Seoul 5 - Nemesis and Royz
NEMESIS AND ROYZ CONCERT OMG.
... Sorry, only the first line shows up as a teaser on facebook XD
Alright, so because I knew the concert was that evening,and because my legs and feet are already in 'omg you're killing us' mode from vacationing too hard, I decided to laze around the hostel, take my time, shower, get dressed, get lunch, get make up'd, etc. I had my hair in a braid with a clip holding back the bangs and hiding the fact that they're not really long enough to go in the braid.
I headed over and got to the venue around 3:30. It was way easier getting to Rolling Hall than I remembered, but maybe we were coming from the other subway station last time or something?
I got my ticket, number 65 (I think there were only 120ish people, rough estimate), so pretty good. I probably was the 60th person in since there were a handful of people who weren't in line by the time we were let in.
Nemesis only had CDs for merch, but since Mich didn't have Piano part 1 and neither of us had part 2 it was what I wanted most.
Royz had a looooooot of merch. like, nail stickers, and diaries, and everything. I got a tote bag (partially to hold everything I've bought, and partially because LOL their tour is called 'Crisis Core'), their most recent single A type and a towel (it's a thing at these concerts that you have a towel or flag or something to wave around at certain points).
There was an opening band. they were fine, not amazing or anything. They did two songs and I didn't catch their name. It wasn't on any of the printed materials. What sucked though was that it took TEN MINUTES for them to set the stage up for Royz after the opening band. Like... opening bands are to warm up an audience, and that wait was sooo bad.
Royz
I had watched exactly one of their songs once on youtube before the concert, and felt it was good, not amazing. I didn't want to get more into because I realized... what are the options? a) I really like their stuff and I'm excited b) I end up not liking most of their stuff and am not stoked c) I liked one song well enough and my optimism will buoy me into being excited. As there was 'risk' to listening to more and no real reward for listening, I just went in mostly blind.
But here's the thing. I'll go see a random Viskei band I know nothing about any day of the week. I'll pay 50 bucks to see an hour concert of a viskei band I don't know.
Y'know why?
Viskei bands excel at live show. I mean, 'vis kei' means visual shock. Presentation is a big part of these bands. You KNOW a viskei band is gunna be dressed to the nines. You know they're gunna give it all. And you know their fangirls are gunna have hilarious cute hand gestures memorized to the songs because despite the fact that I don't get it at all, that is definitely a thing.
Listening now, I think I liked Royz' music better during the concert than out, but that's normal for me. And they are pretty good so I'll definitely be listening to them from now on. They were full of energy, demanding tons of participation from the audience. And unlike D whose fans I felt were TOO choreographed, the Royz's fans (called Wings I believe) moves were easy to pick up. I was doing them right along side after watching once or twice. Royz also required headbanging so I felt a lot less weird sitting around dancing in the middle of the crowd than I felt with D, and some of the Wings moves were like, everybody in the line dance like an idiot moving all the way to the left, now back the other way, now back again! which makes you feel pretty giddy during the show.
I found out after the concert that one of the members of the band had left two days before because his mother is sick, but that the band had decided to continue as a 4 man show. During the show I didn't notice that anything was missing so the second guitarist really picked up all the slack.
His name is Kuina or somehing like that and he's my new love *laughs*
He was the biggest damn goof, which is funny cuz they're dressed all goth of course and he's pierced to high hell. But he was grinning the whole time, loving every second, winking and giving hand signals to the people in front of him, giving people thumbs up for dancing and winking if you're dancing and screaming and he was a joy to watch. It took me a song to notice that his belly was exposed *laughs*.
Nemesis
When you look at the poster to this concert, it's HILARIOUS, because it looks like these two bands should not be on the same poster ever. There's Royz all viskei'd out, black and red and pointless buckles and straps everywhere and 1 foot high multicoloured hair everywhere. And there's nemisis looking like the cool guys hanging out in the rock cafe doing garage band on their macs.
The bands have a very different vibe, as Nemesis tends to stop between everysong to interact with the fans. The lead singer is hilarious, based on.. the 2 things I understood and the constant laughing from the crowd. Both bands had phrases in the other language written on the stage and would really obviously look down before saying something which killed me cuz I'm an awful person.
Nemisis brought out ALL their heavier songs to appeal to the Wings, which is fine by me because those are the songs I like better, especially for a concert, so it was wicked. As Sebin was standing on the same side of the stage as the ROyz guitarist (which is why I was there. I saw the keyboard when I came in and knew where to stand XD), and the two couldn't be more different. Sebin tends to look like he's rocking out in his own little world most of the time, which he makes charming.
