When Mandy Sekiguchi announced in April 2024 that he was leaving the legendary entertainment company LDH Japan, it came as a shock to fans. Since debuting as an original member of Generations and later joining Exile — one of the most commercially successful and culturally influential groups in modern J-pop — he had spent more than a decade within the LDH ecosystem, becoming one of its most recognizable faces in the process.
But for Sekiguchi, leaving was less about walking away than proving something to himself. The agency had become “like a second home,” he tells TW.
“If you stay at your parents’ house, you have family and siblings, you can eat delicious food and you have a place to sleep,” he explains. “It’s very safe. But one day, I suddenly wondered if staying there would truly contribute to my long-term growth. I began to think that … standing on my own two feet and surviving on my own would be the real way to show my gratitude.”
Now, Sekiguchi is building a second career on his own terms — one centered on solo music, acting and an increasingly international outlook.
Growing Up Between Worlds
Long before fame, Sekiguchi was already navigating what it meant to stand apart. Born to a Japanese mother and a Nigerian American father, he grew up straddling two worlds that never fully defined him, yet profoundly shaped his identity. It was in elementary school that he first felt a quiet awareness that he didn’t quite fit in. “I noticed that my skin color and hair texture were significantly different from those around me,” he says. “Back then, the concept of diversity didn’t exist as it does today, and few children had mixed roots. Fortunately, I was big and had many friends, so I never experienced any obvious bullying.”
However, he does recall one occasion when classmates teased him about his hair. “My homeroom teacher at the time reached out to me, saying, ‘You might feel frustrated looking different from the rest of the class, but you share the same roots as Michael Jackson, who is my favorite artist.’ She encouraged me to feel confident, and after hearing her words, I was able to accept myself and realized it was OK to be different from others,” remembers Sekiguchi.
As he began to grow more comfortable in his own skin, another force began to shape his identity as well: music. He was influenced by his mother’s tastes, listening to tracks by artists like Diana King, Norah Jones and Mariah Carey, as well as Japanese acts like Double and M-Flo. His interest in hip-hop and R&B started to grow after watching Eminem’s semi-autobiographical film 8 Mile.
Dance came later, almost by accident. While studying at Nippon Sport Science University to become a PE teacher, he joined a dance club on a whim, thinking it would make him popular with girls. (The dance club “shined the brightest,” he explains.) Although he had no prior experience, his fellow members expected him to be skilled due to his appearance. Their disappointment fueled his desire to improve, and he says he ended up practicing “harder than anyone else.”
Joining Exile
His intense work ethic led him to EXPG Studio, the professional dance, vocal and acting school run by Exile. But getting accepted there was only the beginning; students were evaluated constantly, and Sekiguchi was warned he would be cut if he didn’t show significant improvement within a year. Instead, he advanced rapidly, debuting with Generations — a seven-member dance and vocal group positioned as the next generation of Exile performers — in 2012.
The group quickly garnered a strong fanbase, topping the album charts with their self-titled debut album in November 2013. Within a year, Sekiguchi was competing again — this time for a place in Exile itself. “The auditions were grueling,” he recalls.
At the end of the arduous audition process, he became part of the group’s “Chapter 4” lineup, one of just five new members chosen from around 2,000 contenders. When his name was announced at the final audition, he recalls, “tears welled up before any other emotions could surface. I was in a state where I couldn’t even breathe.”
He went on to establish himself as one of Exile’s most popular members, while continuing to perform for Generations and other groups such as Dance Earth Party and Honest Boyz. As his status grew, Sekiguchi’s presence began to reach beyond music and dancing; he became especially well known for his appearances on variety shows. In 2018, he reached a truly iconic career milestone: Sanrio transformed him into an official character collaboration, Hello Mandy — essentially a crossover between Sekiguchi and Hello Kitty.
Going Solo
In May 2025, Sekiguchi released “Mandemic,” his first single as a solo artist. A high-energy track that centers on independence and breaking free from frames, it’s mostly sung in his second language of English because he feels “a strong desire to become a bridge connecting Japan and the world.” That, he believes, is his life’s mission as “someone of mixed roots who grew up in Japan.”
“Mandemic” features on En-Ter-Mandy, Sekiguchi’s debut studio album that came out earlier this year. An experimental fusion of J-pop, hip-hop and club music, it explores themes of artistic freedom and global ambition. For the eight-song project, Sekiguchi worked with producers from Japan, South Korea and the US. “Recording on location in the three countries created a different atmosphere for the tracks that naturally changed the output,” he muses. “I think that added a nice touch to the album.”
As he branches out, Sekiguchi’s pursuits are not limited to music. In recent years, he has also established himself as an actor, taking on roles that allow him to express a different side of his personality. Notable credits in 2025 included Shuhei Shibue’s live-action musical comedy fantasy Paripi Koumei the Movie and Shinji Hamasaki’s supernatural comedy Baban Baban Ban Vampire.
These projects reflect a growing confidence in working across different creative fields. Sekiguchi’s ultimate ambition, though, is to tour the world as a solo artist. To achieve that, he realizes how important it is to improve his English conversation skills. “My current objective is to reach a level where I can handle media interviews with humor,” he says. His professional ambitions are much loftier: “My long-term goal is to win a Grammy Award and to perform live at the Super Bowl halftime show.”
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Follow Sekiguchi on Instagram at @mandysekiguchi7jr.
