New visual book explores the early years of hardcore culture in Japan · News ⟋ RA

Manga Corps documents over a decade of the hardcore and gabber scene in Japan with a curated visual collection from the 1990s–2000s.
Gabber Eleganza and Never Sleep are releasing a book.
Manga Corps traces the early years of hardcore and gabber in Japan with a curated range of visual artefacts including flyers, graphics and designs of the ’90s and early ’00s.

The 192-page book tells the story of hardcore taking hold in Japan, with its initial arrival sparking in 1993 from a licensing deal between label Avex Trax and Rotterdam Records. Extreme genres were shunned from Japan’s mainstream venues and vendors in the early ’90s, so they thrived in the underground. Similar in grit, trade and working-class roots to other hardcore capitals—Rotterdam and Frankfurt—Osaka was the home of many of Japan’s first hardcore pioneers.

Manga Corps follows hardcore to Tokyo and demonstrates the crossover of gaming subculture with electronic music. Gaming, raving and ambitious designing find unfiltered fusion in this archive of a historical underground scene.

Find the book on the Never Sleep website, where it will be officially available on June 26th.