ELLEGARDEN to Discontinue

Today ELLEGARDEN's leader Shinichi Ubukata announced that ELLEGARDEN is going to discontinue. The reason for this seems to be because of different opinions among the members regarding the motivation of making a new album.

Quoted from ELLEGARDEN's official site:

ELLEGARDEN has been in the process of creating a new album since last year, however, during the band's activities, there arose a difference in opinion regarding the motivation for creating a new album.
We no longer feel we are able to create an album that we would be satisfied with, and after much discussion we arrived at the conclusion to end the creation of the album and suspend the band's activities indefinitely.
All previously decided shows (including shows not yet announced) up until early September 2008 will still be performed.

We want to thank everyone who has supported ELLEGARDEN from the bottom of our hearts.
In order to once again create new music as ELLEGARDEN, each of us wants to work on our own personal growth and development.
Thank you for everything.

ELLEGARDEN, Leader: Shinichi Ubukata

This is really sad news to me, since I've been waiting for a new album for quite some time now. Hopefully this isn't the end of ELLEGARDEN, as it seems it's just a break, even though it sounds like it could be a long one. I was hoping that they would tour the US once more and was actually hoping for a world tour, but I guess I'll just have to wait. I hope they'll make the best out of the remaining months and release a DVD of the tour, seeing the last show will be so sad.