Hiromitsu Kitayama to Leave Kis-My-Ft2

Hiromitsu Kitayama, a member of Johnny’s boyband Kis-My-Ft2, has announced that he will be graduating from the group and leaving Johnny & Associates on August 31st.

In a message posted on the official Johnny’s website, Kitayama stated that after living 21 years as an entertainer, in a world where things are changing at a dizzying speed, he’s begun to think that he wants to start a new life and challenge himself to try new things. Kitayama did not provide any concrete details about his future plans, but he expressed his gratitude to the members of Kis-My-Ft2, Johnny’s and all of the other people who have supported him throughout his career. He stated that he will always remember the love he received from the fans and that he wants to continue to do his best from now on to make people smile.

In a group comment, the members of Kis-My-Ft2 stated that Kitayama first brought up his desire to graduate from the group last fall, and they were not able to accept it at first. They had many discussions about it, but his conviction did not waver, so they decided to respect his desire to live a new life. Kis-My-Ft2's final release with Kitayama will be a new song titled Tomo ni that will be released sometime this summer.

Kitayama joined Johnny & Associates at the age of 16 in 2002. He made his CD debut with Kis-My-Ft2 in August 2011. This May, he played a major role in the latest installment of KinKi Kids member Koichi Domoto's long-running musical “Endless SHOCK”.

The music video for Kitayama's 2021 solo track Hai ni naru mae ni, which was produced by KM and rapper (sic)boy, can be viewed below, followed by the MV for Kis-My-Ft2's 2012 single Shake It Up and footage of the group performing a medley of all of their past singles on the variety show “Shounen Club Premium”.