[CON] Yellow Gold Tour 3011 @ Nippon Budokan, 12/02/2011 18:30
Day 2 of the Tokyo cons found me more or less where I was yesterday, only about twenty seats to the left and so many rows back I opted for binoculars. Row Q just wasn't working for me. I think I got spoiled in the US - now I want detail, damnit! But boy, is it difficult trying to dance without moving the binoculars. I think I'm going to need a hip replacement by the end of the holiday.
Anyway, you'll be pleased to hear things were livelier today, especially where we were at the back. The woman next to me started dancing before the con even started, so I knew she'd be moving around a lot (we crashed into each other occasionally and smiled politely). I forgot, actually, that they make an announcement about the use of penlights and uchiwa, and while I didn't see any uchiwa, when the lights went off there were several red penlights in the crowd. Sorry, Jin, you can't escape them. The entire crowd started clapping every time Yellow Gold played, even when it was just in the videos. I didn't realise the Japanese audience liked it so much!
The show doesn't exactly change from night to night, so I'm only writing about things that I only noticed tonight, or differences. All the songs were played, I just might not mention them if I don't have anything to say, okay?
The down side to looking at things through binoculars was having a better view of Jin's chair thing in the transparent bubble when he first appears on the stage. Those of you familiar with Doctor Who (not the new series - the classic) may remember Davros. If you don't, you can probably Google a picture. Jin's chair? Same kind of thing. I can't quite see him as a fiendish mastermind, though. He hasn't got the face for it.
Looking at the dancers' costumes up close was enlightening in a not particularly desirable way, too. I watched Paul kill the female robots in a suit that appeared to have wings - or rather, one large, lopsided, blinged-out wing. I suspect this is what you'd get if Koki tried to cosplay an angel.
I did have fun watching Jin have a little "mechanical malfunction" after he pushed the guitar away in Christmas Morning, though. Not in the sense that the instruments went, but Jin-as-a-robot goes on the fritz and has a little meltdown.
I'm gaining appreciation for Magnitude, I think. It's hard not to find it cute when Jin lets his voice play on behind him while he takes little sips through his drinking straw as he does a circuit of the arena. How many drinks in this show? He's got something for Magnitude, something for Paparats...you'd think Tipsy Love and Pin Dom, he'd have something in his hand too. And...er...Lovejuice. I'll stop there, shall I? But Magnitude is also about the cute little hand gestures, like the one he makes to signal the fireworks.
During Bass Go Boom, Juice did his best to get us to be louder. Louder doing what, exactly, I don't know. To be honest, I spent most of my time watching Jin's feet and marvelling that he managed not to trip up at all - the jeans actually come right down over his shoes.
The mic battle with Lizzy during INP turned into the MJP (Molest Jin Party) as Paul and Juice both cosied up to him, and then Lizzy grabbed him too. Everyone wants a piece of Mr. Akanishi, clearly.
Jin and Juice (sounds like the start of a shopping list, doesn't it?) kicked off Oowah by trilling...something? Was it "peripheral"? I can never make it out. The floating bubbles blocked my view of Jin for a while, so I watched Lizzy instead. What a gorgeous smile! I'm sorry, Aubree. I'm afraid in your absence Lizzy might be replacing you as my #jincrew crush. Juice's expression when he had a eureka "equals you" moment was hilariously overdone.
I stand corrected about all the blonde girls - one of them was wearing a pink wig, sorry. Kazumi had blonde Bo Peep hair.
Off came the shades for Body Talk, left to dangle from the neck of his T-shirt. The jacket came off as well, but it was only half off when he started singing, had to remove the rest of it after a few lines. I didn't realise all the girls were barefoot while dancing for this song. Jin, on the other hand, had extremely shiny shoes. They didn't really go with the jeans.
I shouldn't have looked at the creepy fluorescent ghosts. They have headtails, like that girl in Return of the Jedi. (Oola, maybe?) At least in their case, the headtails are part of really silly hats.
Care and Murasaki were both on the soft side in parts, but still very pretty.
During the dance/cage bit I saw Paul turning up with Juice in blue costumes to be locked up, so no, that's not him dancing with Jin after Murasaki as he can't be in two places at once. This isn't Prince of Tennis.
