Note on the title: Imai gave this song the working title "Gustave," after a character created by the Japanese artist Higuchi Yuuko, who has a cat's head, eels for arms, and octopus tentacles for legs. Imai and Sakurai were mutually enjoying Higuchi Yuuko's re-imagining of Peter Breugel's Tower of Babel, so Sakurai was aware of the Gustave character, and decided to keep Imai's working title and write a song about a cat. Sakurai stated that he wrote the chorus to this song while petting his own cats, because no matter how hard he tried to come up with other words, "cat" was the only word in his head.

Higuchi Yuuko has stated that she named the Gustave character after Gustave, the fearsome man-eating Nile crocodile, because she has a fascination with large beasts.

In Japanese, the word "hige" means "whiskers" when applied to a cat, and "beard" when applied to a human. I guess that means that when Gustave the cat transforms into a man, he has a beard.

1. In the original lyrics, Sakurai uses the word "heroine" in English. However, in Japanese, the English word "heroine" generally refers to the female protagonist in a love story specifically.
2. Instead of the standard kanji for a cat sticking its tail up, Sakurai uses the kanji for "erection."
3. The New Romantics were a group of London musicians and club kids in the early 80's who adopted a bold, androgynous fashion style and dance-oriented, synthesizer-heavy sound. The New Romantic movement got its name from the frilly shirts popular among its members, which hearkened back to the frilly shirts worn by the Bryonic anti-heroes of the original Romantic movement, in the 18th and 19th centuries. The New Romantic movement was primarily inspired by the androgynous glam rock looks of Marc Bolan and Ziggy Stardust-era David Bowie, though the music was mainly made on synthesizers rather than acoustic instruments. The most prominent bands associated with the New Romantics were The Culture Club, Duran Duran, Spandau Ballet, and Visage–the members of Visage met while working at London's Blitz nightclub where Spandau Ballet was a regular act. Steve Strange, frontman of Visage, worked as the bouncer at the Blitz Club for many years, and became notorious for his ruthless enforcement of the dress code–only the most creatively attired were admitted, and Strange is famous for having turned away a drunken Mick Jagger with the line, "if you were me, would you let you in?" The New Romantic bands also gained significant popularity in Japan and were covered in Japanese music magazines at the time, and may even have influenced Buck-Tick's look to a degree–the red lipstick and colorful clothes sported by Buck-Tick in their early years bear notable resemblance to the New Romantic style, and it's clear that Sakurai still loves frilly shirts. Anyway, if you still doubted that Gustave is a Club Cat, doubt no more.
4. The words for the slavering wolf and the growling stomach of the cat are more childish onomatopoeia than dictionary words, so I have attempted to preserve this feel in my translation. The line about the wolf may be a reference to Duran Duran's hit song "Hungry Like the Wolf."
5. In Japanese, the word "kuu" ("to eat") is used as a slang term for a man's sexual conquests. In this line, Sakurai uses the word "kurau," which is basically the same word, but more literary. The sexual connotation is surely intentional.
6. There are an abundance of superstitions in Japan relating to bake-neko, or "transformed cats," who gain supernatural powers and may transform into humans to play pranks, seek revenge, or wreak havoc. Bake-neko in some cases might even eat people, then take their shape (see Note 6). Magical cats were thought to be able to summon spirits or use rituals to reanimate the dead as servants of their aims. Cats who lived past a certain age were thought to become bake-neko, and possibly grow additional tails, though the cats with additional tails were often referred to as nekomata, and might be more powerful or sinister than the bake-neko. It's worth noting that in the original lyrics, Sakurai claims that Gustave has lived "many tens of thousands of times." However, I left it at ten thousand times in the translation because it fits with the syllable count, and I'm sure after a few thousand lifespans it's easy to lose track of how many, exactly, one has lived.
   
   According to Edo period superstition, cats with long tails were thought to have the power to bewitch people, so long-tailed cats were considered evil or unlucky. Short-tailed cats were selectively bred, giving rise to the Japanese bobtail breed, and many long-tailed cats had their tails cut off. These practices account for the high prevalence of short tails on Japanese street cats today. For the same reason, the maneki-neko (lucky cat) figurines often seen in homes and shops are nearly always bobtail cats. Thus, the significance of Gustave's long erect tail earlier in the song becomes clear. Gustave is a Bad Cat!
7. Japanese has special verb endings which indicate when actions are performed as services or favors to others. In this line, the word "namete-ageru" means "I will lick you (as a service performed for your benefit)." If you doubt the sexual connotation, look at the next few lines.