Ikuyo Kita

“*Gotoh-san is so good If she teaches me I'll be able to do it!*”
―Ikuyo Kita's character information
**Ikuyo Kita** (喜(き)多(た) 郁(いく)代(よ), *Kita Ikuyo*) is one of the main characters in the manga and anime series, *Bocchi the Rock!*. She is in the first year of Shuka High School and is in charge of the guitar and vocals of the band, Kessoku Band. She has great admiration for Ryo Yamada, after seeing her street concert.

## Character information

A bright and popular first year of high school. She is in charge of the guitar and vocals of Kessoku Band. She is a cheerful character who likes to interact with people and can talk to her with a smile without hesitation, even when she meets her for the first time. She looks up to Ryo, and her feelings can go too far. She often takes photos and uploads to Isosta.

## Appearance

Kita has red hair with grown-out bangs and yellow eyes.

In her uniform, she wears a white chocolate sailor uniform with long sleeves, six yellow buttons at the side and red ribbon ties, a short gray pleated skirt, white socks, and maroon shoes.

## Personality

Kita is a "cheerful character" (陽キャラ, *you-kyara*) and "party people" (パリピ, *paripi*), who is sociable and has many friends, as if she calls herself "I love to interact with people", and actively uses social networking service. She has good motor skills and can study safely, but she also thinks she is a mediocre person with no special excellence compared to Ryo. She hates her first name and would strongly prefers to be called by her last name. Her name actually sounds the same as "Came" (きた, *Kita*) and "Let's go"/"I'm going"/"I'm coming" (行くよ, *Ikuyo*).

While living a daily life that felt fun but mediocre, when she saw Ryo at a concert performance on the street of the band she used to belong to, she admired her, saying, "I'm jealous of walking on an unusual road." Although she applied as a guitarist to add to the initial members of Kessoku Band, she escaped from the band just before her first concert because she couldn't play the guitar. She later reconciled herself by reuniting with Ryo and revealing her truth. When Hitori persuaded her, she joined Kessoku Band again.

Although she has little experience in playing and is technically immature, as a result of practicing under the guidance of Hitori at the school festival concert, she showed that she had grown up to connect time with ad-lib for Hitori who had a problem with the equipment.

Initially, she addressed Hitori as "Gotoh-san", but at the school festival concert, she started using "Hitori-chan" instead.

While Kita is very optimistic and can come across as a bit of a scatterbrain, she's actually far from thoughtless, very well-aware of others and is especially emotionally intelligent. Being genuinely kind and selfless, she tries to support others in the best way she can, especially Bocchi, helping her (along with Nijika) overcoming her massive social anxiety.

## Plot

### History

Kita has been having a lot of friends due to her friendliness since she was young. She also admired Ryo after seeing her in a street live, and decided to join the new band Ryo formed with Nijika just to get close to her. However not being able to admit her lack of knowledge of playing guitar, she abruptly quit Kessoku Band.

### Volume 1

Kita got "scouted" by Bocchi, due to Bocchi hearing things about she was on another band and quit. However, Bocchi's anxiety made it reversed when she ended up chasing Bocchi instead before found her in the space below the stairs, playing guitar of her frostiness. Bocchi later invited Kita to her band, in which due to her record of running away, she refused, but asked Bocchi to teach her guitar instead. Bocchi wanted to refuse due to her commitments with STARRY, but Kita wanted to follow her otherwise.

However that's where things got revealed to Kita later on when knowing Bocchi is working in Shimokitazawa and become afraid when the way Bocchi is going is similar to where the old band was and refused to go further - and Nijika catching them up made it worst for her when she get caught running away from her. Kita later admitted about how she was in the wrong, lying and leaving without telling anything.

Kita later joins the crew in STARRY working to serve drinks there and wore the maid dress which somehow kept by Seika all this time. Originally Nijika asked Bocchi to show her the ropes, but Kita ended up helping Bocchi instead. During work, she also explained the real reason she joined Kessoku Band because of her admiration towards Ryo. Kita ended up rejoining Kessoku Band after the work. Not long after, the rest of the band discovered that the reason why Kita couldn't play guitar in the first place was because the "guitar" she bought and tried to practice with was actually a six-string bass, much to her dismay. Fortunately for her, Ryo bought up the bass (making her penniless once again), and let Kita borrow her guitar indefinitely.

Kita and Bocchi has a regular guitar training later on, and revealed about her having an Isosta account and being active at it during the photoshoot. When Seika challenged the band for an audition, they passed decently, Kita came together with Nijika to Bocchi's house to visit her and talk about the band's design on their t-shirts, as well as they get to know Futari and Jimihen and play with her. They got cursed by Bocchi later on, trying to change her appearance.

