Yoshiki, leader of X JAPAN, the biggest rock band in Japan, put his "crystal" piano - a see-through Plexiglas Kawai grand - up for auction on April 17th to raise money for the Japan Relief Fundraising Auction in conjunction with Yahoo! Japan. About eight minutes into the auction, the bid shot from $.01 to $42,000.00; within hours, an online bidder pledged a staggering $73-million.

On Tuesday, April 19th, Yahoo! Auctions temporarily suspended the auction, citing an overload of unexpected high volume of traffic on the site, high bidding prices, and the time required for bidder confirmation procedures. Yahoo! Auction's systems have now been restructured, new bidding policies are in place, and Yahoo! has identified the last confirmed bid for the piano as $512,231.70.

The auction is set to resume on Monday, April 25th, and will run through Thursday, April 28th. Stay tuned for updates.

The Japanese-born Yoshiki, who lives in Los Angeles, felt the earthquake tremors while in a Tokyo recording studio working on X Japan's first North American album, and was shocked by the large-scale damage across Japan. Yoshiki and his X Japan band mates decided to postpone the March 15 release of their first US single, 'Jade', so they could focus their time and energies helping with the recovery.

In addition to the auction of Yoshiki's "crystal" piano, Yoshiki, through his Yoshiki Foundation America, is spearheading a major celebrity auction to benefit the survivors of the earthquake and tsunami. The Foundation has already received items from MARILYN MANSON, RED HOT CHILI PEPPERS' Anthony Kiedis, comic book legend Stan Lee, Robert Pattinson, James Franco, and Reese Witherspoon.

For more info on the Yoshiki Foundation America, go to Yoshikifoundationamerica.org. For information on X Japan click here.

As previously reported, X Japan's 2011 recently announced their first dates for a world tour. Their schedule is currently as follows:

June

28 - Shepherd's Bush Empire - London, UK

July

1 - Zenith de Paris - Paris, France
2 - Tivoli - Utrecht, Netherlands
4 - Columbiahalle - Berlin, Germany

August

13 - Summer Sonic Festival - Osaka, Japan
14 - Summer Sonic Festival - Tokyo, Japan

In Asia, X Japan - Toshi (vocals), Pata and Sugizo (guitars), Heath (bass), and Yoshiki (drums, piano) - plays arenas and stadiums, bringing elaborate production including lasers, catwalks, and holograms. For the UK/European and South American dates, X Japan will tailor its "stadium-sensibility theatrics" to the more intimate venues, focusing primarily on its "QUEEN-meets-GUNS N' ROES-meets-The-Matrix" rock assault.

"We had a wonderful time last fall on our first North American tour, playing theaters, something we hadn't been able to do in Japan since the early days," Yoshiki explained. "We were able to make a strong connection with our audiences because they were right there, just feet away from the stage. I even crowd-surfed a few times! So, we're looking forward to the same sort of close-up-and-personal but intense experience on these dates."

Yoshiki and X Japan's vocalist Toshi were in Paris last July, making a special appearance for more than 5,000 fans. The duo performed a handful of X Japan songs "unplugged," and had the entire audience singing the chorus to one of the band's most exquisite compositions, 'Endless Rain'.

The members of X Japan have been writing and recording what will be their first album to be released outside of Japan with English lyrics. According to Yoshiki, about half of the album will feature some of the band's most popular songs from throughout their career, with nearly all of the lyrics re-recorded in English, and the other half, brand new songs written specially for this album. The album's first single will be 'Jade', and will be on the 2011 European set lists as well.