Babybeard - Interview

Matsupati, how are you? We have Baby Beard aka oh my goodness he's an amazing Lady Beard. I'm so excited to have him on today. It's going to be fun. It's going to be energetic and I have been following Baby Beard for about uh two years but I've been stalking Lady Beard for about a couple of years now so I'm a huge fan. Lady Beard, how are you? Hi darling Matsupati. Good to see you sweetheart thank you so much for having me on the show today hello dear viewers my name's ladybeard from the group babybeard i'm thrilled to be here today with my best friend patty patty how are you sweetheart i'm doing great how is everything over there you know i need to get over there we gotta get over here to tokyo japan tokyo japan ladies and gentlemen that's where this whole operation is going down that's a place where you can move to as a small town son of a lawyer from australia and become famous as a cross-dressing pro wrestler and heavy metal singer that's the place where it happens tokyo japan is the only place i'm telling you i love it i love it i love it i love it so uh i got a question for you so you're before we start uh you know get into the actual interview your color is pink that's right listen listen pink pink is the most adorable of all the adorable colors there is no color on earth that can possibly match pink in general cuteness lightness and fluffiness if it's not pink it might stink that's an old expression that they sometimes say in the west of Japan Kagoshima is an expression from Kagoshima if it ain't pink it might stink i made that up uh pink's my color because it suits me very well and i like it it compliments you well just by the way for anyone who's confused as to what's going on we didn't go through the proper introductions let me tell you a bit about myself my name's Ladybeard, hello, I'm from Australia but I now live in Tokyo, Japan where I'm a cross-dressing pro wrestler and heavy metal singer, I've been here for 10 years and I'm the lead singer of a group called Babybeard which features me and two adorable young Japanese ladies we sing kawaii metal, they sing i scream it's fantastic i love it i love it i love it can you tell me uh can you tell us about the origin of the band Babybeard the actual name and how it represents the music and style sure well well it's pretty really really when it comes down to it it's relatively straightforward so the group is me and a pair of adorable young japanese ladies as we've said so so they are very small they're petite they're extremely cute so they are the babies you see they are the babies i am Ladybeard it's a simple mathematical equation really babies plus Ladybeard equals Babybeard it's very straightforward i love it i love it what inspired you to form a band and how did you all come together okay so here's what happened back in 2015 2016 i was in a different group there was the similar formation to this it was me and two adorable young japanese girls that group came apart due to unforeseen circumstances but the world made it very clear to me that that is what the world wanted to see from Ladybeard so finally in 2020 we said it must be done we held an audition we held a worldwide audition candidates wrote in from every corner of the globe there were candidates from sweden there were candidates from the united states candidates from from senegal and even diego garcia where they don't even have citizens for crying out loud the entire world wanted to be a member of Babybeard finally we picked our adorable young ladies suzu and kotomi they have been the members of the group apart from me up until now uh we had this global audition and their second round was live auditions a physical audition in tokyo um and then these two girls turned out to be the chosen two one of them just left so we're holding the audition again okay but it's exciting it's great i you know i love the energy and everybody every time you do everything you know it just makes us want to just love you more so that's even my fans like they're so excited you know whoever the third person is going to be it's okay because you know watch will just you know get more excited than very kind you're very kind you're very nice to me miss patty thank you sweetheart by the way i have a huge collection of these uh cat ear headphones you've got going on yes i want to i want to see you in your whole your neck call me again yes you are yay you look so cute yeah but most of it yeah i is it's great but i wish i could leave it on but i can't hear you you know because it's bluetooth so yeah i apologize maybe i'll put it on later but yes like i've actually uh like a year or two ago um i uh reacted to one of your song and everybody's like oh my gosh i even have a cat that follows me every time they see me they see you it's like their favorite video yeah hang on hang on a minute you have a cat who follows you yeah sorry yes i have a cat fluffy animal yes a fluffy animal yes yes and i think uh he's in finland finland yeah yeah so the owners always sends us every time they see me you know he follows the the ears and then it's always you in the back i'm gonna have to get the owners to send us the clip so you i can laugh at it i love it that sounds wonderful what is the name of this finnish cat oh my god it sounds like uh but it's i think it's like suitcase or something like that it's like it's a unique name but they're like think of suitcase you know okay so it's probably a finnish name then it's probably sound nordic yeah so it's like she's key or something around the like those lines like that yeah oh my gosh you and i are right there with each other this is amazing i can't wait to meet Sheik the Finnish canine this is fantastic yes he's gonna be famous right he's gonna be famous more than you and i more famous than me that's right this cat could be the third member of my group well additionally this will be perfect i love it so your music is often