Follow TV Tropes

Following

Music / LADYBABY

Go To

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ladybaby.jpg
Original members, from left to right:
Rei Kuromiya, Rick Magarey (a.k.a Ladybeard),
Rie Kaneko
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/dz056duvmaaofsy.jpg
2018 lineup.
From left to right: Emily Arima, Nana Ikeda,
Rie Kaneko, Fuka Karasawa
Change the rules, Smash the boundaries

LADYBABY is a Japanese alternative Idol group formed in 2015 and lasting until 2020, then rebooted in 2023. Following in the footsteps of Babymetal, its music mashes together one or many genres at once with cute girls and brutal heavy metal screaming …except when it doesn't. The group refers to its style officially as "kawaiicore".

The project was originally created by costume company Clearstone, which had worked with annual modeling contest MissID and wanted to showcase its wares using two of the contest's winners, plus a six-foot-tall Australian cross-dressing wrestler. This lineup, revealed on March 25th 2015, consisted of…

  • Richard “Ladybeard” Magarey [Date Of Birth: 1983-08-03]
  • Rie Kaneko (金子理江) [D.O.B: 1997-12-18] (brown hair)
  • Rei Kuromiya (黒宮れい) [D.O.B: 2000-11-29] (black hair)

The group's first music video "Nippon Manju", released July 4th 2015, was so weird even by Japanese standards that it became a viral hit – as of 2023 it has over 35,000,000 views. This success led to more music videos plus physical singles and multiple live shows, where Magarey's ability (and Rie's to a lesser extent) to jump language barriers helped the group gain an international following, allowing them to perform in Los Angeles, New York, Cologne, Mexico City, and London, to the delight of fans.

Unfortunately, LADYBABY soon gained a reputation for poor management and member turnover – Magarey left the group in Summer 2016 after a contract dispute, leaving Rie and Rei to continue as a duo for another year with a temporary Prince-like name change. During this time, they released their first full album, which contained all but two of their songs with Ladybeard. They also continued to record more music of varying harshness levels and perform more shows, including a well-received appearance at Tokyo Idol Festival. Then, in November 2017, Rei abruptly quit due to several factors – some disclosed, some not – seemingly ending the group.

However, in January 2018, Rie announced, along with a "memorial" album of her duo songs with Rei, that she would reboot LADYBABY after overseeing open auditions. Less than two months later, Rie plus three new girls debuted as the group's "Third Generation".

  • Rie Kaneko (金子理江) – Lead singer (only original member left)
  • Nana Ikeda (池田菜々) – Rapper and backup singer [D.O.B: 1998-10-30]
  • Emily Arima (有馬えみり) – Screamer and backup singer [D.O.B: 1999-03-07]
  • Fuka Karasawa (唐沢風花) – Singer [D.O.B: 2001-10-12]

Emily's scream abilities allowed the group to finally cover Ladybeard's parts live again. This version of LADYBABY was known for the members' closeness, high-energy live shows, and music becoming much more experimental. Unfortunately, despite its popularity (live shows in Japan regularly sold out), this LADYBABY ceased activities in January 2020 after nearly two years. While there were plans for one-off shows through that year, the COVID-19 pandemic kept them from happening, and the quartet went their separate ways while still remaining friends.

In January 2023, Clearstone announced it would reboot LADYBABY (again) with the assistance of Idol management company HEROINES in lieu of Rie, who had declined to return, and held open auditions. In November 2023, LADYBABY's social media announced the group's "Fourth Generation" – a quintet of young girls of (to-date) indeterminate age who officially debuted one week later on December 1st with "Gotcha NIPPON!", the first new LADYBABY song in nearly four years…

  • Rem Serizawa (芹沢 レム) [D.O.B: ????-09-12]
  • Mia Kanrei (神黎 ミア) [D.O.B: ????-05-27]
  • Sena Kurusaki (來崎 せな) [D.O.B: 2000-08-31]
  • Sakura Tsubaki (椿 さくら) [D.O.B: ????-02-10] – Screamer
  • Ei Tsukimachi (月街 えい) [D.O.B: ????-09-03] – Youngest and tallest (173cm/5’8”!)


