♪————!
♪——! ♪——!
Phew...
That should be good for now.
Yeah, shall we call it a day for practice?
Sounds good.
Oh, I have to get to work. Later.
Great work, everyone!
See you tomorrow!
Alright, I think I'll take a break.
How about you, Kohane, Toya?
I'd like that.
Sure, a cup of coffee does sound nice...
Hm? You guys...?!
Mita? It's been a while...
Yeah! I just ran into Akito a second ago too. I didn't realize you were all here.
Yes, we were borrowing the stage as part of our practice.
You serious? You get to use this place as your own practice studio...? No, that's not why I'm here...!
Akito looked a lot better now than he did before. Like he's back to his usual self, you know?
Yes, and we're sorry for making you so concerned about him. Everything is alright now.
That's good.
But it's been so long since I last saw Akito with that look on his face.
I understand. Not since when we just formed BAD DOGS or maybe even when he was doing solo performances...
Wait... I knew about Toya and Akito going way back, but you too, Kotaro?
I'm in the same boat as these two. After I saw RAD WEEKEND, I felt like diving right into this world.
I see...
So what was Akito like back then?
It sounded like he was way more of a bad boy based on what you've been telling us.
I wouldn't go that far, and he didn't have that look when he first invited me to join him either.
Man, you guys aren't showing any mercy at all...
But I guess he really hasn't changed that much since then.
The biggest difference might be how he used to go after guys that made fun of him.
Oh, right. A lot more people started becoming performers after RAD WEEKEND happened...
Exactly. Everyone looked up to Ken and his team back then!
Hehe. It really wasn't that long ago, but it feels so nostalgic.
All those voices, all those songs, all those performances... They were all part of what made it such a legendary night!
But some guys also fought over where to play or what to sing. Then a bunch of new live houses started popping after that.
Is that why there are so many live houses on Vivid Street...?
Yeah. But you know what they say, The nail that sticks up gets hammered down.
Older musicians would tease or bully younger musicians, and some just stopped showing up altogether.
Right. That does happen...
You too, An...?
Yeah, I've had to deal with it a few times. They'd crash an event I was in and try to test how good I was.
If you do well, they'll help get the crowd going for you and even give some advice on how to get better.
That's pretty cool of them to do that.
Most of them are good guys that are just as into music as we are.
But there's always a few bad apples.
Akito tended to attract the latter type to him...
Wait, why...?
Because he told everyone that he'd put on an event that surpasses RAD WEEKEND on his own.
Mita's right. Most of the older musicians are indeed good people but...
There's always some that feel the need to bring you down to their level.
But because of his personality, he'd usually end up biting back.
True.
Who do they think they are?
Making fun of someone's dreams like that.
Why are you even here if you don't have any hopes or dreams?
A lot of things made Akito mad back then.
To be fair, it's not that he wanted to be angry...
Everybody has dreams that they're aspiring towards, so it's perfectly normal to be furious with someone that tries to take that away from you.
At the same time, he'd get mad at people who said they'd surpass RAD WEEKEND even though they weren't serious about it.
I see...
I really does mean that much to him.
True.
His dedication is why I chose to join him...
Just ignore the haters and let them say what they want.
We'll silence them all someday...
Right. And we can do that by starting a team together.
Then it's settled!
Starting now, we're the BAD DOGS!
BAD DOGS...?
Yeah, like a pair of dogs that no one can train or teach anything.
The way everyone else probably sees it, what we're trying to do is completely nuts.
We'll show them. They'll know what it feels like when the dogs bite back.
Wait, is this why you were asking me so many questions about English?
Yeah, but it also has a different meaning too.
A different meaning?
Yeah. BAD DOGS is apparently a slangy way of saying that we're serious business.
How's that sound?
(I didn't really think about it because I didn't really understand back then but...)
(I have to think he chose dogs for our name for another reason...)
Aoyagi, is something wrong...?
No, I was just thinking about how much we'd been through even though it's only been two years.
I'm sure a lot more will happen in the future as well.
Yeah, but we'll be fine.
I think so too! As long as we're together, we should be able to overcome anything!
I agree. I'll be counting on you two when that happens.
And I'm not giving up either!
We wouldn't expect anything less.
(We have to keep moving forward if we're actually going to surpass RAD WEEKEND...)