Awich: “They've Faced Forward,” Her Father's Words and the RZA Album
This article is also available in Japanese: Read the Japanese version
“Everyone in Okinawa has lost friends and family they held dear, but they've faced forward and kept on living.” (translated from the Japanese)
Those were the words a father said to his daughter when she had shut herself away after losing her husband. That daughter is Awich, a rapper from Naha, Okinawa. She went back to music, and went on to stand on the stage of the Nippon Budokan and make an album with RZA of Wu-Tang Clan.
This article covers her real name and where “Awich” comes from, the loss of her husband, her relationship with her daughter, and the orchestral concerts scheduled for November 2026, mainly in her own words. The channel figures are ones this site measured on November 1, 2026.
Awich Profile: How Old Is She, and Where Is She From?
According to the biography on her official website, Awich was born on December 16, 1986, and comes from Naha, Okinawa. As of November 1, 2026, she is 39, and she turns 40 on December 16.
In Japanese she officially writes her name エーウィッチ, pronounced “AY-witch.” She works as a rapper, and her channel description, checked on November 1, 2026, lists her as a member of the hip-hop crew YENTOWN (“The member of YENTOWN.”).
She debuted in 2006 with the EP Inner Research and moved to Atlanta around the same time. In 2007 she released her first album, Asia Wish Child.
What's Her Real Name, and Where Does “Awich” Come From?
Her real name is given as Akiko Urasaki (浦崎亜希子). KAI-YOU's keyword page states this as her real name, and Tatler Asia and GRAMMY.com also give her name as Akiko Urasaki. From her own side, however, we could confirm only the given name, “Akiko.” We did not find the family name there.
Where the name comes from, her side explains clearly. Awich is short for “Asia Wish Child,” and her YouTube channel description, written in English, says: “It also happens to be the meaning of her birth name, ‘Akiko.’”
Akiko is written 亜希子: 亜 as in 亜細亜 (Asia), 希 as in 希望 (hope, wish), and 子 (child). If you read it that way, it does seem to fit.
Tupac, and an English Class on a U.S. Military Base
She seems to have started writing quite early. In a Tokyo Weekender interview, she said, “I began with poetry when I was nine,” explaining that she wrote to get through nights when she couldn't sleep.
According to a May 2022 Oricon article (in Japanese), she longed to attend Okinawa Actors School in elementary school, but her parents were against it. Though it wasn't exactly a replacement, she went to an English class on a U.S. military base.
The turning point came in her early teens, when she discovered Tupac's music. The official biography says she was 13 and the Oricon article says 14, so the sources differ by a year. According to Tokyo Weekender, she went to a record shop with her cousin, closed her eyes and picked out a CD, and it “happened to be All Eyez on Me.”
The official biography says her “primary English textbook hailed from Tupac's lyrics, interviews, movies and books.” A CD picked up by chance turned into her English teacher, which sounds almost too good to be true.
According to a 2024 GRAMMY.com article, she writes and sings in three languages, Okinawan, Japanese and English, and she said, “Each language has its own personality.”
Losing Her Husband, and Her Father's Words
In the United States, Awich married an American man and had a daughter. According to the official biography, she earned a bachelor's degree from the University of Indianapolis three years later.
But in 2011, just as the family was preparing to return to Japan, her husband died. The Oricon article reports that he was caught up in an incident and shot. In a TOKION interview, she described herself at that time as “the 24-year-old me who lost her husband.”
She did not want to lie to her young daughter. She told her, “Your father has died,” and when her daughter asked, “Does it hurt?” she answered “I don't know” to the things she didn't know, she says in the Oricon article. (Her Oricon quotes in this article are translated from the Japanese.)
She told Tokyo Weekender, “Out of the blue, she said ‘I see daddy.’ I asked where and she replied ‘everywhere.’ When we scattered his ashes, I told her he'd gone into everything that surrounds us. At three, she understood that.”
According to GRAMMY.com, “Ashes” is a song about Awich and her daughter spreading her husband's ashes in the sea.
