Osaka After Midnight: Welcome to KinGuu, A goth cabaret bar

Dec 1

Written By YS Kim

Amidst the neon haze and saccharine overdose of kawaii cute culture of Osaka, let us never forget that Japan is also the home to extreme death metal and fetish culture.

After you’ve had enough of the madness of tourists taking photos of the Glico man while doing his signature pose, another madness awaits a few blocks away. Welcome to KinGuu, a goth cabaret bar and hellish retreat.

Once you step off the elevator of an otherwise nondescript building, you are confronted with the quirky and unique ambiance of taxidermy and dolls heads that are the signature oddities of the place. This is the realm of KinGuu, a zone named after its owner, a goth cabaret artist with a passion for tango and vintage music. If this place was an album *You can easily picture R. Crumb creating the cover art for its vinyl reissue.* Now, take the time to process the significant elephant in the room - a colossal camel, dominating the space alongside shibari fetish dolls, other stuffed nightmares, and eccentric paintings. According to the artist, the camel originated from a museum in Nara that went out of business.

It’s time to take a seat and let the absinthe kick in - this is also an absinthe bar, though I settled for a gin and tonic. The mesmerizing owner, with his Clockwork Orange-meets-The Adicts make up, will charm you with conversation on music, travel, and Osaka. We discussed in Japanese and English everything from the tango music of Carlos Gardel, to Slovenian industrial band Laibach’s tour of North Korea, to the music of Fellini movies. On Saturday nights he also performs his own tango and cabaret music. Despite the macabre vibe, this is still a Japanese operation, and KinGuu walked me out to the elevator, a proper traditional way of thanking customers in Japan. The elevator ride gave me time to prepare for my next stop - getting lost in the neon version of Pinocchio’s Pleasure Island, in Osaka’s Dotonbori...