CD Singles

  • Nippon Manju (2015) † 
  • Agé-Agé Money (2016) † 
  • Renge Chance! (2016) † 
  • Sanpai! Gosyuin Girl☆ (2016) † 
  • Pelo (2017) † 
  • Pinky! Pinky! (2017) † 
  • Hoshi-no-Nai Sora (2018) † 
  • Damedame Tono (2018) † 
  • Riot Anthem (2019) † 
  • Haten ni Raimei (2019) † 
  • Gotcha Nippon! (2024) † 

Compilation Albums

  • Ladybaby: One Year Best ~2015-2016~ (2016) note 
  • Beside U (2018) note 
  • Reburn (2020) note 

Concert Videos

  • Ladybaby: One Year Best (2016/04/15 – released September 2016)
  • Invisible Rice Tour Final (2019/03/27 – released September 2019)
  • SEE YOU REBURN Tour Final (2020/01/13 – released August 30th 2020)

Ladybaby's official website is here. It has links on its main page to the group's social media portals, most notably the twitter feed. Every member, past and present, has a twitter account, though former members usually talk about their own projects.

In addition to Babymetal from which it takes obvious inspiration, compare also PassCode, another multi-girl Idol group with a death-screamer, which has been around longer and seen more success. Interestingly, PassCode hired Emily as its replacement screamer in 2021 while she was a free agent waiting for a call to re-form LADYBABY that never came.

Tropes relating to LADYBABY:

  • all lowercase letters: The song "bite me" (which not coincidentally is Rie's longtime internet-handle) plus Rie's solo project from late 2017, trolleattroll, along with both songs released for it.
  • Anime Hair: Every girl associated with the group (except Rei) has toyed with this.
    • As you can see in the photo above, 2018-era screamer Emily Arima's naturally black hair is pink. The actual shade has varied from neon to pastel to nonexistent except for the tips.
    • In July 2018, Nana dyed her black hair pink, though she went for cotton-candy instead of neon. She later dyed it strawberry blonde (and chopped off at least 30cm), then back to black. As of Summer 2019, her hair is a very very light pink, almost white, and extremely short — she wears wigs and hair extensions.
    • Rie, whose hair is naturally brown, has been known to dye her hair odd colors.
      • In the "Easter Bunny" video she has maroon tips
      • Photos and video shot at the beginning of the Foursome Era show her hair with a reddish or orange sheen depending on the light. She dyed it back closer to her natural brown later in the year.
      • In early 2019, Rie sort of went off the deep end on the dyeing front, eventually ending up with a sort of silver with greenish sheen. Later, with Fuka's help, she painted it purple.
      • In September 2020, her longtime friend and former choreographer Mikity posted a photo of himself with Rie in which her hair is dyed bubblegum pink (so are her eyebrows). In REIRIE she flips between pink and blonde hair to contrast Rei's black.
    • Fuka's hair is naturally very dark brown. In June 2019, the day she left Warepuwa, she dyed her hair blonde with an under-layer of red.
    • In Ladybaby 4.0, Rem often has blue streaks in her otherwise dark hair.
  • Accidental Pun: "Pelo" has one across languages. In Japanese, 「ペロ」 (pero) is an onomatopoeia for licking or lapping up liquid – and, in context, is likely just as much of a Double Entendre as in English. However, the use of esoteric Romanization (not unheard of in Japanese) made the term identical to the Spanish word for "hair". At the time "Pelo"'s music video was uploaded, Ladybaby already had a large proportion of its international fanbase in Latin America. Cue many of them asking in both Spanish and English why the girls were singing about their hair whilst holding lollipops.
  • Aloof Dark-Haired Girl: Rei. Her hair is jet-black. When she was still a member of Ladybaby, she rarely spoke in interviews and is known to be quiet around people she doesn't know. Even with her larger-than-life stage presence and over a decade performing in front of audiences, she's still very quiet when she isn't singing. After Ladybeard left the group, Rie took over most of the talking, culminating in this admission during the April 2017 Tokyo Girls Update interview.
    Rei: "I'm not good with people, so I let Rie speak for me."
    Rie: "I speak for Rei."
  • Animal Motifs:
    • Rei = Rabbits. She draws one as part of her autograph and is occasionally pictured carrying around a plush bunny… which she stabbed to death in BRATS's 2015 music video, "Fourteen-Year-Old Disease". This carried on to REIRIE, whose mascot is a rabbit, and "RABBITS" is the title of their debut song.
    • Nana = Cats. Her first uniform had her wearing a headband with black kitty ears. She's also known to draw cat ears on social media photos of herself.
    • Rie = Dogs. The oldest surviving video of her, from 2013, shows her playing with her dog Chippy. She also has a loyalty streak. And of course her usual sad expression wouldn't look out of place in a Humane Society commercial. She was also photographed in 2019 hugging a Huskie with a look of pure bliss (both Rie and the dog).
  • Briefer Than They Think: Ladybeard's time as a member of Ladybaby. If one counts his time with the group from the first promo video on March 25th 2015 until his official departure on July 31st 2016, that's a total of 495 days (exactly 16 months plus a week).
    • If one only counts live performances, well, their debut was on May 31st 2015 and the last show with Ladybeard was April 15th 2016. That's 321 days, or just 10½ months that the original Ladybaby trio actually performed together. Note 1  Note 2 
  • But Now I Must Go: Discussed twice.
    • On May 30th 2019, Fuka announced she would leave her original Idol group Warepuwa, with her final performance as a member on June 21st 2019. Her stated reason was being a double-duty Idol for over a year left her exhausted, and she wanted to put her full energy into Ladybaby, which was set to begin its "Ride The Lightning" Tour the next day (June 22nd).
    • Ladybaby's own (in English) at the end of their final music video "Misogi Island".