Of the time after she and her daughter went back to Okinawa, she told Tokyo Weekender, “I returned to Okinawa and every day was like a rollercoaster.”
It was during this period, when by her account in the Oricon article she was “withdrawn for about two years,” that her father said the words at the top of this article. “That woke me up,” she recalls.
Her account in Tokyo Weekender is blunter still. Her father asked how long she was going to be depressed and pointed out that all Okinawans had lost people close to them, including him and her mother. “I wasn't special,” she says.
According to GRAMMY.com, her parents grew up while Okinawa was under American rule, and the article also recounts a U.S. military jet crashing into a school while her mother was there. Her father's words sound harsh, but they may be something only a parent of that generation could say.
Her other source of support, she has said, was what her husband told her while he was alive, even in the middle of a fight: “Keep singing.”
In Okinawa, Tokyo Weekender reports, she launched a production company built on local resources and culture, and in 2017 she won an award for a short film she wrote and directed. According to the official biography, her album 8, released that same year, was her first album in 10 years.
What Is Awich's Relationship With Her Daughter, Toyomi?
Her daughter herself appeared as “Toyomi” on Nippon TV's MUSIC BLOOD, broadcast on May 6, 2022. According to the Oricon article, she was 14 at the time of the broadcast.
In the studio, her daughter revealed that the everyday Awich is “like a child,” and Awich answered, “For me it's the other way around. Toyomi is like a parent.” When Awich acts like a child, it seems, she gets told off: “Behave yourself!” It's quite a different face at home from the impression she gives onstage.
Awich also talked about mother and daughter performing together live. Even when they were short on rehearsal, she said, Toyomi came through at the show: “I can really rely on her.”
In Tokyo Weekender she said, “I teach my daughter to be a leader not a victim.” We were not able to confirm her daughter's current activities for this article.
Aiming to Be “the Queen of Japan”: The Road to the Nippon Budokan
Her career took a big step forward in 2020. In January she released the album Kujaku (孔雀), and in July she made her major-label debut with Universal Music.
“GILA GILA feat. JP THE WAVY, YZERR,” released the following year, 2021, is the most-watched video on her channel as of November 1, 2026, with about 40.84 million views.
Of her album Queendom, released on March 4, 2022, she declared flatly to Tokyo Weekender: “Now, I'm aiming to be the queen of Japan. Period.” Ten days later, on March 14, she played her first solo concert at the Nippon Budokan.
She told TOKION, “I felt slightly anxious right before the show,” but just as it was about to start she found herself thinking, “It's alright, nankurunaisa (everything will be alright).” She told Tokyo Weekender it was also what she said to herself in her hard times (“I tried to tell myself ‘nankurunaisa’”), so the same phrase did its work in a very different setting.
Her goal after the show was a big one, too. She told TOKION she wanted “a presence as strong as Yoko Ono,” adding, “Ultimately, I want to become the most famous Japanese woman on the planet.”
The following year, 2023, she released “RASEN in OKINAWA” and “Bad B*tch 美学 Remix,” and on November 5, “Queendom-THE UNION-” at K-Arena Yokohama became her first solo arena concert.
In a Tatler Asia interview, responding to having long been called the best among female rappers, she said: “If you want to compare me against rappers, do so with all the rappers; not just female rappers.”
Her Official YouTube Channel: Subscribers and Video Count
Her official channel had 653,000 subscribers as of November 1, 2026. On that date its total views stood at about 345.99 million, and the channel page showed 266 videos. That number seems to include videos from other channels, however. The videos posted by her own channel came to 260. The most recent upload was on September 23.
The channel description is written in English. The channel itself, though, is mostly Japanese-language videos, so she is best seen as someone who also communicates in English rather than as the host of an English-language channel.
Counted by year, her own channel posted 46 videos in 2020, 6 in 2021, 18 in 2022, 89 in 2023, 34 in 2024 and 43 in 2025. For 2026, the count is 24 as of November 1.
2023 stands far above the rest, but 18 of those videos were a behind-the-scenes series on “Bad B*tch 美学 Remix.” That song has about 30.07 million views, and it ranks near the top alongside “LONGINESS REMIX” at about 32.40 million and “RASEN in OKINAWA” at about 26.85 million (all as of November 1, 2026).