visual spectacular energetic so how or whom comes up with the dance movements or arrangements oh my goodness our dancers our dancers so as i said before the group is me screaming and dancing with my band mates also singing and dancing um so our dancers are choreographed by professionals professionals not so many this ain't no amateur hour operation over here we hire the real thing so we have our dance choreographers who we work with so the process goes something like this song will get made we'll work with a um a composer song gets made then lyrics get written for recent songs i wrote the lyrics oh yeah lyrics get written we then record the songs and then send that the dance choreographer comes up with dance moves brings it back teaches them to us we turn them into a performance and then we take it to the stage that's how the process operates spectacular i like the last one the little one you know love it love it love it thank you very kind so your new song twisted and I'll say is it Kaiju Twisted, Kaiju Tail? That's right yes yes which is streaming now may you tell us a little bit more about the song and lyrics because it's very well bless you thank you you're very very kind bless you Matsupati, Matsupati is my favorite person what a good woman thank you sweetheart, Twisted Kaiju Tail by Babybeard this is our brand new release it's streaming now as we have said um i wrote the lyrics all right happy days and uh some was composed that's right which is why i was very excited about my lyric writing i was very excited about my lyric writing the composition was done by a swedish individual who lives in tokyo uh their name is Endigo and they were recently on the uh the swedish version of Drag Race so you can go check that out um twisted the kaiju tale so you know what a kaiju is yeah matsupati it's a giant japanese monster yeah godzilla's a kaiju uh every one of the bad guys from the ultra man series and the uh the Kamen Rider series these are all kaijus you see so so at face value at surface level it tells the story of a kaiju emerging from the sea to attack tokyo and of course two adorable young japanese girls reaction to said kaiju attack but but if you peel the layers of the onion back a little bit you will realize this song has a deeper meaning it's actually a song about refusing to judge people and circumstances and things by their appearance because human beings are deep creatures and just because someone looks a little bit silly doesn't mean that they're really someone to be avoided they can be very pleasant just looking a particular way so this is what it's about it's about saying no to biases it's about saying no to premature judgments it's a song about refusing to judge a book by its cover because a cover is only useful if you're singing a heavy metal version of a BTS song that's the only covers we're interested in i love it i love it no wonder i love that song you know know everyone's so judgmental all the time you know a lot of judgment in the world isn't there really a lot of people jump straight to it they'll see an image they haven't even they haven't gotten any deeper than that and straight away they've decided but but but but i hate it yep yep that's what we're fighting back against it's like a public service announcement it's a public service announcement in song form and i like it that's why we're gonna get make it viral that's why yes thank you sweetheart the dance video just went up on the YouTubes and the other video majigs the TikToks and the rest of them please go check it out out yes yes yes so let's talk about Chile yes yes i it was in april correct yes yes so can you share some interesting stories and experience from your time performing the live shows or anything interesting and exciting that happened in Chile and before you answer i caught the after show and i love the energy it was on IG i was like oh my gosh i was like hearting everything so oh thank you you are so kind but lots of patty is wonderful thank you sweetheart you are wonderful i'm a true fan i love it bless you what a quality human being um that's right recently baby beers this is actually our most recent international show in april we went down to santiago chile for a gigantic festival called gamers city so it was a kind of an anime convention meets music festival um so we had this fantastic big outdoor stage that we performed on it was absolutely fantastic really great time everyone very very kind very very nice to us here's let me tell you something here's one of the most most interesting and challenging things about doing this live performance matzah patty my friend so we go on stage all right we have ourselves organized with The whole hour of singing, dancing, screaming, things are very tightly choreographed. We run a very tight ship. And then, then, then, then, every time we're in the middle of a performance, some clown who fancies himself as a poor wrestler will walk onto the stage and take some kind of issue with me. And I have to bring some form of violence upon him and get him off my stage so that we can go back to the singing and dancing that we came here for. It's unbelievable. Every time I do a show, some character takes issue with me and must be disposed of so the singing and dancing can ensue. That happened in Chile. Not only did that happen on the stage, I was challenged to an in-ring match the very next day. I wasn't allowed to relax after my singing and dancing performance. I had to go prepare myself for a hardcore battle. The world's first, history's first ever lucha game out. the first ever gamers match in history it was remarkable i have to tell you every time we get on stage some clown takes issue with me in austria someone took issue with me in brazil someone took issue with me in Switzerland everywhere we go some character decides he's not into this ladybeard business and he comes on stage to try and send me packing not once has he succeeded not