(no subject)
fan report time... and I am freshly reminded of why Yunho is my favorite :]
so, yesterday afternoon! I wake up from a prolonged afternoon nap, having no intentions of doing anything at all with my day except trying to write (ha -_-) and realize that I got a text while I was sleeping. it's hyperballad, reminding me that the MJ tribute concert is tonight and that g_aria and kuro_jashin are going. I wake the fuck up like whoa, wait, what, Yunho, are there still tickets?? nobody knows, so I tell hoyah to roll out of bed and meet us at Samgakji station, to try.
we get there, maybe... 4:30? 4:45? walk past some of the super-long lines that have already formed up as people wait to go inside... some guy tries to hawk us special cheap tickets by pulling us aside and we're like LOL sry no as he ambles toward the parking lot, then shows us some weird ticket that's had part of it pasted over when we refuse to go further. ignoring him, we bypass and head for the official merch booths and ticket booths, which are all jammed in together in a narrow corridor. since my Korean fails, I pick the first one that appears to have some kind of ticket printing machine on it, and go up to the girl like "I CAN HAS TICKETS?? :DDDDD" she stares at our motley crew, stares at her computer, and then finally establishes that we can has STANDING tickets, ok. they're kind of expensive, but what the hell, it's my first chance to see Yunho at closer than a full park-length away and skewed off to one side, and I'm still kicking myself over not getting into the Mirotic concert. Mai bought sitting section tickets, because she didn't want to get trampled by a crowd taller than her and wind up seeing nothing, we bought some beautiful postcard sets that came with posters, and then went to stand in our respective lines.
the whole concert was held outside, in the big square in front of the War Memorial... it was quite cold waiting in line, but we got there so late we didn't have to wait that long, tbh. around 6:00 I think they started letting us in... g_aria, her mom, and myself ended up in the central standing section, like squarely in the middle of it, and kuro_jashin and her friend had tickets from online for the righthand standing section (I felt so bad for you guys--never buy online tickets if you have the option of buying at the venue, honestly u_u). there were some super-nice Taiwanese fans near me who struck up a conversation (the Chinese/Hong Kong/Taiwan fans always seem so eager to show their English if they spot an obvious foreigner at any of these events) and we exchanged emails and such and chatted about everything from Super Junior to Big Bang to my obvious bias for Tall Men, lol. we agreed on all points except Nichkhun, who I still think needs a bag over his head. it was nice to be the one who gets approached, for once! there were also a ton of Japanese ladies who'd flown over to see it... I heard so much Japanese while standing in line and at sales booths and stuff.
anyway, the concert started some 40 minutes later than it was ~supposed~ to... there were a few false alarms and screams that went up around the perimeter. being tall, I could see some guys in black circling around the edge right in time with the squeals, and then people were yelling "Changmin!" and it spread through the crowd that Changmin came to watch (I love MinHo :3) and he apparently brought Minho from SHINee and Jungmo from TRAX... I'm so sad that Heechul probably can't make it back from Vietnam in time to go see, because I'm sure he would if he could :(
Yunho was the opening song, with Beat It, in a white jacket with armbands (some of the fancams have been popping up mislabeled and such). I think from the moment he came on, I couldn't look at anyone else. I had my camera and planned to get some good fancams, but standing areas are never great for that and security was not only really aggressive but kept chilling right next to me, smacking people when they wouldn't put their cameras away. Yunho was just... gorgeous. most of the fancams I've seen don't do him credit, because people kept zooming all the way in on his face/chest... but by doing that, they were missing all his footwork, and it was so smooth and just beautiful.
ngl, I spent a good portion of the first song just staring at his penis. everything everyone has ever said about it is absolutely true. it's a barely restrained beast, ok! he needs to bolt that puppy down or something, I probably missed half the song on account of staring like a pervert.
after Beat It, the 'main' singer guy came out, Yunho vanished, and he did a few songs... he was good, but honestly, I wasn't there to hear him sing, I was there to see Yunho dance, and the Michael Jackson songs I know and like are primarily the fast-paced dance numbers. I felt a little bad because he was trying real hard to work the crowd... in English... and I think a lot of them just didn't understand well enough to follow the flow of it. the main female vocalist did a better job of working the crowd and getting their energy up, overall.
