During an appearance on InterFM's "The Dave Fromm Show", legendary guitarist Slash was asked for his opinion on the Japanese pop-metal group BABYMETAL. "I've heard these guys. I know these guys," he said (hear audio below). "Anyway, [it's] the most exciting thing that I'd seen recently, what I heard. 'Cause they have a look, and they're girls."

Asked if he would ever consider playing a show with BABYMETAL if the opportunity arose, Slash said: "Yeah, sure."

Established in 2010, BABYMETAL is the offshoot of the Japanese pop idol group SAKURA GAKUIN that performs a distinctly Japanese mix of schoolgirl J-pop and heavy metal.

BABYMETAL's members — Suzuka Nakamoto (a.k.a. Su-Metal, who handles vocals and dancing), Yui Mizuno (a.k.a. Yuimetal) and Moa Kikuchi (a.k.a. Moametal), the latter of whom both scream and dance — admit that they had never listened to metal before joining the group. The girls wear gothy schoolgirl costumes, do choreographed dance routines and bang their heads violently.

Many heavy metal fans have been reluctant to embrace BABYMETAL — which also includes producer Kobametal and a backing band of corpse-painted virtuosos — with some Internet forums calling them "the definition of a gimmick", "awful" and "metal for hipsters."