During a short hiatus in 1997, Inaba released his debut solo album

During a short hiatus in 1997, Inaba released his debut solo album, Magma , on which he wrote all the music and lyrics. The album, which topped the Oricon charts, showcased another side of him, different from that of his usual image in B’z. In March, the dome tour “B’z Live-Gym Pleasure ’97 ‘Fireball’” consisted of 9 performances in 5 locations. Tickets for each dome, which have a capacity of about 30 to 50 thousand people each, were all sold out. The tour included stops at Tokyo (3 nights), Nagoya, Osaka, Fukuoka , and Maebashi , all being successful. On November 19, their ninth studio album, Survive , showcased yet another new direction in sound and style. B’z’s first promotional effort for the album included performances in concert halls in Akita , Hakodate , Kōchi , Shiga , and Nagasaki , before plunging into the main tour, “B’z Live-Gym ’98 ‘Survive’”, which started on January 24, 1998. On May 20, B’z released their first official compilation album, B’z The Best “Pleasure” , which also marked their 10th year since debuting. Every song included in this album was a huge hit and was highly acclaimed as it was the first Japanese album to sell more than 5 million copies, which was achieved by the end of the year. On June 6, the “Survive” tour successfully ended. In mid-1998, B’z entered a period of both rest and recording. During that period, on September 20, their second best-of album, B’z The Best “Treasure” was released, selling almost 4.5 million copies by the end of the year.