Rock On, LỰU ĐẠN

June 17, 2024

Back in the 80s, the rockabillies ran Harajuku. Before the pastel decora girls of the kawaii wave, there were the Yoyogi Park goers with greased hair, head to toe in denim and leather, dancing to the rock music played from nearby American military bases. For his latest collection, titled "Do Or Die," LỰU ĐẠN’s latest campaign features the Yoyogi Rockabilies — the two entities unified by their defiance, courage, and love of leather. It makes sense why LỰU ĐẠN’s Instagram bio is "The Sheisty Asian Dude in all of US."

No models and no influencers, photographer Federico Radaelli followed around the Harajuku Strangers, a Tokyo rockabilly gang that's been active since the 90s. Every Sunday, the Strangers meet to dance in Yoyogi Park — and with their latest AW24 campaign, LỰU ĐẠN creative director Hung La proves that rock and roll has no age. While the culture itself faces declining numbers, the enthusiasm of its participants never wanes. After shooting in Yoyogi park, the leather-clad gunslinging grandparents take over a nearby karaoke bar. Sans firearms, the campaign looks like a normal night for my friends and I — in leather and funky hair, drinking in public, generally causing a ruckus. Rock on.

By Izzy Capulong
Campaign by Federico Radaelli

The "Do Or Die" spirit is certainly present in LỰU ĐẠN's collection — with oversized cheetah print suits, studs, leather, and fringe. While it's certainly not new for brands to dedicate entire collections to aesthetics of eras past, very few of them do so with the same guiding ethos. So many self-proclaimed 'punk' brands of today seem to forget that the punk movement came out of anti-capitalist efforts, labor rights, and sustainability. You can't just slap studs on a mass-produced Shein pleather jacket and call it punk. LỰU ĐẠN knows this, producing and advertising mindfully and with the same ideologies that filled Yoyogi Park back in the 90s.

See the campaign imagery shot by Federico Radaelli below.

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