once not once that's great though thank you i mean on stage when i'm all hyped up and energetic you know into the show already they should really yeah they should read like the art of war and they should attack me when i'm least expecting it that's what they should do that's true great book yeah let me tell you another very interesting Chile specific um incident that happened this was very fun so uh in Chile they have a chocolate bar which is called a super ocho so it's kind of like a uh it's like chocolate and wafers those kind of things and um so before the show one of my friends from Chile he said to me hey when you go on stage you have to say something about super ocho everybody here loves super ocho super eight do you speak spanish just a little bit okay so yeah so super okay cool so so we go on stage and we said oh yeah we're very excited to be in Chile can't wait to eat a super ocho and the audience explodes with excitement about the super ocho Emma starts throwing super ochos onto the stage so we get bombarded with chocolate bars and then we had a live camera filming the show so Sisu one of the girls in my group held up this uh super eight with a nice big smile, big close-up of her with this super eight and now now our Chilean fans refer to themselves as the super ocho gang so that's happened oh god uh while you know everybody's throwing the super ocho uh i mean were you trying to dodge trying to catch it how was it it was just you know extreme i'd already had to battle a man on the stage so i was already worse for wear i was taking super ochos to the head oh my goodness i expected the girls to defend me no such luck oh my god i love that that's great that's that's amazing that's oh my gosh i can just i'm gonna have to tell my uh godparents that they're from puerto rico so oh they're from puerto rico really yes yes yes we're going i think in december so yeah really what's what's puerto rico like what's a nice time down to the island i imagine yeah it's hot but but it's nice you know um by the time that we go in down there cool weather but normally it's hot you know you go on the mountains you have like nice spring water it's just very beautiful calm it looks lovely lovely old spanish architecture and whatnot yes yes great food great food yeah and great cafe con leche you know i imagine everyone's just singing despacito all the time that's my image of the place dancing in the street you know, sounds lovely I want to go to Puerto Rico sounds fantastic i can't wait till you get to the U.S. I'm so excited so we can you know you know we're working on it we're working hard trying to get to the U.S. we're working on it hopefully Hopefully, 2024, hopefully, crossing them fingers. Yes, yes. Okay, so for all of your music videos, they're visual, they're stunning, they're fun. Thank you. They're creative. So what themes or message do you try to convey through your lyrics? Well, it varies from song to song, of course. Our first single, Nippon Kara, Konnichiwa, that was kind of a matter of, that means hello from Japan. So that was sort of a song which was about, it was our debut song for the group. But we were in this very strange situation when due to world events, we could not actually, you know, physically go and do a show. So the whole point of that song was kind of sending our love through the internet waves to our beautiful people all over the world. So that was lovely. Pien, our second single, that is about an emoji. There's a, you know, there's the emoji that has the big eyes. It's about to cry. The Japanese call that Pien. and Pien is used to express a minor level grievance a minor level annoyance for example so if you watch the video there's lots of uh things like the girls have dropped their ice cream cone and things like this so things like you hang out the laundry and then it rains straight away these minor level annoyances the Japanese will say Pien in response to this so that's what now Twisted Kaiju tale we already spoke about that that is of course not judging book by its and our accompanying single for that Opti Squad is about just just enjoying life just doing what you want to do not what someone else is forcing you to do your own individual if you want to stay up all night playing the video games you want to drink a little bit of soda you want to eat a super nacho while you're doing it that's your decision and you should be confident in your decisions not anyone else telling you how to do it I love it of course of course the only answers I give you every answer was extremely nice it's great I'm so sorry oh no problem it this is I'm telling you our fans gonna love this oh good maybe I should relax more let me just sit back like this and there you go just relax just a little bit okay relax there you go all right this good hearing them before that's way too relaxing right now too relaxed I gotta I gotta pump my chair back up again here we go so uh since the debut okay of April 28 2021 that's the date that everything's telling me how has the band evolved musically since the actual formation and what can fans expect from your upcoming project you know so it's really interesting when you do a group like this because each individual song you'll kind of you'll start to kind of learn more what the group actually is when you first start the group you know you hold the audition and you meet the girls and from day one you know you're working together you don't really know each other very well right so throughout the whole process of song number one and song number two you're kind of getting to know each other and then you kind of you go on stage together and you go overseas together and now this is process of okay now we become a team and like a family and then so it's through the process of doing the group that you kind of learn what the group really is um so so I've forgotten your question I can't remember the answer that I started telling you what was