My pen ceased to work during A Page, but he had his hood up again so it's not like I could see anything much, anyway.
Coaxed some life back into the cartridge in time for Jin to appear on the round, front stage from under a massive sheet after the coffin destruction. What *is* it with these guys and pretending to defy death on the stage? Next time I vote we chain him up and...wait, Tackey already chained him up. Cancel that plan.
Time for my favourite part of the show. Jin's Davros chair in the bubble has been replaced by a soft, comfy white chair, btw, which is probably the only reason the girls agreed to go in there with him in the first place. No one wants to sit in something that looks like a torture device. Meanwhile, Juice had a great time holding Kazumi's hands and swinging her around in the air.
Paparats was...I won't say "lazy", but more "repressed"? Like Jin was saving the anger for the moments where he really needed it. He held on to his hat a lot, hung it off the mic stand the rest of the time, and during the second chorus he was basically leaning on the mic stand, like he was taking world's most aggressive nap. I need a CD release so I can belt this one out at karaoke. :-)
He woke up for Hey Girl. Josh showed up again, same outfit, trailing Jin around the stage like a puppy. He pointed at Jin on the word "superstar", Jin pointed to him on "I'm not talking to you". Jin deliberately sabotaged his own "la la"s again, and then he and Josh pointed to each other on "whoever said you were a 10". Good to know they hold each other in such high regard.
Since Juice couldn't make us yell last night he decided to make us clap instead. He had more success with that. He introduced Lizzy as his homegirl (Kazumi too) and a very good friend of his, and I don't know if it was Juice or someone else on the stage yelling out "Lizzy-chan!" Then Juice got us to chant "Jin! Jin!" again till Jin returned, Juice says "This guy is amazing." Jin's black jacket is even sparklier with binoculars, by the way. He's definitely still with Johnnys.
Pin Dom - I don't recall the bouncing stage tonight, but Jin did give a cute little leap on the fake hiccups. (Failing the manliness test, here.) I have a problem with Pin Dom, though - to be precise, the line "You're not here to party". Oh, I beg to differ, sweetie. That's *exactly* what I'm here to do. (At the con, not on this Earth, I should add.)
Do the Japanese ship Jin/Lizzy? I'm only asking because there were a lot of screams when the two of them danced up close in Wonder.
Jin coughed a bit during The Fifth Season - I'm hoping that was just the smoke on the stage, though. He spent most of the song facing the far left, so I didn't really get to see much.
Yellow Gold had pretty much everyone in the audience moving in some way, I'm pleased to say. Perhaps he should be releasing that one instead. You know, up close, Paul and Juice's outfits looked like the sparkly gold equivalent of Hawaiian shirts. That just takes the song to a whole new level of tackiness. (I'll leave the tsubasa-ness out of it...)
I haven't had anything to say about My Mp3 since about five concerts ago, sorry...
Hah! Jin screwed up Tipsy Love. There had to be something. He accidentally sang the first line twice - cue amused giggles from the audience - and then continued on as normal, complete with (hopefully fake) coughing, only he changed the tune on the fourth "ye-oh" again so we followed suit.
Josh returned in his pilot outfit. ayuzak and becquinho, your #joshnotes for today: his black tie was actually a sparkly one and it flashed nice shiny colours in the spotlight. Sign the man up for JE!
The thank you section seemed a bit abbreviated. I'm guessing (SK) Juggler is Miss Sullivan? Jin started singing Juice's name, then burst out laughing and hugged him. Sang Lizzy; Lizzy got hug. They sang Paul's name as well, and Paul did his best to hog the spotlight. Sang Keibo, and Josh attempted another failed collarbone grab as part of the manly hug. I swear somebody's putting him up to this. That or he just likes to touch Jin a lot.
And then we sang "J-in, J-in", Tipsy Love still going, and he got us back on the "he-yey he-yey" again until he said "Last one" in English, then thanked us in Japanese.
No comment on Eternal except that he sang with his left hand in his jacket pocket the entire time. Why, I have no idea. Texting on his phone? (Kidding.)
He basically whispered the entire way through the single promo, which makes me wonder about those coughs. Please don't lose your voice, Jin.
