Takaya Kuroda

Takaya Kuroda (黒田崇矢, Kuroda Takaya, born April 17, 1965) is a Japanese actor, singer and voice actor from Tokyo, Japan. He is affiliated with Axlone, and was formerly with Mausu Promotion and 81 Produce.

He is best known for his bass voice, which has usually seen him cast in villainous roles such as the voice of Yaiba in GoGo Sentai Boukenger. He is best known to western audiences for providing the voice of Kazuma Kiryu, the protagonist of the Yakuza series. Because of his vocal resemblance to the late Hirotaka Suzuoki, he was chosen to replace Suzuoki as the voice of Starscream in Transformers: Cybertron as Suzuoki's health deteriorated.[citation needed] Kuroda is also the lead singer of the rock band Takaya Kuroda & Goodfellas.