Metal and Kawaii Overload! Babymetal Live in Manila

Babymetal was currently one of the most recognizable and unique voices in modern metal, known for combining various genres of metal, such as thrash metal, metalcore, and power metal, along with the cutesy vocals and dancing of a Japanese idol group to make the genre they refer to as Kawaii Metal. Pretty strange combination, right? However, it somehow works, and with their most recent album, Metal Forth, they have made collaborations with some of the prominent artists in the metal scene, such as Electric Callboy, Slaughter to Prevail, Bloodywood, Polyphia, Poppy, and Spiritbox.

The group consisted of "SU-metal" (Suzuka Nakamoto) as the main vocalist, as well as "MOA-metal" (Moa Kikuchi), and "MOMO-metal" (Momoko Okazaki) for the backup dance and vocals. Along with them was the "KAMI BAND", which backed them up with heavy metal instrumentation.

It was around 2013 when I first learned about Babymetal while I was listening to Visual Kei bands. All of a sudden, their song Megitsune gets mixed up, and I kinda enjoyed it, so that's when I began to listen to their songs. Fast forward to 2025, and I got to finally watch them live at their very first concert here in the Philippines as part of their Asia tour that was held last Wednesday, October 8, 2025, at the Arena Colosseum.

While the time of the concert will start at 6:00 PM, I was already there as early as 12 noon to line up for some merch and to get along with other fans afterwards. While waiting in the venue, there were also a lot of fans who would give away free merch, such as fan art that they had made. Just to show their love for the group. Some female fans even wear red and black dresses, similar to how Babymetal dressed up during their early years.

As we wait at the venue, we even get to give a short message to them, which was later used in the After Movie video. We were at 1:40 of the video.

During The Concert

During the concert, I did not take many videos or pictures as I wanted to fully enjoy the performance, and I was also in the upper box, either way, so I will not have any close-up pictures of them. I also changed from my previous clothes into the merch clothes that I bought earlier to get me more in the concert mood.

Before Babymetal, the opening group to perform was "Metalverse", also known as "Chibi Babymetal", and was kind of a multiverse counterpart of Babymetal, thus, why they were called the Metalverse, and if I am correct, this was just their second concert outside Japan, with the first being in Malaysia. For the opening, they sing their original songs, which were Crazy J, Giza, Si Si, and Naked Princess, all performed with great energy. Here is them singing Crazy J.

After the awesome performance from Metalverse, there was a short break, and some Babymetal intro lore, but as soon as that ended, it was followed by the heavy beats of Babymetal Death, along with a loud cheer from the audience. This has been their usual Opening, and for good reasons to since this song has the most interaction with the audience.

It was then followed by their song Headbangeeeeerrrrrr!!!!! that the audience headbanged all along, and before the headbang part of the song, Momo suddenly growls, which really shocked me.

After that, they sing Pa Pa Ya!!, which is a collaboration song they had with the Thai rapper, F.Hero and during this song, I almost let go of my towel as I swing it into the air. So far, the first three songs were from their old albums.

For their fourth song, they sing KxAxWxAxIxI, which was more of a rap metal song and was from their latest album. Again, Momo doing bar-growling in the background, this time, at the last part of the song, really does make the song somehow more satisfying.

Then by the fifth song, they performed Metali!!, a collaboration with Tom Morello, who is a previous member of Rage Against the Machine. This song was started with each of the Kami Band members to have a solo intro, showcasing their skills. In this song, not only does Momo have portions where she growls, she also has a center position. At this point, you must have realized that I am more of a Momo fan.

Kon! Kon! on the other hand, was a collaboration that they had with the Indian Nu metal band, Bloodywood, and has some Indian influences with it. It was also their only colab where their collaborator shot their part, so that Babymetal could use it since it was obvious that they could not always perform together.

Another song that they performed was Brand New day, which they partnered with the instrumental rock band Polyphia, and gave a city pop vibes.

Then all of a sudden, it becomes heavy with the next song being Song 3, as they have collaborated with Slaughter to Prevail. Counting 1-3 in Japanese has never been as heavy as this before.

Then the vibes switch up again as the next song was Ratatata, having a groovy techno rhythm in it, since they collaborated it with Electric Callboy. This is what it means when people talk about fun metal music, and songs like this are something my grandma could listen to and probably won't get angry with me.

For the 10^th were going Kawaii again, as Babymetal sings Gimme Chocolate!!, which is one of their most popular song and by which they also performed in the movie Heavier Trip.

Next to the last song was From Me to U, a colab song with Poppy that has been used as the trailer song for Marvel Zombies.

Finally, Babymetal sings Road of Resistance, with each of the girls holding a Babymetal flag, and it was also their go-to last song. During this part, there are 3 pits in the front. Unfortunately, I sucked at taking pictures, so I was not able to capture them. But there are other fan cams around that you can check to see it.

Overall, I really enjoyed the concert, despite being far from the stage. I also enjoyed the time that I spent with fellow fans while waiting for the show, and was really thankful to the fans who went out of their way to give free merch to people. I hope that this is not the only time that they will perform in the Philippines, but whether that will happen or not, "only the Fox God knows"..

That was all for this post. Thank you, and see you at the next one!