Tokyobilly

Okay, so my good friend Marco (who incidentally owns this blog) asked to me step in as guest blogger for a day and say a few quick words about some of the awesomeness that is happening in Tokyo right now.

First I would like to take a moment and reflect on a few things this great nation has provided to us, the western world. I simply can't go further without mentioning the following: Nintendo, The Ring and of course Hentai.

But what do we have to lend to our eastern cousins? Off the top of my head, I've got the Big Mac, Star Wars and the Atom Bomb. Hmm..

Okay so the first two are actually pretty cool, and the latter not so much. Nonetheless, the japanese have managed to scour our vast cultural wasteland to unearth one of the few morsels of "cool" and embrace them, nay, fucking own them.

I'm referring to nothing other than the phenomenon which I will henceforth dub Tokyobilly. That is, a portmanteau of Tokyo and Rockabilly.

What is Rockabilly you say? Okay, let's take it back a notch.

Rockabilly, very quickly, is a sub-culture which emanated from a combination of rock and country music styles which were fused in the 1940s and 1950s and originated in the southern regions of the USA, such as Nashville or Tennessee.

The rockabilly sound can be stylistically linked to such early rock and roll icons such as Bill Haley with Rock Around The Clock or Johnny Cash with well, anything by Cash could be considered rockabilly. Hell, even Elvis was rockabilly.

Fans of rockabilly were quickly influenced by the popularity of movies such as James Dean's Rebel Without A Cause or Marlon Brando's The Wild One which depicted motorcycle-riding scofflaws, clad in stovepipe (or drainpipe) jeans, t-shirts and leather jackets with large quaffed hairstyles slicked back with anything from wax or gel to Vasoline or olive oil. These teen idols, combined with early musical pioneers cemented the image of rebellion which continued right through the many revivals that were to follow.

Still unsure? Think Fonzie, from Happy Days.

Through these revivals, a small, yet oddly sincere part of western (read: American) pop-culture has filtered through to the rest of the world, with radio stations, groups and events being hosted around the sub-culture, celebrating the retro-themed antithesis of current mainstream culture.

Which brings us back to Tokyo, and in particular, Harajuku Park, where rockabilly loyalists clad in retro '50s gear twist, jive and generally exude the greaser attitude on a regular basis, much to the delight of onlookers (including our mutual friend) with more than a few snapping photos of the happening, and some even taking some cheeky footage. See below.

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