I Just Read About That…

[ATTENDED: June 28, 2025] Babymetal

My son and I saw Babymetal last year and while we loved the show, the venue (Wind Creek in Bethlehem) was overcrowded.  So when they announced this show at the Mann, and I scored decent seats, I was excited for us to see them again.

Then my son couldn’t go.  So I asked my wife to go and she was pretty excited to see them.

We had stayed in our ADA seats for this set the actual seats were pretty uncomfortable and despite being further away in the ADA seats, the view was still much better).

Like last time, they opened with Babymetal Death.   First comes the masked Kami band (their masks are cool and the band is incredible).  Then the trio came out: Su-metal, Moametal and Momometal.

Everyone there knew the words (in English and Japanese) and what to do and when to do it–Total crowd synchronicity.

They followedwith Megitsun (that’s 2 songs from the debut to open the show). This one has a great synth line that translates well live.

Throughout the songs the trio danced like crazy.  Their precision synchronization was impressive–I like the hop dance on Megitsune.

There were videoscreens at the base of the stage and behind them and they were used to great effect–flames during Pa Pa Ya, etc.  During Pa PaYa, Su=Metal spun a towel over her head and the crowd knew what to do as everyone started waving shirts or bandanas or whatever around their heads too.

They played the puzzlingly named BxMxC after which the Kami band was given the opportunity to play some solos.  They followed up with more cultural mashup with the traditional sounding Japanese instruments merging with modern synth rock on Metali.  The screens had fun images from (I’m guessing) Japan’s past, and a guitar solo from Tom Morello.

For Kon Kon which is on the soon to be released album, Jayant Bhadula and Raoul Kerr from Bloodywood joined  stage and delivered their parts with lots of intensity (I’m very excited to see Bloodywood again next year).

There’s always fun storytelling at a Babymetal show and there was an interesting backstory/video about the next song, the also new Song 3.  And then back to the beginning with the always fun to see and hear Headbangeeeeerrrrr!!!!!

The stomping fun of Ratatata was accompanied by a video of Electric Callboy singing along.  This was fun, but nowhere near as fun as they way the crowd reacted when Gimme Chocolate started.  It was, as always, glorious.

Then they took an encore break (it is a fairly short show, but the band does work very hard).

The first encore song was another new one–from me to you–which featured Poppy screaming along on the screen.  It was followed by Karate, a super catchy early song that they didn’t play last time.

Then all three members came out waving Babymetal flags and it was time for Road to Resistance.   It’s really impressive how much crowd control Su-metal has.  She instructs and everyone does what she says.  And with a closing anthem like Resistance, it’s easy to see that everyone can join in and feel part of the fun.  And I know my wife had a really fun time too.

Babymetal always put on a great show.  But after seeing them three times I’m not sure I’ll need to see them again. We’ll see what happens when they comes back next time.

β Babymetal (2014)
⊗ Metal Resistance (2016)
Ø Metal Galaxy (2019)
⇔ The Other One (2024)
∇ Metal Forth (2025)