Okinawan Wuman, the Album She Made With RZA
The newest album we could find as of November 1, 2026, is Okinawan Wuman, released digitally on November 21, 2025.
According to the Japanese music news site Natalie (in Japanese), RZA, a founding member of Wu-Tang Clan, produced all 13 tracks. It is reportedly the first time RZA has taken on an album by a Japanese rapper. The guests include Joey Bada$$, FERG, Lupe Fiasco and Westside Gunn, among others.
Her comment, as Natalie printed it in Japanese, opens, “Together with RZA, my mentor” (translated from the Japanese). In the English wording quoted by Bandwagon, she says she shaped the project “to complete the story I've carried within me since childhood.”
You could say the teenager who learned English from Tupac's lyrics got here by studying under one of the giants of the music's home turf.
On May 13, 2026, a music video was also released for the album track “Fear Us.”
Her work outside hip-hop also stands out in 2026. On January 19, the music video for “黄金の彼方 (Golden Horizon)” with ALI came out, and the video's title describes it as the opening theme of the final chapter of the anime Golden Kamuy.
According to a July 2026 article in The Hollywood Reporter Japan (in Japanese), she was set to take her first turn as MC of a dating reality show on Season 2 of Netflix's Badly in Love (ラヴ上等), set in Okinawa, with all 10 episodes announced for release in three installments from August 4.
The theme song is a remastered version of “Body & Soul” by SPEED, who are from Okinawa. According to Tokyo Weekender, the artists Awich first loved were Namie Amuro and SPEED, so this may well have meant something to her personally.
On September 13, a short video with “THANK YOU ROCK IN JAPAN FESTIVAL 2026” in its title also appeared on her channel.
What Is Red Bull Symphonic, Coming in November 2026?
As of November 1, 2026, the biggest item on her schedule is Red Bull Symphonic 2026. According to Red Bull Japan's August 2026 announcement (in Japanese), it is a concert that reworks an artist's signature songs for orchestra, and this is the first time it will be held in Japan. Past performers overseas include Metro Boomin, Asake and Rick Ross.
Four shows have been announced, all with doors at 5:30 p.m. and the show at 7:00 p.m. JST:
- Tuesday, November 17: The Symphony Hall, Osaka
- Thursday, November 19: Fukuoka Symphony Hall
- Wednesday, November 25: Sendai Bank Hall Izumity 21
- Friday, November 27: Yokohama Minato Mirai Hall
The music will be performed by Tokyo Secret Orchestra, conducted by Mika Takayama, and ticket prices have been announced as ¥9,000 for S seats and ¥7,500 for A seats.
Awich said of the concerts that hip-hop was born in environments where access to traditional instruments was often difficult, adding, as quoted by LiFTED JAPAN, “Being able to reconstruct my songs with an orchestra feels like a significant milestone and holds deep meaning for me.”
Rap carried through halls built for orchestras: these should be special shows for her, too.
What Label and Agency Is Awich With?
Her major-label debut was with Universal, but we could not confirm her current label or agency. An official news item from February 2024 directed readers to sonymusic.co.jp for the CD of the album THE UNION, so a move to a Sony-affiliated company is one possible reading. That said, we have not found any document announcing a move.
The news section of her official website had also stopped at December 29, 2024, when we looked on November 1, 2026. We're sorry this isn't a cleaner answer, but this remains only our guess.
The easiest place to follow her recent activity is her fan club, Asia Wish Children (in Japanese), whose announcements had been updated through September 25 when we looked on November 1, 2026.
In Summary
In her TOKION interview, Awich looked back at her own younger selves and said that none of them could have imagined voicing the goal she talks about today: “The 14-year-old me, the 24-year-old me who lost her husband, and the depressed 26-year-old me wouldn't have thought it was possible.”
In the GRAMMY.com article she also said, “I always think that if I was a guy, I would've been way more famous.”
Her willingness to talk openly about the long way around may be where her strength really lies.
