolution archival images.