jasongray

11 Year-Old Guitar Dynamette Rocks Akasaka Blitz for Crows Zero 2

Friday was a busy day of finalizing subtitles in Ginza and settai at a good Chinese restaurant in Shimbashi. Sandwiched between was a big event at the Akasaka Blitz to promote Crows Zero 2 (produced by TBS, who opened AB about a year ago next to their office tower). The lobby was loaded with loot related to the film -- soundtracks, posters, t-shirts and more. Famed Crows mangaka Takahashi Hiroshi was even there to autograph books and action figure boxes. Needless to say there was a mix of punks, rockabillies, yankee, film geeks and kankeisha who filled up the venue in no time as Crows star Yabe Kyôsuke took the stage as MC.

The ear-splitting live lineup included DOES, 10-Feet, ODD-BOWZ, The Street Beats and more. To cut to the chase, everybody was knocked out by 11-year-old "Guitar Shôjo" Namiki Ruri (並木瑠璃). I know I'm late coming to the game, but I had no idea when I saw the film a few weeks ago that this little dynamo was responsible for one of the loudest, grungiest pieces of axe work on the soundtrack. She rose to stardom after debuting on comedian Sanma's Super Karakuri TV variety show (on TBS, natch):



I had to leave before The Street Beats took the stage unfortunately but it was a good 90-minute blast of punk rock to gear fans up for the movie, which opens next Saturday. I was working on a podcast about seeing the press screening at Toho but never had time to finish it, alas. I enjoyed the first Crows -- part two is generally more of the same but I think it edges it out part one in terms of mayhem and character work (less of Kuroki Meisa's ditz, too). Miike uses faces like a manga artist uses a pen.

Posted by Jason Gray at 4/04/2009 11:53:00 PM