  • The Cameo: Magarey briefly returned to Ladybaby in May 2018 as a featured performer in the recording and music video for the song "Biri-Biri Money" with the new lineup. The reason this does not count as Putting the Band Back Together is that the reunion did not involve Rei, who was busy fronting her sister's band BRATS and still was not on speaking terms with Rie, plus Beard only performed one live show with them.
  • Camp Gay: None of the girls or even Ladybeard, but rather Ladybaby's original choreographer Mikity Honmono, a good friend of Rie's who co-hosted Nadarezaka Rock with her (and formerly Rei). He's extremely flamboyant on camera and is part of a male-Idol group called "Sakigake Gay".
  • Catchphrase:
    • Ladybeard's, for all of his many projects over the years, is "Sing. Dance. DESTROY!!!"
    • Rei doesn't have a verbal one, but she has long been known to flip off cameras when onstage.
      • She enjoys cursing. Her greeting to you on her twitter profile is, in katakana, "motherfucker".
    • Rie's unofficial one is "bite me". It's incorporated into her twitter and Instagram handles and is the title of one of her first post-Rei Ladybaby songs. The 2018-era lineup of Ladybaby has been seen wearing T-shirts with the phrase on it. When asked about it during a livestream (regrettably not translated), she appeared to say that she knows exactly what it means, though the song of the same name is a bit more ambiguous.
      • She's also known to end some of her social media posts, especially on Instagram, with "Amen". While she was raised at least nominally Christian (she is half-Filipino), the posts themselves aren't really prayers.
  • Color-Coded for Your Convenience: Informal during the 1st through 3rd lineups, explicit in the 4th.
    • As can be seen in the first photo above, Rie's and Rei's first costumes were blue and pink, respectively, to help distinguish them. This continued into their duo era with the white two-piece dresses, if subtly – Rei's outfit had pink accents and Rie's had bluish silver.
      • Despite switching to white once she reunited with Rei independent of Ladybaby, Rie is still heavily associated with blue to this day.
      • Rei may have worn pink-accented clothes during her 2+ years in Ladybaby, but the color long associated with her by fans and herself is black.
    • Ladybaby 3.0 had unofficial colors due to a bit of overlap amongst members' preferences but eventually solidified as…
      • Rie = Blue
      • Nana = Pink (also Black)
      • Emily = Red
      • Fuka = Green
    • Ladybaby's 4th Generation gave the members' official colors alongside their names.
      • Rem = Blue
      • Mia = White
      • Sena = Green
      • Sakura = Red
      • Ei = Purple
  • Costume Evolution: Inevitable considering the group's original backer, costume company Clearstone. It would honestly take up too much space to detail every single era of costume (plus occasional throwbacks), so here's an abridged version.
    • The Ladybeard Era had three costume sets, most notably the schoolgirl cosplay outfits seen in the photo at the top of this page.
    • The I.F.K.A.L.B Era had two, plus one-off costumes only worn in the Sanpai! Gosyuin Girl☆ video.
    • The Foursome Era had three sets, the latter two of which were co-designed by Nana. The second photo at the top of this page shows the quartet's first set.
  • Distinguishing Mark: Rie is notable for her beauty marks, plus what appears to be a large scar on her forehead above her left eye – the photo in this tweet shows it clearly. In the model shoots she did as a teenager it was usually covered by her bangs. Her hair isn't as thick these days, making it very visible in close-ups, such as her trolleattroll song "lost". It's even more obvious in a makeup tutorial she did for bis in mid-2018 that briefly showed her without makeup and her bangs pulled back. She is not known to have ever spoken about it.
  • Early-Installment Weirdness: The earliest Ladybaby material features a tall woman with short black hair. During the first promo videos, she's dressed in white with a triangle on her forehead (symbols of death) and introduces herself as "the ghost who lives in [Ladybaby's] house" and she randomly gets a pan-up shot by a pool during Nippon Manju. The woman is Shizu Mizuno, who was a co-winner of the MissID2015 contest along with Rie. She was never a member of Ladybaby and did not appear again after Nippon Manju. The group's own history, such as it is, completely omits her.
  • Eyelid Pull Taunt: Every girl (Rei included) has done this on camera at least once. Fuka in particular enjoys the gesture.
  • Fanservice: Not blatant at first, but two cute Japanese girls – busty gravure models no less – in cute outfits bouncing around on stage would inevitably fall under this. Ladybeard also has his fans from a completely different demographic.
    • During her solo bit for "Nippon Manju", Rie flashes her bloomers twice. Whether she was aware of it while filming is unknown.