I wish they'd saved Rose of Versailles for a little later in the show, they did it 3rd, but whatever.
Curtain
So, it's over, and I'm confused because Nemesis usually does a kpop cover in their live shows, and either I missed it (I don't think I'm THAT out of the kpop loop. am I?) or they hadn't done one. But then all of Royz and 3/5th of Nemisis come back out on stage.
The two bands perform a rock cover of Fantastic Baby (Korean Version), which is my favourite kpop song by far so I was living for it. Then the nemesis lead singer turns to the royz one and is like 'now we should sing a japan song. Japan song? X JAPAN!!!" And they did an X Japan cover as well. It wasn't tears. and that's about the only X Japan song I could have identified so I'm not sure what song it was *laughs*.
Then we lined up and we got to shake the hand of every band member of both bands. YOu had enough time to kind of say one thing and get one thing said back. Most people I just said like thank you to. The Royz Guitarist and I, omg. WHen he saw me in front of him, we grabbed each others wrists and just kind of fangirled at each other and I exclaimed 'awesome!' in Japanese and that was about it. *laughs* I guess the only white girl in the whole show standing two people in front of you and dancing like a maniac the whole time is noticeable. I told sebin I loved him *laughs* and told the royz lead singer they were awesome.
At the end of the line, everyone was given a copy of the concert poster :3 I had been sad it wasn't on sale earlier but that explains why.
During the encore, the Royz members had ALL been wearing the 'concert' tshirt,and I decided to buy that after the show. I was tempted to buy their other tshirt but I was literlaly out of cash. I only had enough money on me to buy supper (I hadn't anticipated buying so much merch).
Standing in the subway, a girl walks over to stand over by me to wait, looking down in her phone. She's wearing a Royz towel around her neck like I am. I can't tell right away if she's Korean or Japanese (some people you can tell, some times you can't) so I said in English 'that concert was awesome!'
She looks up and sees my towel and we start talking. SHe's Korean but her English is ok. SHe's a huge Royz fan (she's the one who told me about the one guitarist leaving). She shows me a bunch of band pictures on her phone and we talk about jrock and anime and exchange e-mails :3
look at me being sociable for once.
In conclusion. Yeah, probably the best concert experience I've ever had. :333
... Sorry, only the first line shows up as a teaser on facebook XD
Alright, so because I knew the concert was that evening,and because my legs and feet are already in 'omg you're killing us' mode from vacationing too hard, I decided to laze around the hostel, take my time, shower, get dressed, get lunch, get make up'd, etc. I had my hair in a braid with a clip holding back the bangs and hiding the fact that they're not really long enough to go in the braid.
I headed over and got to the venue around 3:30. It was way easier getting to Rolling Hall than I remembered, but maybe we were coming from the other subway station last time or something?
I got my ticket, number 65 (I think there were only 120ish people, rough estimate), so pretty good. I probably was the 60th person in since there were a handful of people who weren't in line by the time we were let in.
Nemesis only had CDs for merch, but since Mich didn't have Piano part 1 and neither of us had part 2 it was what I wanted most.
Royz had a looooooot of merch. like, nail stickers, and diaries, and everything. I got a tote bag (partially to hold everything I've bought, and partially because LOL their tour is called 'Crisis Core'), their most recent single A type and a towel (it's a thing at these concerts that you have a towel or flag or something to wave around at certain points).
There was an opening band. they were fine, not amazing or anything. They did two songs and I didn't catch their name. It wasn't on any of the printed materials. What sucked though was that it took TEN MINUTES for them to set the stage up for Royz after the opening band. Like... opening bands are to warm up an audience, and that wait was sooo bad.
Royz
I had watched exactly one of their songs once on youtube before the concert, and felt it was good, not amazing. I didn't want to get more into because I realized... what are the options? a) I really like their stuff and I'm excited b) I end up not liking most of their stuff and am not stoked c) I liked one song well enough and my optimism will buoy me into being excited. As there was 'risk' to listening to more and no real reward for listening, I just went in mostly blind.
But here's the thing. I'll go see a random Viskei band I know nothing about any day of the week. I'll pay 50 bucks to see an hour concert of a viskei band I don't know.
Y'know why?
Viskei bands excel at live show. I mean, 'vis kei' means visual shock. Presentation is a big part of these bands. You KNOW a viskei band is gunna be dressed to the nines. You know they're gunna give it all. And you know their fangirls are gunna have hilarious cute hand gestures memorized to the songs because despite the fact that I don't get it at all, that is definitely a thing.