Yunho's next song was Smooth Criminal, performed in the red and black outfits with the hat... again, he was real smooth. even Mai said he's improved in his dancing... it's the difference between being "the dancer" in the group of five singer/dancers and practicing 10 hours a day with an entire group of highly skilled professional dancers, and it showed. he was gorgeous. he had a small accident where he knocked his hat off by bumping it with his shoulder, but he bent down, whipped it back on real smoothly, and continued on so well that if you watch the fancams it looks almost intentional, lol. there was a lot of flirting/humping of everyone, male and female, on stage. I support it.
the singers did some more songs... the slow song that stood out to me the most was Stranger in Moscow, because the punk rocker guitarist girl actually sang the whole song instead of either vocalist, and she had quite a beautiful voice. the crowd loved her *_*
Yunho came out next for They Don't Really Care About Us and Jam (idk about the order, I forget which one came first) in a white jacket with giant sparkly metal bits all over the front, and sparkling silver gloves for part of it. the stage lights were blinding for part of this, set up right behind him and aimed squarely for the middle of the central standing, so I just had a burned retina in the shape of Yunho for a minute in the middle of it all. this set is where I managed to sneak a little bit of crappy fancams...
you can tell I took these, because my eye-level is a head above the crowd, lol. they suck in comparison to my FTI fancams, sry, the crowd was jostling around a lot and I had a hard time keeping my feet.
he was having so much fun with air-guitar and playing with the guitarists, it really was fun to watch :3 throughout the whole show, he would try to keep his game-face on, all serious and intense, but every so often, he'd just burst out with this giant, happy grin, and I absolutely melted. I could hug that boy forever.
the concert wound down with some special tribute songs and whatsit, including This Is It itself... then they darkened the stage for a bit, and I think the audience wasn't sure if that was the end or not, because no one was yelling for an encore, but no one was going anywhere, either. finally they came back up with Thriller, which I'm pretty sure was their 'encore' piece. the other dancers were in white 'zombified' wedding gear, they blew mist all over the stage, and Yunho popped up at the back in his track pants and leather jacket, lol. penis everywhere!
again, he was amazing... he had the dance down so smoothly, I wish there were better fancams that showed all his footwork :( I was getting knocked around quite a bit every time the crowd surged, and honestly, I wanted to watch Yunho, not watch my camera screen or try to fumble for batteries (it was almost out). everyone asks about his singing... I could hear his voice for parts of it, especially during Thriller, but the other vocalist also backed him up. I'm not sure if he was lipsynching to his own voice on a background track, or actually singing into a hands-free mic... I could believe he was singing for it, with the assistance of the other guy, but I wouldn't swear to it. hands-free mics are becoming slowly more popular in Korea, and this was a show run by Westerners, so they might have had real equipment with them instead of the fakey prop mics Korean TV used to use all the time. either way, Yunho sounded good... about the most Engrish I heard him actually SAY was "put your hands up!" though, haha.
super glad I went... makes me feel better about missing Mirotic due to being sicker than a dog, I thought I'd lost my chance to see him, once and for all. also super happy that Changmin and the others showed up! yay for SMTOWN support :]
so, yesterday afternoon! I wake up from a prolonged afternoon nap, having no intentions of doing anything at all with my day except trying to write (ha -_-) and realize that I got a text while I was sleeping. it's hyperballad, reminding me that the MJ tribute concert is tonight and that g_aria and kuro_jashin are going. I wake the fuck up like whoa, wait, what, Yunho, are there still tickets?? nobody knows, so I tell hoyah to roll out of bed and meet us at Samgakji station, to try.
we get there, maybe... 4:30? 4:45? walk past some of the super-long lines that have already formed up as people wait to go inside... some guy tries to hawk us special cheap tickets by pulling us aside and we're like LOL sry no as he ambles toward the parking lot, then shows us some weird ticket that's had part of it pasted over when we refuse to go further. ignoring him, we bypass and head for the official merch booths and ticket booths, which are all jammed in together in a narrow corridor. since my Korean fails, I pick the first one that appears to have some kind of ticket printing machine on it, and go up to the girl like "I CAN HAS TICKETS?? :DDDDD" she stares at our motley crew, stares at her computer, and then finally establishes that we can has STANDING tickets, ok. they're kind of expensive, but what the hell, it's my first chance to see Yunho at closer than a full park-length away and skewed off to one side, and I'm still kicking myself over not getting into the Mirotic concert. Mai bought sitting section tickets, because she didn't want to get trampled by a crowd taller than her and wind up seeing nothing, we bought some beautiful postcard sets that came with posters, and then went to stand in our respective lines.
the whole concert was held outside, in the big square in front of the War Memorial... it was quite cold waiting in line, but we got there so late we didn't have to wait that long, tbh. around 6:00 I think they started letting us in... g_aria, her mom, and myself ended up in the central standing section, like squarely in the middle of it, and kuro_jashin and her friend had tickets from online for the righthand standing section (I felt so bad for you guys--never buy online tickets if you have the option of buying at the venue, honestly u_u). there were some super-nice Taiwanese fans near me who struck up a conversation (the Chinese/Hong Kong/Taiwan fans always seem so eager to show their English if they spot an obvious foreigner at any of these events) and we exchanged emails and such and chatted about everything from Super Junior to Big Bang to my obvious bias for Tall Men, lol. we agreed on all points except Nichkhun, who I still think needs a bag over his head. it was nice to be the one who gets approached, for once! there were also a ton of Japanese ladies who'd flown over to see it... I heard so much Japanese while standing in line and at sales booths and stuff.