Kita was hampered her friends can't come to the band live due to the rainstorm, and her dull MC session doesn't help much with the crowd. However Bocchi stepped up motivating the whole band, which made their live ending well. In the izakaya where they had their celebratory dinner, Kita broke when her last name got mentioned by Ryo due to how punny it is.

## Relationship

### Hitori Gotoh

Hitori Gotoh/Bocchi is a schoolmate of hers, and later in their second year, a classmate.

They first met accidentally when Bocchi was scouting for another member of Kessoku Band. Despite her already running away from the band, Bocchi managed to bring her back to the band (per some surprising turns of events) and eventually picked up guitar lessons with her. From there, she build her trust in Bocchi and the rest of the band, and eventually became close to each other, to the point of first-name calling with her. She also would not hesitate to share her problems with Bocchi and other band members where she could confess everything and seek help.

Kita is considered the closest person to Bocchi, given that their being schoolmates and later classmates means she is able to interact and watch on her more than the other bandmates. She is aware of Bocchi's social problems and tried hard to cover and help Bocchi go through her school days with that. Although sometimes she is the reason why situations Bocchi had become worse, Bocchi has no hard feelings toward her. In fact, despite her shortcomings, Kita helped Bocchi to be better known in their school with them participating in the cultural festival and helped her become closer to her other schoolmates as well, and the reason why Bocchi managed to get close with Tsuguko Sasaki, Kita's classmate since her middle school.

### Nijika Ijichi

Her friendship with Nijika is such of a bandmate, where she first met Nijika when she joins Kessoku Band. Despite Kita being the one putting the band in a pinch due to her suddenly quit from the band, Nijika has no hard feelings toward her and understands her situation well, and has no issue having her back in the band.

Kita and Nijika remain friends in the band since then, with Nijika assisting Kita when necessary and opening her ears to all complaints and confessions from her.

### Ryo Yamada

Kita first knew Ryo when Ryo was still in her old band. Her cool and androgynous aura is what make Kita admire her so much back then, and Kita even went as far as joining Kessoku Band when she heard the news that Ryo joins the band and it still has open positions.

During their first meetings, Kita tend to be head over heels for her, but over time when she managed to get to know her closer to the point that she knows some of Ryo's bad traits as well, her fanaticism towards Ryo subsided. She and Ryo now remain friends in the band and Kita still has her high admiration towards her, but now in a proper manner as a bandmate.

Ryo always assisted Kita when necessary and helped by giving her advice at times, and do not really mind her fanaticism and even her running away from the band.

## Etymology

* The name **Ikuyo** means "fragrant, cultured" (郁, *iku*) and "world, age" (代, *yo*).
* Ikuyo's surname **Kita** means "joy" (喜, *ki*) and "many" (多, *ta*).

## Trivia

* Her surname is derived from Kensuke Kita.
	+ Her birthday, April 21 (4/21) is a reverse reading of his birthday, January 24 (1/24).
* Despite deriving her name to Kensuke Kita, Kita's role in a band was more related to Masafumi Gotoh, the rhythm guitarist and lead vocalist of ASIAN KUNG-FU GENERATION.
* Her guitar is a 1959 Gibson Les Paul Junior DC in Pelham Blue finish.
	+ Along with the guitar she uses a Pro Co RAT distortion pedal and a BD-2 overdrive.
* She did not appear as one of the main characters until chapter 5. In the anime, she appears instantly in "Lonely Rolling Bocchi".
* Her Isosta account is @kita0421 in "Jumping Girl(s)".
* Her first name is revealed in chapter 13 for the manga and episode 8 for the anime.
* Her infamous "omnidirectional 3rd finger" from the third ending animation in the anime series became popular on fandom.
	+ According to the ending animator Haruka Suzuki, Kita was actually raising her index finger, as supposed to the alleged 3rd finger.
* On the last page of chapter 66, she carries the athlete's foot with her (taken out by Bocchi when she wants to escape due to her athlete's foot). As a result, many fans criticized about she has athlete's foot.

## References

1. ↑  *Bocchi the Rock!* manga - Volume 1, chapter 5, page 50
2. ↑  *Bocchi the Rock!* manga - Volume 1, chapter 13, page 115
3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 *"Bocchi the Rock!" TV Animation Official Guidebook -COMPLEX-*
4. ↑ *Bocchi the Rock!* anime - Episode 4: "Jumping Girl(s)"
5. ↑ Volume 1 purchase bonus 4p from the official setting document collection (booklet).
6. ↑ Translated from the official website.
7. ↑ *Bocchi the Rock!* manga - Volume 1, chapter 13, page 115
8. ↑ スズキハルカ on Twitter: "本当は人差し指です笑　すみません…！！！😌\*"
9. ↑ https://twitter.com/hamazi\_\_/status/1659158595802652672
10. ↑ https://twitter.com/osiriitai69/status/1659475138612719616