So after hanging out in Tokyo with MikeyG, I rushed back to Okazaki for work and to meet up with Guillaume!!
He arrived on August 2, and for my day early birthday present, he agreed to join me to a visual kei festival, even though he was super jet-lagged, and it was ABSOLUTELY AMAZING!!!! I originally wanted to go because I felt like I NEEDED to see Ayabie before leaving Japan, but really almost all of the bands were amazing!
Or Guild in romaji, these guys were absolutely AMAZING! They did fun Nana chan poses, and it was super adorable - something they could only get away with doing in Nagoya. (It was actually at during the song in the video that they did the nana chan poses, but given that this video was taken in shibuya, they're not there). (watch until at least the second minute for music!!)
For those of you who don't know who Nana-chan is, you can see her in the above picture. She's basically a huge doll thing that hangs out right in front of the Meitetsu Station in Nagoya, and she's regularly dressed up in lots of different outfits - in the featured picture, she's dressed up as Naruto.
Anyway, Guild was definitely my favorite band of the night that I didn't previously know.
The lights were super flashy and all over the place, so every time I tried to look at the stage to watch them, I started getting a headache. Thus, they were super hard to watch.
They're on the heavier side of visual kei compared to what I normally like, but they were still pretty good. Much better than I was expecting.
They vocalist apparently had a throat cold and thus wasn't there. Which was. . .weird. In the beginning they were all just jumping around and having fun, and it looked like they weren't even trying to play their instruments. And then they had the singer's voice coming over a recording. It was just, as I said, weird.
Despite the weirdness, the music was totally awesome, and the bassist was maybe the cutest thing I've ever seen (but unfortunately, he seemed to know it). I've been listening to more of them since, and I'm totally into it!
I'd be interested to see them live again when they actually have a singer.
Another band on the heavier side of visual kei, they were MUCH better than what I was expecting. I'd even told Guillaume that when they came on, we could take a break, but in the end, that didn't happen. They were super fun - a little bit hard, but I totally got into it. I often judge bands by just one song, and this is totally a case of "I shouldn't have done that."
Of course, this was the best concert of all time (I remind people to beware of my tendency to exaggerate). I absolutely LOVE OVER ADORE them, but the show was even better than I ever could have possibly imagined. They played most of my favorite songs, and Yumehito, the singer, with the best voice of all time, was super cute with his explanations of songs and dances (and really expensive fans).
The only sad thing was that they just didn't play long enough (well that and that their t-shirt was really ugly, so I didn't want to buy it). And even though they're on tour now, I won't get to see them again before I leave Japan, because the day they play in Nagoya I will be in Tokyo seeing An Cafe.
Fingers crossed for a North American tour!
Stylized Gotcha6a.
YAY!!!! On the ticket, it said there would be a secret band playing, and I don't know why, but I kind of thought it would be Gotcharocka, and they were!!!! HAPPINESS!!!! They were playing as ハイパー (Hyper), but it was still totally them doing their songs, and it was wonderful!
Their songs were just as amazing live, and I'm so happy all those dudes decided to get together to form a group! Pure awesomeness.
I don't LOVE Kra (which I learned this night is actually pronounced kera), but I do like them quite a lot. And that is EXACTLY how I felt about their live as well. I didn't love love LOVE it, but I did like it quite a lot.
The singer has this amazing voice that seems like it can do pretty much anything, go pretty much anywhere. And a lot of their music is really pretty.
Maybe I would have been able to enjoy them more if Ayabie and Gotcharocka hadn't played just right before them
Anyhow, it was an AMAZING concert (during which Guillaume might have fallen asleep), and I'm SO happy that I got to go!!!! It's so sad for me to think that soon it's no longer going to be so easy for me to just hope over to Nagoya to see visual kei bands whenever I want.
YAY VISUAL KEI!!!! YAY PUNK!!!! (And as I write that, I am listening to kanjani8. Awesome)
And that's all for now, folks. 以上です。
3 things said:
Nana-chan! Holy natsukashiii~ I lived in Nagoya in 2005. I distinctly remember that even when wearing dresses Nana-chan never wears underwear ;)
So remind me again....are they boys or girls? Just kidding! I wanna be a popstar....
Just stopped by to see what you've been up to and it looks like you've been having a blast. I feel a lot more educated now about Japanese music (which I pretty much know nothing about). Do you understand the words?
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