How BABYMETAL broke boundaries and pioneered the kawaii metal genre

Even if you were staring into a crystal ball, nobody could have foreseen one of modern metal’s wildest innovations taking the form of three teenage girls performing synchronised dance moves.

Decked out in elaborate costumes with dazzling production behind them, BABYMETAL have always made jaws drop and brows furrow, but they’ve also opened minds. Quickly defeating any notions of them being an unserious, flash-in-the-pan novelty act, they’ve consistently reimagined what metal can be, and who can make it. In doing so, they’re now pioneers, becoming the original flagbearers of a whole new scene: kawaii metal.

Kawaii metal was the brainchild of KOBAMETAL. Both a card-carrying metalhead and an instrumental figure at Japanese talent agency Amuse, he aspired to give the heavy scene something radically different from what they were used to.

“This scene is older. It can be boring – the same old guys doing metal!” he told Billboard in 2014. “It’s not bad, but this is something new. That’s how I came up with this, just trying to do something no-one had heard before.”

Kawaii metal is about the colliding of extremes, the pairing of things that shouldn’t work and yet weirdly, addictively, do. It marries aggression and cuteness, brutality and fun, the music of an Eastern culture and a genre that historically was the domain of the West.

To understand the genre, it’s important to first unpack the concept of kawaii itself. Ideas date as far back as the 11th century, when it was used as a descriptor for certain feminine frailties, but in modern times has taken on a more commercial and consumerist veneer. It can be defined as a specifically Japanese style of cuteness, celebrating qualities such as innocence, warmth and playfulness.

Associated more with visual art or shōjo manga (girls’ comics) than music, it often features cartoon characters with round faces, big eyes, small noses and bodies and minimal facial expression, as well as the use of bright or pastel colours. Ever seen Hello Kitty? You’ve encountered something kawaii. There’s far more to the concept, of course, particularly when it peaked in popularity during Japan’s economic boom in the 1970s, and kawaii metal is one of its more modern offshoots. In comparison to kawaii culture at large, this subgenre is rather young, originating when BABYMETAL were assembled in 2010.

That’s the kawaii side, but how about the metal? Sonically, it draws significantly from the lightning-fast soloing and chunky, menacing riffs of speed metal and particularly power metal, and sometimes does so thematically as well, albeit with a sugary twist. Both subgenres lean on the fantastical – take a song like Awadama Fever, which is all about the thrill of magic bubblegum that allows you to fly through time and space. The kawaii element of the music also shines through more broadly in its lyrics, common touchstones including friendship, fun and other topics that are generally cutesier and more positive than metal usually dares to be. Then again, one of its biggest and most successful songs was, of course, BABYMETAL’s early hit Gimme Chocolate!!, a giddy see-saw between fast, low chugs and bubbly melodies.

Pop and metal end up shaking hands rather a lot across different subgenres, especially in recent years, but kawaii metal is perhaps the most unique and cross-cultural fusion of that formula. Its catchy, upbeat melodies originate within the hyperactive world of Japanese pop and sometimes contains electronic elements that give J-pop its futuristic touch. Both these sounds and kawaii metal groups’ aesthetics, not to mention that their energetic, tightly-choreographed dance routines also feature an element of cuteness. As an example, SU-METAL explained in the same Billboard interview that the choreography for their early hit Headbangeerrrrr!!! involved their own version of the classic metal move known as the ‘baby headbang’: “Instead of doing it forwards, we do it side to side so it looks cute.”

Their style of dance, as well as their theatrical costumes, derive from the culture of Japanese idol groups. These bands of usually young girls are assembled by large entertainment groups – in BABYMETAL’s case, Amuse – in audition scenarios not unlike reality TV shows. Often consisting of fluid line-ups, the members are not just singers but performers, trained in dance and sometimes they can also be actors and/or models.

It’s common knowledge that BABYMETAL started as an offshoot of the now-defunct idol group Sakura Gakuin, a group of school-aged girls who would perform in uniforms and sing about topics related to school life. After releasing an album at the end of each academic year, members would ‘graduate’ at the same time that they would ordinarily finish school at the age of 16. SU-METAL– who had also completed a stint in the group Karen Girl’s – graduated in 2013, while MOAMETAL and YUIMETAL were still part of Sakura Gakuin when BABYMETAL’s first album was released, before they themselves graduated in 2015.

