[Report] 2009 PUZZLE TOUR - Kumamoto (June 6th, 2009 @14:00, 18:00)
I wrote a simple report from Kumamoto. The specific details of the entire show can be found in my first report from Hiroshima, so please take a look at that first so that things will make more sense, haha.
Here goes (spoilers ahead):
2009 PUZZLE TOUR - Kumamoto (June 6th, 2009 @14:00, 18:00)
I hit for the first show in Kumamoto and the friend I went with hit for the second. My seats weren’t too good… as you can see, the Kumamoto venue is very FLAT and it goes wide. Stand A was on one side while Stands F, G (where we were) and H were on the other. G & H felt very left out, haha! Yoko did come by a lot though because the wheelchair seats and the kids section were in front of us. I guess it was nice that we got to see the overall view in the 1st show (and got THIS, which I’m not going to complain about, lol) and then a much closer view in the 2nd.
(I think I did an awesome job with "Paint"!!! LOL)
In the 2nd show, I was sitting in between an American girl (my friend) and a guy. I can’t imagine a situation where I would stand out more other than if the guy was also non-Japanese and he had a baby with him, lol. The following report will mostly be from my view in the 2nd show because I just saw more in that one, haha.
1. MUSEKININ HERO - They come out on the center stage that goes round and round, so this was a perfect start to the 2nd show!! Great, clear view of everyone!! Nothing got in our way because we were at the edge towards the center stage. Kumamoto is a weird arena so you never know the setup until you get there… when my friend first told me that we were in arena C4 block, I knew that we were going to have a great view… but for the seat numbers to be at the very end!! This was just pure luck, haha.
2. IT'S MY SOUL - The guys scattered around so the Veterans came to the center stage instead. (I think this was their first song?)
3. KANFUU FIGHTING - They kept on walking around and ended up along the back stage side, where they got on their individual dragon stages. Yoko was having fun with the smokes that come out from the mouth of the dragon.
4. ICHIBYO KISS - They walked towards the main stage for this song WHICH I TOTALLY LOVE LIVE. I’m beginning to memorize the movements to the chorus, haha. Ryo messed up the lyrics for the second verse when he sang “Tenki yohou ja…” which is Shota’s part in the first verse, haha.
5. GLORIOUS - Ohkura walked towards our area to introduce this song. He sang on the back stage facing us so I was watching him. Towards the end of the song, the three walked to the center stage. I couldn’t take my eyes off of the stage knowing what was going to follow… haha.
6. KICYU - I think I would never see Kicyu THIS close unless we get lucky for the seats in the remaining venues, haha! Unlike in Hiroshima when they went on separate carts through the arena seats during the song, they stayed on the center stage for the entire song. SO CUTE!!! I love this song and I was getting very sad as the song neared its end :-(
7. YOU CAN SEE - In Hiroshima, Shota performed the “magic” with the red cloth, but this time it was the Veterans (I think Bun-chan and Kikuoka). Maru and Hina appeared on each end. Maru was on our side in the 1st show.
8. PUZZLE - I don’t know why, but in every show that I’ve been to, there is a small laughter when the screen shows chibi Hina and grown-up Hina, haha. When they showed chibi Shota’s picture, the crowd went “Kawaiiiiii!!” something I didn’t hear quite as loudly in Hiroshima, haha. They all gathered at center stage and as Ryo stood in the middle to sing the last chorus, the guys surrounding him started putting on their white gloves. The blue suit is kinda interesting… Yoko and Subaru’s pants are a bit shorter, and while Yoko’s look fine, Subaru somehow looks like an ossan, lol.
9. KAWAITA HANA - Subaru took Ryo’s spot and sang the opening phrase, which Arashi’s Sakurai seem to LOVE, haha. They all had their white gloves on and walked to the main stage where there were mic stands with different flowers. The movements to the chorus are so simple that the Eighters easily followed. I like the cute little dances during Maru’s solo part.
10. EIGHT RANGER - Same story, no shuffling, haha. It’s probably hard to shuffle the roles up since Yoko, Ohkura and Maru are wearing three layers of ranger suits, lol.
I think this was the first time I’ve ever seen the Rangers so close for a long period of time… they spend a lot of their skit on the center stage, and it was very fun following their expressions. They are so into it! In the second show, the fake-Red went on Red’s bike during the Ranger song and cut through the middle of the stage. When Green said “I want people to call me cute! I want to live and laugh like an idiot! I want to become small!” Blue said “I want to become bigger too…” Orange is always afraid of Yellow, and Red is somehow always the “kohai” character to Yellow, haha. Yellow still says the “shimauma” joke, but it sounded funnier in Hiroshima. I think he’s lost his confidence when saying it, lol. Let me explain the “shimauma” joke - Red says that the three (fake-Red, fake-Blue and fake-Yellow) have gotten an island of their own. Yellow says “Well it’s time to set the record straight… (=in Japanese we say “shiro kuro tsukeru” shiro is white and kuro is black)… just like a zebra (=”shimauma” in Japanaese… shima can also mean island)!!” Red says “Sooooossuyoneeeee!!” It's funnier when Yellow says it loud and proud, hahaha.