the question so how did the band you know evolve since that's why i'm telling you this i'll tell you about the evolution of this thing that was that was terrible wasn't it i can see my manager just fuming all right so so so therefore the evolution of the project kind of happens quite naturally and then a lot of things happen which are they're not necessarily intended to happen but they just end up happening so for instance the recent songs we started out and all the lyrics are in japanese and now the recent songs my lyrics are all in english and there wasn't necessarily a planned decision that's just the way that things kind of came together and now so now with one of the girls leaving and replacing her we're kind of going to have yet another stage of that evolution process so a new girl will come in she'll bring something new to the group whilst me and suzu keep what we already have in the group and so we're going to kind of you know shift into a new form of the group i suppose again it's really interesting doing these groups and watching them kind of you know from the inside watching as they develop because it's you know sort of i guess it's like watching an infant grow up you know the group learns how to walk and then the group learns how to talk and then the group starts saying funny things and then the group takes on a life of its own somewhat and what's interesting as well is then people will see the group as in the fans will see the group and the fans will state start making their own decisions about the group and that influences the group it's very interesting because you'll be at the show and the fans will react to you and then their reaction starts influencing the group so the process of evolution is really quite uh lovely and beautiful and interesting to behold in terms of what happens next i'm not sure i'm not sure the future is an open book yet to be written perfect perfect perfect and uh since time is coming up quickly uh we're going to go to the last one oh okay okay how can how do you maintain such incredible energy and showcase remarkable dance skills oh you are too bless you you are too kind to me you know i um before i started doing these groups i was never a dancer i was a pro wrestler and a heavy metal singer and i got put into these groups with uh little japanese girls and got told all right well you're a dancer now figure it out so so so i did um hey hey listen here is Ladybeard's key to maintaining energy which it will enable you to go and join a japanese pop group and be able to dance with the same energy and intensity as a pair of adorable young girls blueberries eat a lot of blueberries ladies and gentlemen blueberries for breakfast lunch and tea the blueberry is the king of fruit without the berry the blue there is no support for this performance extravaganza that comes at you And then when it comes to the maintenance of the instrument, the hair, the skin, the voice, I recommend you fill a bathtub with egg yolks and avocado and then slide into that bathtub with a straw connecting your mouth to the surface, enabling you to breathe and soak in your egg yolk avocado concoction for 20 minutes once every two weeks. Blueberries, avocado, egg yolks. These are the keys to human life, ladies and gentlemen. and Ladybeard encourages a healthy diet and active lifestyle for everyone oh my gosh that's that i will follow that that's perfect perfect that's a theme for the new song avocados egg yolks and blueberries yes we should do it you should do it i agree right my manager her face is does it does not convey a sense of uh being impressed that's the new song avocados egg yolks and blueberries do you have we have like five minutes do you want to uh add anything that we can edit in like any products or anything like that or you just want to have the last word before i uh wrap up uh so everybody currently we are running a campaign on the TikTok it is a dance challenge campaign we have a segment from the dance of our song Twisted Kaiju Tail we call it the YY Dance there is an animated effect on the TikTok you can go into the TikTok you can shoot your own cover dance of the YY Dance from Twisted Kaiju Tail by BabyBeard and stick it up on your TikTok stick it up on your TikTok stick it up on your Instagram stick it up on your YouTube Short or wherever you put your short videos don't forget to use the official music Twisted Kaiju Tail by BabyBeard and i can't wait to see your dance covers i tell you what actually it's interesting doing these dance cover challenges because people start like we were talking about with evolution people will take what we've done and then the fans kind of adapt things themselves so this morning i saw one which was uh the YY Dance but the jumping version so so the dance looks like this but we've got someone who's jumping the whole time while they're doing it other fans will do them like sitting down other fans it's very interesting so i look forward to seeing your dance covers dear friends perfect perfect i appreciate that i thank you so much for coming on you know the fans will love you i can't wait for new projects you know other than that you know uh love support you know from here and from everybody in the U.S. thank you you're very very kind um ladies and gentlemen other friends please head down to the social medias please follow at ladybeard underscore japan and also the group at ladybeard underscore japan our music videos are up on the youtubes and the TikToks and the other places that have videos please go check them out um please stay tuned our new singles are streaming now and all the places where you can stream music please go check them out thank you all so much for your support and my dear friend matsupati thank you for having us today everybody make sure you keep watching matsupati there is no human life without my friend matsupati that's perfect thank you so much thank you sweetheart that was a joy thank you