Every time I make my way to Japan, I always try to maximize my time there by taking in as much car culture as I can. Those of you who have followed this site for a number of years now understand that. I just want to see and experience as much as my body can handle. When I first started going to Japan, my plan was to try and visit as many tuning shops as I knew existed and if there was a meet or something going on, I’d try to get to it. I thought it was a solid plan at first but I felt that I could always do more, so one day, I just decided to throw my own car meet. Why not, right? I had solid connections to car enthusiasts overseas and the site itself had developed a pretty decent following through the years. There seemed like no better way to see car culture than to bring it right to us. I knew I had a good grasp on the Honda crowd over in Japan but Yasu and I decided to enlist the help of Freddie from Autofashion USA to pull the Bippu (VIP) crowd. Freddie is usually in Japan with us and his brand has also gained some notoriety in Japan so doing a joint meet would really help to bring in the cars that we wanted to see. I myself am a Japanese Bippu enthusiast as well so I was excited to see some VIP-styled builds from both Osaka and Tokyo. I think we’ve organized around 4-5 meets now in Japan over the past two years and they’ve all been pretty successful. I never go into these things expecting anything but am always appreciative of the enthusiasts who do make the trek to come hang out…

For the May Osaka Night Meet, I almost expected no one to come out because we literally organized the meet 6 hours before it actually happened. I was on the fence about doing a meet because we were so busy heading into Wekfest Japan that I just wanted to take a break from car stuff. The weather was so nice though that it seemed like a waste not to do a car meet so I put a flyer together in the early afternoon and posted it up on various social media outlets. We went about our day like normal and even did some touristy stuff in the late afternoon. Around 9 PM, we started getting everyone together to head over to the meet. When we arrived, the parking area for the meet was completely filled-up! Cars were any and everywhere you could fit them and we ourselves had a hard time finding a spot to park. The great thing about Osaka is that their car culture is incredibly rich and diverse. There were VIP builds, high-end luxury exotics, and of course, Hondas. You don’t see Civics driving around in Osaka during the day time but if you have a meet or anything car-related going on, you better be ready to see an influx of Civics because they come out in full-force. You’d never think that Osaka had any Civics at all judging by the types of cars you see driving around during the day but I can’t recall the last time I seen so many EGs and EKs together in one place. It’s crazy…

Hopefully you watched the Vlog by now which covers this meet, because you’ll get a better feel for the meet in video than you do in the small photo set I captured. Luckily, I had Tiffanie with me and she shot a ton of photos at the meet. I like her photographic eye because she sees things very differently than I, especially since she’s still very new to this whole car “thing”. It’s interesting to see what catches her eye and I also like the fact that she covers more of the “human” side of things. I used to do that a lot more and I know I’ve done less and less of it over time because I’d rather use video to capture the true “lifestyle” feel of things. Tiffanie helps re-introduce that personal side to my photo coverage and I’m very happy that she cares enough to do so much car shit with me, haha… I think I shot like 20 or so photos and she just beasted through the entire meet shooting continuously…

Anyways, sorry for the lack of updates lately. I have so much content loaded-up to post, I just really need to find the time to post them up. There’s so much going on lately with real life stuff that at times it can be difficult to just sit down and work on the site. There’s more on the way and I’ve even started shooting more photos again. June is a little slower compared to how April and May was so I’m gonna start unleashing a hoard of content in the coming days and weeks. Stick with me and I promise you’ll have plenty to see. Thanks for the support as always…

THE CHRONICLES x AUTOFASHION USA OSAKA NIGHT MEETING

Photos by STICKYDILJOE & TIFFANIE.MARIE

Seeing this Civic above was one of the many highlights of my journey to Japan this year. I’d seen glimpses of this EK before on Instagram as well as some other photos floating around online and was stoked to finally check it out in person. The owner goes by the nickname “Wharp Dumbo” and dubs the EK the “Miracle Civic No.1”. Love the livery and how the wheels were coated to match. The owner and car are also from the legendary Osaka underground “Wharp Racing” car club…

EK9 Civic Type R on SSR Type-C from car club “Pandemic”…

Beautifully-done Toyota Crown Athlete on Work Meister M1… For those that don’t know, VIP-style or “Bippu” culture is huge in Osaka and it is believed that the style originated and was popularized in this region…

Oka’s Z33 with Rocket Bunny kit is by far one of my favorite builds in Japan. Not simply because of the Rocket Bunny aero, which I am not honestly that huge of a fan of but I love this build as a whole because of all the unique and personal details. You can spend quite a bit of time looking the whole car over from the custom interior to the Air Jordan/Nike-inspired wheels…

Another favorite is Mao Nakai’s Nissan Skyline GT. His car defines the new era of the “GT VIP” look and encompasses both the sporty and luxury aspects of many custom builds coming from all over the world today…