A note about the end credits, which I stayed for again. They still credit Joey, Dom and Aubree as being there, even though they weren't, so I wonder if the roll was just done once and isn't updated at all? In which case, I won't bother looking for my name at the end tomorrow. I am actually getting a legal ticket for a change, courtesy of J-ticket International, and I have no clue where they're going to put me. Fingers crossed that it isn't the very back row?
Anyway, you'll be pleased to hear things were livelier today, especially where we were at the back. The woman next to me started dancing before the con even started, so I knew she'd be moving around a lot (we crashed into each other occasionally and smiled politely). I forgot, actually, that they make an announcement about the use of penlights and uchiwa, and while I didn't see any uchiwa, when the lights went off there were several red penlights in the crowd. Sorry, Jin, you can't escape them. The entire crowd started clapping every time Yellow Gold played, even when it was just in the videos. I didn't realise the Japanese audience liked it so much!
The show doesn't exactly change from night to night, so I'm only writing about things that I only noticed tonight, or differences. All the songs were played, I just might not mention them if I don't have anything to say, okay?
The down side to looking at things through binoculars was having a better view of Jin's chair thing in the transparent bubble when he first appears on the stage. Those of you familiar with Doctor Who (not the new series - the classic) may remember Davros. If you don't, you can probably Google a picture. Jin's chair? Same kind of thing. I can't quite see him as a fiendish mastermind, though. He hasn't got the face for it.
Looking at the dancers' costumes up close was enlightening in a not particularly desirable way, too. I watched Paul kill the female robots in a suit that appeared to have wings - or rather, one large, lopsided, blinged-out wing. I suspect this is what you'd get if Koki tried to cosplay an angel.
I did have fun watching Jin have a little "mechanical malfunction" after he pushed the guitar away in Christmas Morning, though. Not in the sense that the instruments went, but Jin-as-a-robot goes on the fritz and has a little meltdown.
I'm gaining appreciation for Magnitude, I think. It's hard not to find it cute when Jin lets his voice play on behind him while he takes little sips through his drinking straw as he does a circuit of the arena. How many drinks in this show? He's got something for Magnitude, something for Paparats...you'd think Tipsy Love and Pin Dom, he'd have something in his hand too. And...er...Lovejuice. I'll stop there, shall I? But Magnitude is also about the cute little hand gestures, like the one he makes to signal the fireworks.
During Bass Go Boom, Juice did his best to get us to be louder. Louder doing what, exactly, I don't know. To be honest, I spent most of my time watching Jin's feet and marvelling that he managed not to trip up at all - the jeans actually come right down over his shoes.
The mic battle with Lizzy during INP turned into the MJP (Molest Jin Party) as Paul and Juice both cosied up to him, and then Lizzy grabbed him too. Everyone wants a piece of Mr. Akanishi, clearly.
Jin and Juice (sounds like the start of a shopping list, doesn't it?) kicked off Oowah by trilling...something? Was it "peripheral"? I can never make it out. The floating bubbles blocked my view of Jin for a while, so I watched Lizzy instead. What a gorgeous smile! I'm sorry, Aubree. I'm afraid in your absence Lizzy might be replacing you as my #jincrew crush. Juice's expression when he had a eureka "equals you" moment was hilariously overdone.
I stand corrected about all the blonde girls - one of them was wearing a pink wig, sorry. Kazumi had blonde Bo Peep hair.
Off came the shades for Body Talk, left to dangle from the neck of his T-shirt. The jacket came off as well, but it was only half off when he started singing, had to remove the rest of it after a few lines. I didn't realise all the girls were barefoot while dancing for this song. Jin, on the other hand, had extremely shiny shoes. They didn't really go with the jeans.
I shouldn't have looked at the creepy fluorescent ghosts. They have headtails, like that girl in Return of the Jedi. (Oola, maybe?) At least in their case, the headtails are part of really silly hats.
Care and Murasaki were both on the soft side in parts, but still very pretty.
During the dance/cage bit I saw Paul turning up with Juice in blue costumes to be locked up, so no, that's not him dancing with Jin after Murasaki as he can't be in two places at once. This isn't Prince of Tennis.
My pen ceased to work during A Page, but he had his hood up again so it's not like I could see anything much, anyway.
Coaxed some life back into the cartridge in time for Jin to appear on the round, front stage from under a massive sheet after the coffin destruction. What *is* it with these guys and pretending to defy death on the stage? Next time I vote we chain him up and...wait, Tackey already chained him up. Cancel that plan.