    • After Ladybeard left, Rie and Rei turned up the fanservice in their videos, often wearing midriff-baring outfits and playing up a yuri angle, getting extremely close in certain shots.
      • There are plenty of instances, both photographs and video, dating from late 2014 to September 2017, of Rie and Rei kissing. Sometimes a peck on the cheek, sometimes full on lip-locking.
    • The first round of 2018 costumes, as mentioned above, have Rie and Nana showing off their model-tight midriffs and Emily showing off her long legs. Rie also likes to take scissors to T-shirts to allow herself to show off more skin.
    • The fourth lineup has yet to do anything revealing, but three of the members – Mia, Rem, and Sakura – are "cosplay girls" with pre-LB Instagram photos where they show themselves in varying stages of undress.
  • Flipping the Bird: Rei was infamous for doing this during live shows. Still is. During BRATS's 2015 music video "Fourteen-Year-Old Disease", she flips off the camera twice in different sequences.
    • During 2018's "REVENGE" tour, Rie and Emily were both caught on camera flipping off the audience.
    • Emily has a blink-and-you'll-miss-it one during a fitting part of the "Riot Anthem" video (which she makes much more obvious during live performances). She also gave a stealth double-bird in this promo clip. The smirk she sports immediately after is priceless.
      • Fans have confirmed that this is one of Emily's favourite photograph poses.
  • Genre Roulette: Even more than most groups, alt-Idol fusion or otherwise, Ladybaby has never been tethered to a single style of music. Individual releases can and probably will have songs with wildly different tones.
    • Their very first single had this – "Ultra☆Lucky" sounds absolutely nothing like "Nippon Manju"; the latter is the speed-metal-plus-cute-with-growling the group is known for, but the former is full-on J-Pop with no growling whatsoever (yes, Ladybeard actually sings).
    • "Pelo" and "Easter Bunny", both of which are punctuated with growling, were paired with the soft-rock "Lady Baby Blue".
    • "Pinky! Pinky!", which arguably has some of Ladybaby's harshest riffs, was released alongside "Generation Hard Knocks". The latter is a slow melodic pop ballad that Rie was unable to perform without crying.
    • "Haten Ni Raimei", the girls' 2019 single whose title track rivals "Pinky!" for heaviness, is pared with "LB 4 Future" (featuring more Emily screaming)… and the soft-rock ballad "God's Not".
  • Girl Group: What Ladybaby became after Ladybeard left. More obvious with the 2018 four-girl and 2023 five-girl lineups. Officially, since Rick's "Ladybeard" character is a five-year-old girl, the group was always one.
  • Girlish Pigtails: Rie, Rei, and Ladybeard usually wore their hair like this for shows and videos. Beard still does as the style is integral to his character, though photos exist of him wearing his hair down.
    • Averted after Ladybeard left. Rie and Rei usually had their hair down or in a single ponytail for later videos and shows.
    • Returned in the 2018-era lineup. All four girls – yes, even Emily – have worn their hair in pigtails in at least one show and/or photoshoot.
    • For the fourth lineup, Rem's hair is almost always put up in twintails. Her Instagram shows that this has been her preferred hairstyle for years.
  • Gratuitous English: Almost every song Ladybaby has ever made.
    • The Seiko Ōmori songs ("Lady Baby Blue" & "bite me") have the least of it, limited to title drops.
    • On the polar opposite end, "Nippon Manju" sometimes feels like it has an English word every single line.
    • Emily is credited with writing her own scream-lyrics on "Riot Anthem", "Haten Ni Raimei", and "LB 4 Future". The first two have her screaming entirely in English while the latter is a mix of English and Japanese.
  • Harsh Vocals: Ladybeard did this in the original lineup. Emily Arima was in charge of this from 2018 to 2020. Sakura Tsubaki took over in 2023.
    • Emily and Richard screamed together in "Biri-Biri Money".
    • Rie likes to scream to/at the audience during live shows. Unfortunately for her, her voice is naturally high-pitched and cute to the point she can't be a true death-screamer.
  • Huge Guy, Tiny Girl: Magarey, being a wrestler around six feet tall (183cm), towers over just about any Japanese girl, especially Rie and Rei who are both ~5'2". He could easily lift them off the ground if they hung onto his biceps – that's exactly what he's doing in the photo at the top of this page, actually. He's also been seen with one girl sitting on each shoulder, giving both of them a piggyback ride at the same time, and carrying one girl under each arm.
    • Taken up to eleven with Beard's partner in Deadlift Lolita, Reika Saiki. She's no more than 150cm tall (4’11”). When photographed together with 2018-era Ladybaby, even tiny Nana (154cm, or 5’0.63”) has a clear height advantage. Note that Reika is 5½ years older than Rie.
