Music
Why Halloween comes early at Kyary Pamyu Pamyu’s Spooky Obakeyashiki shows
As she embarks on a new tour, we catch up with the Japanese pop star, model, fashionista and blogger.
Over the past decade Kyary Pamyu Pamyu became Japan’s first true social media pop star. Kyary started her career as a blogger concerned with all matters Harajuku, the Tokyo neighborhood long seen as the country’s fashion capital. She became a model herself soon after, and in 2011 teamed up with producer Yasutaka Nakata to launch a foray into music. The result was the playroom bouncer, Ponponpon, whose whirlwind video check it out below) went viral at home and abroad. Coupled with a charming Twitter presence, she was the first J-pop star to really use social networks to rocket to attention.
Nowadays, that’s the norm for young J-pop artists and fashionistas, yet Kyary Pamyu Pamyu remains ahead, and is still one of the most recognisable performers in Japan. She also remains internationally known – she could still safely be called a kawaii ambassador to the world, eight years running. In 2018, she’s kept just as busy. She released a new song called Kimino Mikata complete with an eye-catching clip (done in a single take) and just started a tour touching down in Europe, North America and Asia. Fitting for someone with a strong visual side, the jaunt features a Halloween theme, complete with haunted house and creatures in tow.
“Halloween is really popular in Japan now, with most of the people who dress up veering towards international monsters like zombies and stuff, so I thought I’d go with a theme of Japanese creatures instead,” she wrote via email, shortly before heading to London for the first show. Titled The Spooky Obakeyashiki – Pumpkins Strike Back, she performed it in Japan last fall, but she says she wanted to bring a slightly scaled-down version outside her native country. “Monsters from overseas are actually frightening, but the ones we have here in Japan are more on the endearing side, so I hope people abroad will find that enjoyable, too.”
It’s a fitting choice for an artist that has long embraced spooky imagery in videos for numbers like Fashion Monster. “I guess I just prefer to have a bit of scariness rather than pure cuteness alone. I think slightly dark, traumatic elements are important,” she says. The Halloween-themed shows were a highlight of Kyary’s 2017, which saw her perform at a handful of festivals and concerts. She kept plenty busy – but new music wasn’t as available. Save for an Easter single last spring, it was quiet on the release front, but Kimino Mikata, which you can watch in the player below, signals a return and a continued evolution from the popstar.
“This time around, the music is a little more mid-tempo and relaxed than my previous songs, so I guess maybe it’s a bit more grown-up,” she says. “The lyrics are strong and have messages about the world today, which I rap. Incorporating rap is a new feel for me, I think.”
Whether she pivots hard into SoundCloud rap or goes in another direction completely, Kyary herself will decide the direction. She says she doesn’t want to be associated with any one idea – say, kawaii – but rather be known for expressing the things she wants to. “You could say I’m kind of a contrarian or someone who doesn’t like to be predictable, so I try not to live up to people’s expectations, in the good sense.”
