In April 2003, the band resumed playing with a street show in front of the Hon-Atsugi Station on the Odakyū Odawara Line. Moreover, they made a greater effort to compose more original music and rely less on covers. As their style of music was moving more towards an acoustic focus, they planned to expand their scope to cover not only street performances but live house concerts as well. Again, the band re-formed, but then, they were performing with the intent of supporting their increasing fame. By March 2003, Yoshioka recovered from a slump where she had almost thought of not singing anymore she saw this as a second chance to grow as a person. In September 2000, they suspended the band to focus on college entrance examinations for Yamashita and Mizuno. As they were then performing with three members, the band did a cover of Yuzu's single, "Natsuiro" ( 夏色, "The Colors of Summer"). Yoshioka was the younger sister of one of their classmates she entered as the main singer and the band took on its present-day form. In those days, Mizuno and Yamashita planned to make a group with a female lead vocalist, which would be an unusual sound for the street performances they were doing. In November 3, 1999, Yoshioka joined the band. At first, they did covers of Masayoshi Yamazaki. Yamashita and Mizuno formed their band on February 1, 1999, and began performing live on the street not taking it too seriously, they named it "ikimono-gakari" after their shared experience in first grade. Yamashita later noted that he really wanted to be a "blackboard monitor". In 1989, Mizuno and Yamashita met by chance while they were in the first grade they were both put in charge of being Ikimonogakari ( いきものがかり), who are caretakers of the school's plants and animals.
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Several of their albums have reached number one on the Oricon weekly rankings, and their songs have been featured on various media: from TV commercials, anime shows such as Naruto Shippuden, Japanese TV Dramas such as Women Won't Allow This ( 「女はそれを許さない」, "Onna wa Sore o Yurusanai"), live action movies such as Time Traveler: The Girl Who Leapt Through Time (2010) ( 『映画:時をかける少女』 (2010年), "Eiga: Toki o Kakeru Shōjo (2010)"), the 2012 Olympic broadcast theme song for NHK, and the set piece for a national junior high music competition. In 2006, the group released its first single on Sony Music Entertainment Japan's Epic Records label.
The group's name is a reference to ikimono-gakari ( いきものがかり), a group of children who are responsible for looking after plants and animals in Japanese elementary schools. The group started in February 1999 with Hotaka Yamashita and Yoshiki Mizuno, who had known each other since they were six years old, and was joined by vocalist Kiyoe Yoshioka in November of the same year. Ikimonogakari ( いきものがかり) is a Japanese pop rock duo from Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan consisting of Yoshiki Mizuno and Kiyoe Yoshioka.