LIKE A SHOOTING STAR

I love Japan radio personality/Metal ambassador Masa Ito, but he really exemplifies Japanese hard-rock thinking in that he seems to LOVE Bon Jovi. So it's not like his credibility is unassailable. And  thus I wasn't unjustified in furrowing an eyebrow when Ito's Saturday night program Power Rock Today (ahh Japan) premiered The Darkness, led by the double-take magnet Justin Hawkins. I believe my exact words were This is too cheesy for even Japan. Divorced from the band's wacky videos and hammy attire, it was hard to put the shit in context. But when "Get Your Hands Off My Woman" returned the following week, I knew I was hooked. 

Thankfully, attempting to justify the quartet's appeal, both goofball and sincere, to my friends wasn't necessary; The Darkness exploded a few short weeks later in the states. And their swift demise thanks to drug abuse (no seriously, thank you drugs!) ensures that time will unjustly portray The Darkness as a novelty one-hit wonder. Whatever. Turn this shit up and giggle!