Japan has its first feminine Prime Minister, and she or he just isn’t like different Prime Ministers. The 64-year-old ultraconservative Sanae Takaichi rides motorbikes, practises karate, and, most significantly, is a longtime fan of heavy metallic.
Final month, earlier than she was elected Prime Minister, Takaichi appeared on Babymetal’s Metallic Radio, a Tokyo FM present hosted by Babymetal members Su-metal, Moametal and Momometal. The present guarantees to “unite the world and join the world by way of metallic” and options interviews with “secret metallic” followers.
Within the present, Takaichi talks about her love of metallic, revealing that it dates again to her early childhood.
“Once I was in elementary college, I began listening to Black Sabbath: Paranoid, Sabbath Bloody Sabbath, and issues like that,” says Takaichi [machine translated from Japanese]. “Then, once I acquired to center college, Deep Purple got here out, after which Burn and Smoke On The Water and so forth, and I acquired into that.”
Takaichi, who performed bass guitar and keyboards in center college, was ultimately approached by a “delinquent kind” who requested her to play keyboards in what she calls a “actually crappy band.” She took up drums in highschool, the place she was in a band who performed cowl songs, together with the Rolling Stones’ Leaping Jack Flash, earlier than becoming a member of an all-female outfit whose repertoire included UFO classics Rock Backside and Physician Physician, plus Rainbow‘s I Give up.
“Once I get irritated by my husband’s alternative of phrases or behaviour, I play the digital drums after he is gone to mattress,” says Takaichi. “Burn by Deep Purple is a staple. I play songs like this to let off steam.”
Elsewhere within the interview, Takaichi expresses her love of Michael Schenker‘s basic instrumental Into The Area, and Narita, the second album by US rockers Riot. She additionally speaks of her longtime affinity for Iron Maiden, and proclaims her favorite musician to be Japanese star Yoshiki, chief of X Japan.
Your entire interview could be heard under (in Japanese).