Kaseo and his Pikachu army: 100% real.

Japanzine is running this fascinating story which goes behind the scene of Japanese chiptune. Read it and weep (for some kind of 21st century nerd joy, naturally). Quote:

And then Kaseo appears. Wearing a full-on Don Quixote-bought Pikachu costume. Oh boy! There’s murmured laughing in the crowd as he approaches a table covered by a mysterious red cloth. He then starts flipping switches and strange lights begin flashing ominously under the table. Off comes the cloth, and then what I can only describe in Lovecraftian terms as a twisted abomination, a corruption so horrific as to leave the mind stunned in horror … A dozen yellow Pikachu figurines … strange bolts and dials soldered to their tiny forms … wires connecting them all to a cryptic metal tablet which somehow controls them. “Pika-chu!” one volunteers, its eyes flashing red. And then another speaks, and then another and another, a hellish Pika-pika polyphony … After about five minutes, as the twisted pitch-bent cacophonous shrieks of the zombie Pikachu choir become almost unbearable, Kaseo reaches toward a dial attached to his homemade goggles – and then suddenly a Pika-beat! A good ten minutes of Pika-techno later, and the crowd has gone utterly insane.

Much more here.

1. The very best of Japanese chiptune, pt. 2: YMCK Shibuya-kei reborn through the cassette slot of a Famicom......
2. The very best of Japanese chiptune, pt. 3: USK "Just a Gameboy musician in Fukuoka, Japan."...
3. The very best of Japanese chiptune, pt. 1: XINON Mr. 8-bit Awesomeness!...