Sing along in costume

The influence of Comic Con and one of Marvel comics’ latest venture, Suicide Squad have probably been the biggest hype in the Cosplay fraternity, but Bengaluru doesn’t stop at just that. The latest rave in the city is youngsters fusing cosplay with music, thus giving birth to Cosplay Karaoke nights!

“Honestly, we’ve wanted to start it for a while, but then Nikhil (owner of the venue where they usually hold the event) was pretty much the nicest person ever and offered me the chance to curate one night a month, especially for cosplayers,” shares Kelly Gabrielle, the brainchild behind the new trend. When she's not dressing up as her favourite comic and anime characters, Kelly can be found training tiny-tots at an elementary school as well. “It was about time we promoted the love this city has for dressing up as characters from their favourite franchises! And since everybody loves karaoke, we decided to experiment merging the two. Thankfully it has been going well,” she added.

Started by Kelly and her partner and co-host Nabil Khan, their major focus was a venture “For cosplayers, by cosplayers. We theme different months out. June was our cosplay workshop, where we taught people how to build Magneto's mask and it was a really good turnout. July is our Disney theme, we're screening a movie before moving on to the karaoke portion,” explains Nabil, who is a passionate Cosplayer with a ComicCon championship title to himself, and creates cosplays for a profession too.

The songs they sing along to at their Karaoke nights are exclusively curated, with inspiration drawn from the popular anime and manga comics. Aditi Sreevathsa, one of the curators talks about the diversity and uniqueness that comes with the initiative. “It's putting together two unique things that you know go together. It's bringing a part of Japanese culture to followers we can reach out to locally. It's about meeting new personalities and discovering a sub-culture.”

So far, there has been only one instalment, and arch patrons of the city-based Cosplay community have already shown their enthusiasm about it. Avid cosplayer Raza Khan opines, “There is a lack of cosplay events compared to how much passion there is for it. There is no need for a competition, just a fun event to show off what you've been working on!” When asked about the reason behind this increasing craze for blending cosplay with music, he adds, “Personally, I have a lot more self-confidence when I'm in costume and I'm sure other cosplayers will agree they feel the same. Even if all I'm wearing is some superhero helmet I'm not that shy socially awkward kid anymore. I can take the mic and own any Taylor swift song I want.”