Blue starts reading out the “hatashi jou” (the letter of challenge written by Black, Green and Orange) while Red disturbs him, haha. The narration comes in and it’s Black, Green and Orange reading the letter (and having a tough time doing so too because they’re not really the brightest… lol). The screen shows the actual letter and the idiotic faces of fake-Red, fake-Blue and fake-Yellow, and since I’ve seen that a couple times already, I was totally facing the real Red, Blue and Yellow that were still standing on the back stage. The “hatashi jou” comes with an arrow (which almost hits Yellow so Red saves him from it… although in the second show, he was late doing that so it looked very fake when he was “stopping” the arrow from hitting Yellow, haha) and the three were playing around with it. Red was tickling Yellow’s nipples with the arrow, and Yellow got annoyed so he grabbed Red’s crotch instead. Then Red started playing with Blue’s nipples but Blue wasn’t feeling it, lol. I couldn’t believe that everyone was focusing on the screen while the 3-dimensional guys were right behind them!! LOL.
The West Side Story part on center stage is so much better seeing it closer, haha. You can’t really see their expressions on the screen because they can only show one guy at a time, so it was nice to be able to see them from that distance. Oh, the gun shot worked both times and hit fake-Blue’s legs, haha! The dance is soooo stupid that it’s hilarious, haha. When the real and fake colors get together, fake-Blue was strangling Blue saying “I’m not going to let you sleep tonight.” Yellow had his evil face on when he was threatening fake-Yellow, and because Red’s face was so close to fake-Red, Yoko couldn’t stop laughing, haha.
I remember Yoko saying on Recomen how he loves making Nasu run around. I understood what he meant… when Nasu tells everyone to stop fighting, he came out way behind Stand H block and then in the next scene he was on the main stage, running out of breath, haha. (I marked “N” on the spots that he was in a span of a minute or so.) Right before Nasu gets “killed,” he does this dramatic dance by himself in the midst of the others. This is HILARIOUS, hahaha. Oh, in the second show, I don’t know why but Black kept on calling Nasu “Papa” so the whole place ended up calling him “Papa!!” Haha. In the second show, after Nasu brought the three back to their original colors by “magic,” Yoko was taking off his red suit, but… it ripped!! He ripped it!! Hahaha.
11. DONNA NI HANARETE TATTE SOBA NI IRUKARA - I don’t know what got into them, but Hina was hugging Yoko like crazy during the song!! Maru was on Yoko’s side and Subaru on Hina’s, and they were both pushing them together like a sandwich. Later, I listened to the Recomen from that week and Subaru was asking Hina to play around with Yoko during the concert. So THAT was what it was about, haha. In the Recomen a week later, Hina was describing that scene. It was so weird!!
In the second show, Hina started out the song but was interrupted by Yoko and Subaru a lot. He’s like “I’m singing my part!” while the song is going on… at first I was like “Is his part lip sync’d!?” It was confusing because they made Hina sing the full verse (Yoko and Subaru made him sing their parts) and he sounded normal. He was reading the lyrics on the screen though, haha. Green and Blue were as always very lovey dovey with each other, haha.
12. GIGA MAJI MEGA FIGHT - At the end of Donna ni, the guys were gathered on the back stage and Subaru was sticking his crotch out. What the hell? Then they started the intro to this song and started moving around like crazy.
13. MC - 1st show: It was unrealistically HOT in the venue, so the guys kept on saying “Atsui, atsui…” for about the first 5 minutes of the MC, haha. They were saying that the air conditioner wasn’t on so they asked for it… also they said that the arena is probably not used for concerts that often so it didn’t have very good ventilation. Then, Hina, who had been sweating like a horse, said “I’m glad I’m suppin (=have no makeup on) today!” Immediately, Ohkura was like “Yeah right!! You were putting on tons of foundation!” Everyone was like “Why did you just lie to us!?” Hina said “It’s close enough (to a suppin)!” The foundation is a part of his skin, he said, haha. Hina then started talking about how he’s been washing his face in Ryo’s way. According to Ryo, it’s better to not wash it too often, so Hina’s reduced the number of times washing his face. Ohkura’s like “Why don’t you tell me those things!” Ryo said “Well, I think this method is useless to these two. They’ve put too much care into their skin already; my face, on the other hand, is like bare feet. I’ve treated it roughly, but that’s why it’s nice and tough. Your faces (Hina and Ohkura’s) have been wearing socks and shoes!”
Then they started talking about how there is nothing to do in Kumamoto (here we go again, lol). Yoko came in to Kumamoto on the day of the concert because of filming, and the others went out to eat basashi and uma-shabu the night before. That was good, but there isn’t really much else to do.
