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Hello Kitty Character, X Japan Rock Band Join Forces
posted on by Egan Loo
Not-So-Daily Link of the Day: The Sankei Sports newspaper reported on Friday that the Japanese rock band X Japan and the Sanrio character Hello Kitty are collaborating for X Japan's World Tour Live concerts. This is the first time since Hello Kitty was conceived in 1974 that "she" has collaborated with a real-life band. Sario created the "Visual-kei Kitty" design pictured at right. X Japan continues its world tour in Seoul on March 21 and 22, and then plans to travel to New York, Los Angeles, Paris, Germany, Finland, Thailand, Beijing, and Taiwan. It also plans to return to Tokyo for concerts on May 2 and 3.
Hello Kitty has been animated several times over the years, and veteran Japanese voice actress Megumi Hayashibara (Ranma ½'s female Ranma, Evangelion's Rei) has played her in almost all of them. Sanrio has been attempting to expand beyond its traditional female audience by selling Hello Kitty apparel to men in Japan. ADV Films released English-dubbed versions of some of the videos. X Japan's most notable anime contributions were the songs in the X² music video collection and later X movie. The animation studio Madhouse adapted both productions from CLAMP's X manga.
Source: Tokyograph
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