anyway, the concert started some 40 minutes later than it was ~supposed~ to... there were a few false alarms and screams that went up around the perimeter. being tall, I could see some guys in black circling around the edge right in time with the squeals, and then people were yelling "Changmin!" and it spread through the crowd that Changmin came to watch (I love MinHo :3) and he apparently brought Minho from SHINee and Jungmo from TRAX... I'm so sad that Heechul probably can't make it back from Vietnam in time to go see, because I'm sure he would if he could :(
Yunho was the opening song, with Beat It, in a white jacket with armbands (some of the fancams have been popping up mislabeled and such). I think from the moment he came on, I couldn't look at anyone else. I had my camera and planned to get some good fancams, but standing areas are never great for that and security was not only really aggressive but kept chilling right next to me, smacking people when they wouldn't put their cameras away. Yunho was just... gorgeous. most of the fancams I've seen don't do him credit, because people kept zooming all the way in on his face/chest... but by doing that, they were missing all his footwork, and it was so smooth and just beautiful.
ngl, I spent a good portion of the first song just staring at his penis. everything everyone has ever said about it is absolutely true. it's a barely restrained beast, ok! he needs to bolt that puppy down or something, I probably missed half the song on account of staring like a pervert.
after Beat It, the 'main' singer guy came out, Yunho vanished, and he did a few songs... he was good, but honestly, I wasn't there to hear him sing, I was there to see Yunho dance, and the Michael Jackson songs I know and like are primarily the fast-paced dance numbers. I felt a little bad because he was trying real hard to work the crowd... in English... and I think a lot of them just didn't understand well enough to follow the flow of it. the main female vocalist did a better job of working the crowd and getting their energy up, overall.
Yunho's next song was Smooth Criminal, performed in the red and black outfits with the hat... again, he was real smooth. even Mai said he's improved in his dancing... it's the difference between being "the dancer" in the group of five singer/dancers and practicing 10 hours a day with an entire group of highly skilled professional dancers, and it showed. he was gorgeous. he had a small accident where he knocked his hat off by bumping it with his shoulder, but he bent down, whipped it back on real smoothly, and continued on so well that if you watch the fancams it looks almost intentional, lol. there was a lot of flirting/humping of everyone, male and female, on stage. I support it.
the singers did some more songs... the slow song that stood out to me the most was Stranger in Moscow, because the punk rocker guitarist girl actually sang the whole song instead of either vocalist, and she had quite a beautiful voice. the crowd loved her *_*
Yunho came out next for They Don't Really Care About Us and Jam (idk about the order, I forget which one came first) in a white jacket with giant sparkly metal bits all over the front, and sparkling silver gloves for part of it. the stage lights were blinding for part of this, set up right behind him and aimed squarely for the middle of the central standing, so I just had a burned retina in the shape of Yunho for a minute in the middle of it all. this set is where I managed to sneak a little bit of crappy fancams...
Click to viewyou can tell I took these, because my eye-level is a head above the crowd, lol. they suck in comparison to my FTI fancams, sry, the crowd was jostling around a lot and I had a hard time keeping my feet.
he was having so much fun with air-guitar and playing with the guitarists, it really was fun to watch :3 throughout the whole show, he would try to keep his game-face on, all serious and intense, but every so often, he'd just burst out with this giant, happy grin, and I absolutely melted. I could hug that boy forever.
the concert wound down with some special tribute songs and whatsit, including This Is It itself... then they darkened the stage for a bit, and I think the audience wasn't sure if that was the end or not, because no one was yelling for an encore, but no one was going anywhere, either. finally they came back up with Thriller, which I'm pretty sure was their 'encore' piece. the other dancers were in white 'zombified' wedding gear, they blew mist all over the stage, and Yunho popped up at the back in his track pants and leather jacket, lol. penis everywhere!
again, he was amazing... he had the dance down so smoothly, I wish there were better fancams that showed all his footwork :( I was getting knocked around quite a bit every time the crowd surged, and honestly, I wanted to watch Yunho, not watch my camera screen or try to fumble for batteries (it was almost out). everyone asks about his singing... I could hear his voice for parts of it, especially during Thriller, but the other vocalist also backed him up. I'm not sure if he was lipsynching to his own voice on a background track, or actually singing into a hands-free mic... I could believe he was singing for it, with the assistance of the other guy, but I wouldn't swear to it. hands-free mics are becoming slowly more popular in Korea, and this was a show run by Westerners, so they might have had real equipment with them instead of the fakey prop mics Korean TV used to use all the time. either way, Yunho sounded good... about the most Engrish I heard him actually SAY was "put your hands up!" though, haha.
super glad I went... makes me feel better about missing Mirotic due to being sicker than a dog, I thought I'd lost my chance to see him, once and for all. also super happy that Changmin and the others showed up! yay for SMTOWN support :]