One of the cars that I had been hoping to run into this time around in Japan was the new “Red Bull” NO GOOD RACING EG6 Civic, owned by the current NO GOOD RACING boss. This EG used to be the red NO GOOD RACING “Shark” Civic that shared the same livery with a couple of the other NGR Civics. In January, while leaving the Osaka Night Meeting that we hosted, someone actually lost control of their car and crashed into the rear quarter panel of the Civic. I don’t think there are any solid clips of it in the Vlogs from January, but the damage was pretty significant. The car was set to be on display at the Osaka Auto Messe event so the guys from Mizuho Ltd. actually repaired and painted on this brand new livery in just about one week’s time. It’s interesting because it looks so different now but back in the early 2000s and before, it was pretty common for cars to change liveries overnight to avoid the local authorities…

Tomoyuki Sasaki’s Civic Ferio built by Tactical Art is one of the finest examples of a COMPLETE Honda build anywhere in the world…

Waki’s EG from NO GOOD RACING. You may have seen this Civic in action at some point in the Vlogs though you may not have actually “seen” the car, if you catch my drift… *wink*

This EG looked pretty interesting with the mismatched Volk TEs…

NGR EG Civic wearing the notable “Shark” livery in blue…

Check out the custom rear bumper cut-outs and the Osaka JDM “Devil” rear wing. Also interesting to note is how Osaka Honda guys run rear window banners…

25mm-wide Chargespeed front fenders with spaced Volk Racing CE28N wheels in bronze…

Every time I see this EG, I can’t help but think of the old “Red Bull” EF9 Civic which sadly, has since been repainted. It would have been great to have both cars together for a photo…

Always enjoyed the sleek body lines of the S180 Crown Majestas. This one looks especially good pancaked to the floor on BBS LMs…

Yasu Shimomukai’s custom widebody Audi A6 on 19×12 CCW wheels…

This Jaguar XJ-series looked so cool on BBS LMs. From the back window decals, the owner looks to be a member or supporter of TOP GUN, another infamous car club from the Osaka area…

The face of the Pandemic EK9 CTR…

Any and everyone was welcome to come join the festivities that evening at the Osaka Night Meet…

A nifty little Honda Today Kei-car wearing the famous Motul livery…

Another of the Miracle Civic No.1…

Nakai’s V37 reppin’ Phaze2 Japan…

Yuta mentally questioning what the hell Tina was doing…

Tina, for the newbies, is Phaze2 Mikey’s wife. This was her first time in Japan and experiencing the night/car culture in Osaka…

Happy to see that I am well-represented in Japan…

The Red Bull car from Tiffanie’s point-of-view…

Angel from Nemo’s-Garage taking in the Osaka car life…

We welcomed all makes and models to the meet so there was a wide variety of vehicles that showed-up, including Lowriders…

The Yellow Fever is strong in JC from Work Wheels…

Two AP2 S2000s styled very differently…

It wouldn’t be an Osaka car meet without at least one set (or pair) of SSR Type-X wheels…

A rear angle of the blue NGR Shark EG6…

JC Pepino’s AE86 Trueno…

The proximity of jacket zipper-to-S2000 ratio makes me cringe a little bit every time I look at this photo…

Lost in translation or nah?…

Lam-bat-ghini, perhaps?….

EK9 Civic Type R on Barramundi Design forged 3-piece wheels…

Yasu’s A6 was just finished days before the Wekfest Japan 2016 event took place. He had the car painted awhile back but was unhappy with how it came out, so he sent the car all the way to Tokyo to have another reputable body shop re-spray it in the same black…

Ken from Wekfest and friends chatting at the meet…

Many others also stopped to check out the Wharp Racing EK…

Someone was making a video for something or other that night…

Myself and Yuta looking on excitedly as things were going on…

A subtlety-executed Civic Type R is one of the rarer things to see in Osaka…

Autofashion Freddie and David from VIP Modular sharing some laughs…

A photo-op featuring a Toyota Celsior and its owner…

Tomomi Fukujyu was the model for Autofashion USA’s booth at the Wekfest Japan event…

EF9 Civic SiR on SSR Type-C…

A couple more of the Honda Today…

Photographers and videographers worked through the night to capture content for various websites…

JC Pepino’s Trueno on Work CR01 wheels…

The ever-eccentric JC was also found making-out with his own vehicle…

More of the slammed Bippu Jag…

WHARP RACING…

The parking area started to thin-out as the night went on but many of Osaka’s night runners stayed to enjoy the rest of the meet…

R32 Skyline on Volk Racing GT-P wheels…

Yuta Akaishi, serial squatter…

That’s a wrap folks. Wekfest LA 2016 event coverage coming right up! Stay tuned!!…