Babymetal, likely the first band to combine Japan's cutesy J-Pop genre with the gloom-and-doom stylings of metal, has announced a new one-off concert in the U.S., further establishing their steady, curious rise to international stardom.
Hard rock authority
Blabbermouth.com reported this week that tickets for Babymetal's headline show November 4 at the Hammerstein Ballroom in New York City will go on sale Friday, and will likely sell out.
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Babymetal was formed in 2010 as an offshoot of schoolgirl J-Pop band Sakura Gakuin, and is comprised of the singing, dancing, and headbanging trio Suzuka Nakamoto (a.k.a. Su-Metal), Yui Mizuno (Yuimetal), and Moa Kikuchi (Moametal).
"I didn't even know what metal was all about before this," says Nakamoto, 16, the oldest member of the group. "When they told me I'd be doing Babymetal, I listened to this music and its heavy drums. I thought it was interesting and I imagined the choreography I would do."
After shocking Japanese audiences for two years, the band made its first major-label debut in 2013 with the album "Ijime, Dame, Zettai" ("No more bullying"). After releasing their second major album, which is self-titled, in February of this year, they went on to play their first American show on July 27 in Los Angeles to a sold out crowd of 1,200, and opened for Lady Gaga on five American tour stops.
In May, Babymetal announced its first world tour, which included an August 9 performance at one of North America's biggest metal festivals, Heavy Montreal, alongside Metallica, Slayer, and Avenged Sevenfold.
According to NPR, the band had a "polarizing" effect on the 40,000 festival goers, many of who were "up in arms about the act's seeming lack of sincerity, its 'corporate' approach, its prefab quality."
NPR metalhead staffers defended the band, however, reminding their fellow headbangers that "heavy metal is no stranger to contrivance and gimmickry . . . [it's] as much about contrivance as it is about substance, and often its best bands have been able to skillfully combine the two."
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