Photo from Bryan Garcia
Koi no City was held on December 15th at Hello Stranger, a venue in the heart of Little Tokyo. This was the first ever event that I’ve curated with my music friends. I wanted to hold an event where I can showcase all of my talented people I know while celebrating my love for retro Anime and Japanese aesthetics and sounds.
I put all the visuals together and they were projected on the wall with retro Anime titles like City Hunter, Creamy Mami, and Sailor Moon along with Japanese city pop commercials featuring music from Yamashita Tatsuro. I didn’t really know what to expect with my first event and I was so thrilled to find out that we had over 100 people in attendance! The event was magical because of everyone involved and everyone who came out to support.
The night was packed with a very exciting lineup that included myself, Polartropica, Shinkawasaki, Zaku 86 of Tune In Tokyo, Ken Harada, and rehabeatation. All the DJs were spinning a wide range of music from city pop classics like Dress Down from Kaoru Akimoto and Jpop classics like La La La Love Song by Toshinobu Kubota. Polartropica performed her original songs like Ride or Die and her rendition of All I Have To Do Is Dream by the Everly Brothers.
Shinkawasaki performed his original songs like What’s It Going To Be and his rendition of Kaneda from the Anime classic Akira. I performed my set with Shinkawasaki where we performed some of the songs we have released together like our original Neon Lies. I also performed my original song Koi no City that I named the event after and my rendition of Rouge no Dengon from the Anime classic Kiki’s Delivery Service that I will be releasing soon with Ajotabeats on all music streaming sites!
Photo by Bryan Garcia
Polartropica also joined me for my set performing my rendition of the Sailor Moon theme song Moonlight Densetsu. It was truly a magical moment!
Koi no City also had VJ Sam and Japanese radio TJS broadcasting the event live!
Having my first event at Hello Stranger which is a female owned venue by Angela Romero that celebrates L.A.’s Black, Mexican and Japanese cultures located in Little Tokyo, which I consider my second home, was the most perfect venue with the most awesome people that I could ever imagine.
The entire night, I was asked if I have this event all of the time and when is the next time this event will happen again. I’m not sure when we will all travel to Koi no City again but stay tuned because there will definitely be a next time!
『JAPANESE POP CULTURE NEWS THAT YOU MUST KNOW!!!』
Writer: Stephanie Yanez
Instagram @stephachu
Website https://direct.me/stephachu
(1/3/2024)
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