Episode 14: Black Shirt to School
My second year of high school, and it was time for the culture festival performance.
LOUDNESS's "SLAUGHTER HOUSE" came out perfect. I also did a separate guitar solo spot.
Well, in a Japan that was all about Komuro-produced pop at the time, we didn't exactly get much understanding.
Maybe a handful of metalheads liked it, and that was about it.
Why wasn't the popular music metal? The stuff everyone else was into just never registered with me at all.
I kept doing the same loop: buying up metal magazines at the used bookstore to gather information, then buying the CDs.
Looking back now, everyone else showed up to school in the standard white dress shirt, but I was the one guy showing up in a black shirt. In summer, I'd wear a metal band T-shirt to school instead.
If you want to call that individuality, I guess it was. I must have stood out. I'm 189 cm tall, apparently the same height as Doug Aldrich 😂
At night, I practiced alone at Studio UEN near Nishi-Ogikubo Station.
My parents never really said anything about any of it.
I probably looked like a delinquent from the outside. In reality, I was just completely, single-mindedly obsessed with metal.
To be continued.
