Having dominated Europe, German rockers Tokio Hotel are threatening to go mainstream in the US, if the reception their riff-heavy pop metal earned among screaming preteens in San Francisco this week is any indication. "The best way to describe the glam-metal-emo-pop-tween group," Aidin Vaziri writes in the Chronicle, "is like the Jonas Brothers for girls who prefer chipped black nail polish and fishnet stockings to unicorn puffy stickers and purity rings."
The mostly female crowd rushed the stage as frontman Bill Kaulitz—“an androgynous singer with extra large hair and extra small jeans”—belted fan favorites like Monsoon and Scream. Come Sept. 7, the band's angst-ridden Ready, Set, Go! will compete with pop darlings Miley Cyrus, Britney Spears, and the Jonas Brothers for an MTV Video Music Award. (More Tokio Hotel stories.)