  • Idol Singer: What the girls technically are. That said, Emily long rejected the label – understandable since she's the screamer, genuine metalhead, and never had any desire to be an "Idol". She has openly questioned her decision to enter that part of the business, though she loved performing with Rie, Nana, and Fuka, even if she couldn't care less about doing cute promos or other Idol things. This extended to her later gig as PassCode's screamer.
    • Rie herself said in a May 2018 Natalie interview that she wished to transcend labels and become more of an "Artist" – her solo songs aren't even remotely Idol or pop in nature.
  • The Leader: Rie Kaneko, undeniably.
    • Even during the Ladybeard Era, as shown on their live DVD, she was listed as leader because she was "officially" the oldest (while Rick Magarey was early-30s at the time, his Ladybeard character is 5).
    • Can't really have a "leader" in a duo, but Rie still did the majority of talking during the TIFKA era.
    • In the 3.0 era, Rie was explicitly referred to as the leader on the group's website. Through her actions and words, she made it clear that Ladybaby was her baby. As such, she took steps toward having some direct creative control – personally recruiting the new members, directing and editing music videos, getting her contacts in the industry to help write songs and/or join The Chaos, etc.
  • Location Song: This is what "Nippon Manju" is for Japan in general. It's also a List Song, naming off a whole bunch of things to see, do, and eat if you visit Japan.
  • Lucky Charms Title: Two thus far. "Ultra☆Lucky" from the Ladybeard era and "Sanpai! Gosyuin Girl☆" from the Rei/Rie TIFKA era.
  • Lyrical Cold Open: "Nippon Manju" starts out with Rie (or the audience at live shows) shouting the Title Drop before the music begins.
  • Lyrical Dissonance: You shouldn't expect any less with a group like this.
    • "Nippon Manju"'s main verses, screamed by Ladybeard (later Emily) and rapped by the girls, are pretty heavy, but they're literally just talking about tourist attractions in Japan. Along with food, the country's famously low crime rate, cute girls, etc.
    • "Agé-Agé Money" has, as is typical for Ladybaby 1.0, extremely upbeat music, but the lyrics are actually a not-too-subtle condemnation of the mechanics of 21st century economics (specifically as applied in Japan, plus the USA where the music video was filmed) in which wages barely keep up with inflation. The music video can also count as a hard-rock take on The Mel Brooks Number since Rie, Rei, and Ladybeard are wearing absurd garish costumes throughout the entire thing.
      "To all the big-shots: Raise Our Wages!!"
    • The Ladybaby 3.0 song "bite me", written by Rie's old friend Seiko Ōmori, is in a major key and very upbeat. As mentioned on the Trivia page, this is Rie's catchphrase, she knows exactly what it means, and she sings it with glee in the chorus.
  • Money Song: "Agé-Agé Money" and "Biri-Biri Money", especially the latter, might be two of the most obvious examples known to man, though both songs carry deeper messages as well.
    Rie: "I want five quadrillion Yen; show me the money!!" (five quadrillion Yen is around 45 trillion US Dollars)
  • Mood Whiplash: Cutesy female vocals counterpointed by death metal screams and growls and shredding guitar solos.
    • Emily Arima pulls this off by herself – she's cute and also a fine singer… who can switch to metal-growling at the drop of a hat.
    • Watching Ladybaby's music videos in chronological order counts. For instance, it goes from the semi-harsh "Pelo" to the slow pop-rock "Lady Baby Blue" straight to the much heavier "Pinky! Pinky!".
  • Multiple Reference Pun: The chorus of Hoshi-no-Nai Sora has one of these that can also count as a Bilingual Bonus. The onscreen subtitles consistently use the phrase "Growly Days", which makes very little sense in English, though it's still apt since the song introduced Ladybaby's new growler, Emily. However, in Japanese, "growly" sounds identical to "glory", meaning the girls are also singing about how their best days lie ahead, which fits perfectly with the song's message of moving on from the past.
  • Ode to Youth: Rie's trolleattroll song "lost" is one, from the perspective of someone wistful and more than a little scared about leaving her carefree teen years. "Nineteen" (in English) constantly pops up in the lyrics. The song, not coincidentally, was posted on Rie's 20th birthday.
  • Precision F-Strike: "Riot Anthem" has one during the central bridge. While the onscreen lyrics themselves are censored, Emily's scream of 'FUCK THE VIRTUE!' is not.
    • At their Italy live show in May 2019, Emily (who else?) and Rie (minor surprise) dropped F-bombs at the audience right before starting "Nippon Manju".