Of course, kawaii metal will forever be associated with BABYMETAL, but inevitably it grew into something even bigger than the band. Although others might not have had the same success across the world as BABYMETAL, kawaii metal has morphed and evolved as other groups have interpreted it in their own way. Often, it’s just as wacky as BABYMETAL were at the outset – if not more so.

One group that epitomised this was Ladybaby, which was initially fronted by Ladybeard, a bearded, cross-dressing professional wrestler from Australia who performed alongside singers Rie Kaneko and Rei Kuromiya. Coarser in sound than BABYMETAL, their frenetic, hyperactive single Nippon Manju, celebrating everything they loved about Japan, went viral in 2015. Ladybeard left in 2016 and they rebranded as The Idol Formerly Known As Ladybaby. Later on, after undergoing some line-up changes, they reverted to their original name before splitting up in 2020, only to reform in 2023 with a totally different selection of members.

Ladybeard subsequently formed the group Deadlift Lolita with fellow professional wrestler Saiki Reika, but the group has not been active in some time. He now plays in the project Babybeard, which has been active since 2021.

Another significant player within the world of kawaii metal was DESURABBITS, an even zanier group dashing between genres as disparate as jazz fusion, EDM and digital hardcore. A common thread between their songs was the use of the phrase ‘pyon pyon’ to mimic the sound of a rabbit hopping, as well as vocal interplay between the gruff death growls of producer Bucho and the childlike voices of the younger female members. They disbanded in 2021, partly to pursue new opportunities, and partly as a result of COVID-19.

Elsewhere, Necronomidol offered a darker take on kawaii metal, infused with elements of black metal and darkwave. Eschewing the genre’s usual fluffier themes, they matched their heavier tone with moodier ruminations on the occult and the supernatural, influenced both by Japanese horror (and literature nerds might notice their name references the fictional grimoire appearing in the stories of H.P. Lovecraft). They are also no longer active, having iced the project indefinitely in 2022.

As with most idol groups, kawaii metal acts – save for BABYMETAL – have had a fairly ephemeral lifespan. The electronic-leaning Passcode, however, is one of the names to have stayed the course, having just released their sixth album. Meanwhile, Ironbunny offers a quirky twist on the genre, landing on a more metallic, less pop-driven version of the sound, with a cyborg guitarist named Ediee in its ranks.

Kawaii metal hasn’t just got a powerful sound – it also boasts an equally powerful influence. It’s offered a springboard for other bands from Japan to be recognised on a global stage, even If they aren’t idol groups or don’t sound quite the same. Truly, BABYMETAL have kicked open the door for a legion of other bands from their home country. Comparisons have been drawn between the stalwarts of kawaii metal and BAND-MAID, the all-female hard rock group who perform in maid outfits. BRIDEAR’s chugging power metal might be something for BABYMETAL fans to sink their teeth into, while HANABIE.’s colourful, feminine ‘Harajuku-core’ aesthetic shares some common ground with that of kawaii metal.

Even more broadly, the larger movement, not to mention BABYMETAL themselves, have become a boundary-breaking, disruptive force. Without it, we may not have seen Poppy adopt the spiky metal sound that shot her to fame on her 2020 breakthrough I Disagree. Scene Queen, meanwhile, has credited them as an influence. “They truly paved the way for a girl like me who loves to experiment with genres the way I do and have fun with music,” she said on X when touring with them last year. Beyond that, they’ve given many a band the vote of confidence to punch through the dividing lines between genres and fearlessly make music that’s kitschy, off-kilter or weird.

“We were trying to make music that didn’t sound like any other band out there and BABYMETAL was doing that really well,” says Bloodywood’s Karan Katiyar. “I was blown away by the whole idea of them just existing.”

Crucially, kawaii metal is a rare corner of our world in which women, and specifically East Asian women, are the dominant force. Femininity is both pushed to the fore and celebrated in a way that other subgenres historically haven’t managed or are now slowly trying to catch up with, while it also punctures through a world where whiteness has been the norm since its inception.

It lets people who haven’t always felt represented in metal feel seen. You think about who you see onstage making metal, and challenges the idea that it has to conform to any sort of convention about how it sounds, its attitude, or who gets to make it. Then again, flip it on its head and it becomes obvious that there’s nothing un-metal about it – it’s maybe even as metal as metal gets. It’s not afraid to be silly, it’s a space for outsiders, it’s an incredible spectacle live. Oh yeah, and the riffs go hard.

This feature originally appeared in the special-edition Kerrang! Presents BABYMETAL magazine.

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