Listening now, I think I liked Royz' music better during the concert than out, but that's normal for me. And they are pretty good so I'll definitely be listening to them from now on. They were full of energy, demanding tons of participation from the audience. And unlike D whose fans I felt were TOO choreographed, the Royz's fans (called Wings I believe) moves were easy to pick up. I was doing them right along side after watching once or twice. Royz also required headbanging so I felt a lot less weird sitting around dancing in the middle of the crowd than I felt with D, and some of the Wings moves were like, everybody in the line dance like an idiot moving all the way to the left, now back the other way, now back again! which makes you feel pretty giddy during the show.
I found out after the concert that one of the members of the band had left two days before because his mother is sick, but that the band had decided to continue as a 4 man show. During the show I didn't notice that anything was missing so the second guitarist really picked up all the slack.
His name is Kuina or somehing like that and he's my new love *laughs*
He was the biggest damn goof, which is funny cuz they're dressed all goth of course and he's pierced to high hell. But he was grinning the whole time, loving every second, winking and giving hand signals to the people in front of him, giving people thumbs up for dancing and winking if you're dancing and screaming and he was a joy to watch. It took me a song to notice that his belly was exposed *laughs*.
Nemesis
When you look at the poster to this concert, it's HILARIOUS, because it looks like these two bands should not be on the same poster ever. There's Royz all viskei'd out, black and red and pointless buckles and straps everywhere and 1 foot high multicoloured hair everywhere. And there's nemisis looking like the cool guys hanging out in the rock cafe doing garage band on their macs.
The bands have a very different vibe, as Nemesis tends to stop between everysong to interact with the fans. The lead singer is hilarious, based on.. the 2 things I understood and the constant laughing from the crowd. Both bands had phrases in the other language written on the stage and would really obviously look down before saying something which killed me cuz I'm an awful person.
Nemisis brought out ALL their heavier songs to appeal to the Wings, which is fine by me because those are the songs I like better, especially for a concert, so it was wicked. As Sebin was standing on the same side of the stage as the ROyz guitarist (which is why I was there. I saw the keyboard when I came in and knew where to stand XD), and the two couldn't be more different. Sebin tends to look like he's rocking out in his own little world most of the time, which he makes charming.
I wish they'd saved Rose of Versailles for a little later in the show, they did it 3rd, but whatever.
Curtain
So, it's over, and I'm confused because Nemesis usually does a kpop cover in their live shows, and either I missed it (I don't think I'm THAT out of the kpop loop. am I?) or they hadn't done one. But then all of Royz and 3/5th of Nemisis come back out on stage.
The two bands perform a rock cover of Fantastic Baby (Korean Version), which is my favourite kpop song by far so I was living for it. Then the nemesis lead singer turns to the royz one and is like 'now we should sing a japan song. Japan song? X JAPAN!!!" And they did an X Japan cover as well. It wasn't tears. and that's about the only X Japan song I could have identified so I'm not sure what song it was *laughs*.
Then we lined up and we got to shake the hand of every band member of both bands. YOu had enough time to kind of say one thing and get one thing said back. Most people I just said like thank you to. The Royz Guitarist and I, omg. WHen he saw me in front of him, we grabbed each others wrists and just kind of fangirled at each other and I exclaimed 'awesome!' in Japanese and that was about it. *laughs* I guess the only white girl in the whole show standing two people in front of you and dancing like a maniac the whole time is noticeable. I told sebin I loved him *laughs* and told the royz lead singer they were awesome.
At the end of the line, everyone was given a copy of the concert poster :3 I had been sad it wasn't on sale earlier but that explains why.
During the encore, the Royz members had ALL been wearing the 'concert' tshirt,and I decided to buy that after the show. I was tempted to buy their other tshirt but I was literlaly out of cash. I only had enough money on me to buy supper (I hadn't anticipated buying so much merch).
Standing in the subway, a girl walks over to stand over by me to wait, looking down in her phone. She's wearing a Royz towel around her neck like I am. I can't tell right away if she's Korean or Japanese (some people you can tell, some times you can't) so I said in English 'that concert was awesome!'
She looks up and sees my towel and we start talking. SHe's Korean but her English is ok. SHe's a huge Royz fan (she's the one who told me about the one guitarist leaving). She shows me a bunch of band pictures on her phone and we talk about jrock and anime and exchange e-mails :3
look at me being sociable for once.
In conclusion. Yeah, probably the best concert experience I've ever had. :333