    • Even in Japan, Emily would do this. During one show, she announced the following number by saying in English, "Next song's f**king called…".
  • Pseudo-Romantic Friendship: Rie and Rei took this to its extreme after they became a duo. Several post-Beard videos show them getting extremely close to each other, Holding Hands, kissing (typically pecks, a few times on the lips). How much of it was genuine and how much of it was just playing to the audience is unknown. However, there's plenty of reason to conclude Rie did not take Rei's departure well – the solo songs she made after Rei left practically scream "Not Over It".
    • As noted above, they were doing this during the Ladybeard era too. From the group's second live show in July 2015 we have Rie and Rei (both still underage at the time) locking lips. Here is another example from a few months later; the tweet even starts with "kiss!" if it wasn't already obvious what Rei is doing.
    • Showing this was the entire point of "Escape Dream", a music video with Rie and Rei filmed before Ladybaby even existed.† 
  • Revolving Door Band: Rie Kaneko was the only person to be in Ladybaby for all of its original 5-year run. However, by the time Ladybaby re-formed in 2023, she was unavailable due to being back performing with Rei.
  • Self-Empowerment Anthem: More than one LB song can count.
    • Reading the lyrics, it becomes very clear very quickly that this is exactly what "Hoshi-no-Nai Sora" is, for people in general but mostly for Rie herself.
    • "God's Not", the final Ladybaby song of 2018, is a variant of this, with lyrics like:
      The noise stabs my soul, but I have the strength to overcome it
      My God does not lie, cannot be fooled, cannot be destroyed / Travelling ever onward, I found It at the end of Despair / [snip] / My God's not narrow-minded.
  • She Is All Grown Up: Deliberately invoked with the Fuu Am I photobook produced for Fuka's 18th birthday show. Some photos from it, including ones she posted on her own twitter feed, look like they'd fit in more with Rie's model portfolio, in stark contrast to the rather conservative clothes and costumes Fuka wears in real life.
  • Song Style Shift: Should you really expect any less from a group like this?
    • "Pelo" has a jazzy piano bridge in the middle of an otherwise harsh song. Naturally, the music video changes style to reflect this.
    • "bite me" has so many abrupt shifts that it's difficult to tell what its style is. Best to just call it Seiko Ōmori's Interpretation Of Rie and leave it at that.
    • "Damedame Tono" has a section right in the middle where it briefly switches to a 60's-style Latin rhythm. In the music video, the picture during this bit is doctored to look like a degraded 16mm film reel.
  • Team Mom: Rie became one by necessity after Rei left. Nana, Fuka, and Emily all invoked this when describing her to Natalie in May 2018.
    Fuka: "I can't do many things without someone's help, so Rie is always helping me, like setting my hair."
    Nana: "Rie […] won't hesitate to listen to me when I'm troubled. She gives off the feeling of a sister you can depend on"
    Emily: "[E]veryone was kind to me, especially Rie who was polite when teaching me the dances. Without that, I would have been garbage."
    • Rie herself backed this up in the same interview. Candid footage from the "God's Not" video confirms it.
      "I'd rather take care of it myself. I'm like an overattentive grandma (lol)."
  • To the Tune of...: 2019's "LB 4 Future" uses the music from 2015's "Beard-chan Robot" but with lyrics rewritten to fit the four-girl lineup. This may be one of the few instances of a group doing this to itself.
  • The Trope Formerly Known as X: A rare played-straight example. As noted in the introduction, after Ladybeard left the group, Rie and Rei opted to continue as a duo. For whatever reason, legal or personal, they chose to call themselves "The Idol Formerly Known As Ladybaby". Yes, 'Idol' singular. Evidently, this was just as annoying a mouthful for Rie as it was for the fans, so she changed the name back in 2018, though the group got a new logo. Fans joked that Rie's new lineup ought to have been called "The Idol Formerly Known As The Idol Formerly Known As Ladybaby".
    • After Beard and then Rei left, some of the weirdness remained. Even by underground Idol standards, very little about Ladybaby follows the "rules" of the scene. Fuka, the only one of the three new members to have an Idol background, said she found Ladybaby's nearly "anti-Idol" aesthetic a refreshing change of pace and was happy Ladybaby allowed her to "discover another side of [her]self".
  • A Wild Rapper Appears!: Nana Ikeda turned out to be this once the others discovered she had a natural aptitude for it. "Riot Anthem", "Haten ni Raimei", and "Misogi Island" make good use of her skills.


Top