Time for my favourite part of the show. Jin's Davros chair in the bubble has been replaced by a soft, comfy white chair, btw, which is probably the only reason the girls agreed to go in there with him in the first place. No one wants to sit in something that looks like a torture device. Meanwhile, Juice had a great time holding Kazumi's hands and swinging her around in the air.
Paparats was...I won't say "lazy", but more "repressed"? Like Jin was saving the anger for the moments where he really needed it. He held on to his hat a lot, hung it off the mic stand the rest of the time, and during the second chorus he was basically leaning on the mic stand, like he was taking world's most aggressive nap. I need a CD release so I can belt this one out at karaoke. :-)
He woke up for Hey Girl. Josh showed up again, same outfit, trailing Jin around the stage like a puppy. He pointed at Jin on the word "superstar", Jin pointed to him on "I'm not talking to you". Jin deliberately sabotaged his own "la la"s again, and then he and Josh pointed to each other on "whoever said you were a 10". Good to know they hold each other in such high regard.
Since Juice couldn't make us yell last night he decided to make us clap instead. He had more success with that. He introduced Lizzy as his homegirl (Kazumi too) and a very good friend of his, and I don't know if it was Juice or someone else on the stage yelling out "Lizzy-chan!" Then Juice got us to chant "Jin! Jin!" again till Jin returned, Juice says "This guy is amazing." Jin's black jacket is even sparklier with binoculars, by the way. He's definitely still with Johnnys.
Pin Dom - I don't recall the bouncing stage tonight, but Jin did give a cute little leap on the fake hiccups. (Failing the manliness test, here.) I have a problem with Pin Dom, though - to be precise, the line "You're not here to party". Oh, I beg to differ, sweetie. That's *exactly* what I'm here to do. (At the con, not on this Earth, I should add.)
Do the Japanese ship Jin/Lizzy? I'm only asking because there were a lot of screams when the two of them danced up close in Wonder.
Jin coughed a bit during The Fifth Season - I'm hoping that was just the smoke on the stage, though. He spent most of the song facing the far left, so I didn't really get to see much.
Yellow Gold had pretty much everyone in the audience moving in some way, I'm pleased to say. Perhaps he should be releasing that one instead. You know, up close, Paul and Juice's outfits looked like the sparkly gold equivalent of Hawaiian shirts. That just takes the song to a whole new level of tackiness. (I'll leave the tsubasa-ness out of it...)
I haven't had anything to say about My Mp3 since about five concerts ago, sorry...
Hah! Jin screwed up Tipsy Love. There had to be something. He accidentally sang the first line twice - cue amused giggles from the audience - and then continued on as normal, complete with (hopefully fake) coughing, only he changed the tune on the fourth "ye-oh" again so we followed suit.
Josh returned in his pilot outfit. ayuzak and becquinho, your #joshnotes for today: his black tie was actually a sparkly one and it flashed nice shiny colours in the spotlight. Sign the man up for JE!
The thank you section seemed a bit abbreviated. I'm guessing (SK) Juggler is Miss Sullivan? Jin started singing Juice's name, then burst out laughing and hugged him. Sang Lizzy; Lizzy got hug. They sang Paul's name as well, and Paul did his best to hog the spotlight. Sang Keibo, and Josh attempted another failed collarbone grab as part of the manly hug. I swear somebody's putting him up to this. That or he just likes to touch Jin a lot.
And then we sang "J-in, J-in", Tipsy Love still going, and he got us back on the "he-yey he-yey" again until he said "Last one" in English, then thanked us in Japanese.
No comment on Eternal except that he sang with his left hand in his jacket pocket the entire time. Why, I have no idea. Texting on his phone? (Kidding.)
He basically whispered the entire way through the single promo, which makes me wonder about those coughs. Please don't lose your voice, Jin.
A note about the end credits, which I stayed for again. They still credit Joey, Dom and Aubree as being there, even though they weren't, so I wonder if the roll was just done once and isn't updated at all? In which case, I won't bother looking for my name at the end tomorrow. I am actually getting a legal ticket for a change, courtesy of J-ticket International, and I have no clue where they're going to put me. Fingers crossed that it isn't the very back row?