Hatsune Miku needs no introduction. She's played a few times in the United States as part of MIKU EXPO and Anime Expo's Mikunopolis and now she's back for her biggest tour yet. I skipped the previous tour in 2014 as it was in Los Angeles. This time San Francisco is included among the ten cities and fifteen shows that consist of the North America leg of MIKU EXPO.

The GazettE, first founded in 2002, is a visual kei rock band that has toured the globe but for some reason never found their way to the States. 2016 marks the year they fix that with four shows, two of which are in California. Tickets range from $50 to $200 depending on if you want VIP. The tour was hinted at by snippets of shows popping up and quickly disappearing from venue ticket sites before finally made official in the beginning of the year.

Japanese band DIR EN GREY is no stranger to the United States. They've been playing shows across America for a little over a decade and thankfully call San Francisco one of their regular stops. The show tonight is in partnership with Goldenvoice who has presented the band in San Francisco for as long as I can remember. The venue is Slim's, a far different place from The Regency Ballroom a mile away that the band has frequented so often. Smaller, more intimate, and much more prone to selling out. If you don't want to get stuck in the cold or stuck in the back you have to arrive early. The formal name for the tour is "Never Free From the Awakening."

ONE OK ROCK, hailing from Japan, has returned to California. They've played as part of the Vans Warped Tour in 2014 as well as Slipknot's KnotFest so California isn't exactly unknown to them. The San Francisco Bay Area, however, is. They had a stop in Mountain View but that was it. They still haven't made their way up to San Francisco proper so hopefully next time.

In just under a week Japanese metal band DIR EN GREY will return to America for scant few shows. One of those shows will thankfully be in San Francisco on Wednesday, November 4. It is presented by Goldenvoice.

As the creator behind the award-winning light novel series, Spice and Wolf, Isuna Hasekura has quickly penned his way into the minds of anime fans worldwide through writing classic storylines focused on economics and how it influences the world. Aside from Spice and Wolf, his portfolio also includes the visual novel World End Economica, which was recently translated and published by Sekai Project. We had a chance to interview him during Anime Expo 2015 and had a chance to ask him about what shaped his work as well as his thoughts about the English translation for World End Economica.

For July 4th Club Nokia plays host to both Wagakki Band and their opening act in the form of the Vocaloid IA.  This happens to be the first stateside show for both.  The two acts are part of the twenty-fourth iteration of Anime Expo in a mini-event dubbed the "Cool Japan Festival."  They couldn't have picked a better stage to debut on in the United States.  Out of all the concerts and events at AX this one was what I was looking forward to the most.

What do you get when you combine a Vocaloid veteran with a model/designer/singer? The answer: GARNiDELiA.  Seattle's Sakura-Con 2015 played host to the duo as part of the event's 18th iteration.  The group consists of Maria, real name Mai Mizuhashi, and Toku, real name Yoshinori Abe.  The two are signed to Sony Japan's Defstar Records.  Remember April 4, 2015; this is the date of GARNiDELiA's first American concert and what a night it was.  Just a few months earlier GARNiDELiA released their first album, "Linkage Ring," and now fans in America would get to see them live.  

J-Pop Summit Festival 2014 took place on July 19-20. This was the sixth rendition of the event and by all accounts the biggest. Just a few weeks ago it seemed hard to surpass last year's event which had Kyary Pamyu Pamyu headlining it but J-Pop Summit Festival seems to have done it. Fans of Japanese music were treated to the sights and sounds of performers like Tomomi Itano (newly graduated from AKB48) and the fresh faces of Tokyo Girls Style. The event may have formally closed at 6PM in Japantown but those willing to hang around were able to see singer extraordinaire May'n and end J-Pop Summit with a bang.

My Sunday began at the San Diego Comic Con. By nightfall it ended at the feet of Babymetal. These idols turned metal princesses are some of the youngest that you will see on stage and have gained plenty of attention in the last year where they went from a national act to an international one in no time flat. They've sold out the Budokan, played festivals like Japan's Summer Sonic and UK's Sonisphere, and now they're on US soil; the invasion has begun.