Hina and Maru protested by saying “There’s the castle!” They talked about how they got their name plates on their by donating 10,000-yen for the repairing of the castle. The others were like “You paid that much!?” The two asked the crowd how many of us have seen the name plates. I was like “I’m going tomorrow!” Haha. They said they went to the castle during the 47 tour but SOMEONE gave up climbing up to the top… “It was too hot!” Ohkura said, lol. He was in the document but he didn’t actually climb to the name plates!? Geez! Haha. Well, it is a lot of climbing, that’s for sure…
Ryo then said that because his relatives live in Kumamoto, he knows that it’s like the second most urban place behind Fukuoka. The crowd applauded to that, but Ryo immediately said “Well, there’s still a big difference” so the people were like “Booo!” Haha.
2nd show: The ventilation was much better in this show (I almost forgot how hot it was in the previous show!). Hina started out by asking “What the heck was ‘Papa’ all about!?” Hina said he doesn’t mind it (really!? lol), but “Papa” reminds him of something else. Maru then said “Well, there are kare-sens (people who like older people). You can be a ‘Papa’ who just go out to eat and stuff, no ecchi stuff.” Everyone’s like “WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT!!!” lol. Oh, Maru. He’s like “Well!! No kissing or anything!!” Hina’s like “There are kids watching you know!”
Then they started talking about marriage. Yoko kept on saying that Hina should get married and how it won’t be weird if he did. If Ohkura or some other guy announced their marriage, everyone will be surprised and shocked but no one will be for Hina. Yoko said that the other time when he talked about this, Maru looked at him with a straight face saying “He can’t get married. He IS an idol, you know.” Yoko said he doesn’t need to get married but he desperately wants kids. He would name the first one “Toranosuke” and the second one “Ryuunosuke” haha. He said that going to amusement parks would be a lot more fun with kids because he’d be experiencing things from a different point of view. While Yoko was in his mode, Maru cut in saying “Yokoyama-kun, if you can’t take care of yourself, you shouldn’t be saying things like that!” Yoko paused for a moment and then said, “I don’t mind if the others told me that… but YOU, out of everyone!? No!” haha very true. Maru (or Ohkura?) said that because Yoko’s so forgetful, he’d forget his children as well.
They then talked about whether to stand by the wife while she is giving birth. Shota said that some women feel comfort with the husband standing by, but some don’t want them to be there because they look so ugly. He said “But, many women don’t mind the husband standing by near the top rather than the bottom…” and Yoko’s like “Yasu, you’re becoming more and more sukebe!”
Yoko then talked about how he wouldn’t be able to stand watching his loved one in pain. He would stand by but leave the room for a bit, drink hot tea and look into the mirror saying “What am I doing!” and then go back to the room. He would repeat this every 5 minutes, lol. Then he said “But, you know, you’ve all been born that way… (looking at them thoughtfully) you’ve all grown up. Thank you.” LOL What the heck?? Hahaha. Hina’s like “Well, we’ve known each other since we were teenagers! Of course we’ve aged!”
Ryo talked about his drama with Takki and also said that his 24hr TV drama has started filming. Subaru talked about Dream Boys and how it’s going to be different from the previous series. They were all curious as to how him, Kame and Tegoshi were going to work together. They asked Ryo what kind of person Tegoshi was because Subaru has barely talked to him. “Tegoshi… is weird,” Ryo said, haha. Yoko’s like “I’ve seen him on Hey Hey Hey where he would do stuff that is not funny at all! But, he recovers with his brightness. He’s not scared!” Subaru said that he can only call him “Tegoshi-kun” and that he’s afraid of him because he has never talked to him.
14. EXPLOSION & Veteran’s Song - When Hina tried to introduce the Veterans, Yoko remained on the stage for both shows. He said “What do you think of Nakayama Yuuma-kun’s debut?” LOL. Maashii said “Honestly I’m jealous!!!!” Haha. Yoko said “What do you think of Nakayama Yuuma with One’s Shadow? What doooooo” and left. He said he just wanted to make fun of Hina’s solo song, lol. Muro’s oldest brother said that they were listening to Hina and Maru’s solo songs before the show. He also advertised “Ahoyanen, Sukiyanen” (a show that him, Hama-chan and Daichi are in) which only airs in the Kansai area... No one in Kyushu’s going to watch it, yo, lol. I don’t know the title to the second song they sang, but it was like a medley.
15. AKAI SHINKIRO - Shota was in front of me during the first show dancing to his part with the Veterans. I knew he was coming out from that side so I followed him from the darkness, lol.
16. BURLEE - They all came to the center stage. YES!! GREAT VIEW!! They used fire during this song and man, was it hot. I felt like my face was burning, haha. So many dance movements and complicated formations going on. In Hiroshima, I could only tell that it was Shota, Ryo and a “few others” with Subaru, Yoko and a “few others,” but this time I clearly saw that it was Shota, Ryo, Maru and Ohkura singing the first part of the chorus and Subaru, Yoko, Hina, Maru and Ohkura for the second. Maru and Ohkura were singing the lower harmony.
17. MY LAST TRAIN - YES! Shota was at the center stage so I was watching him throughout the whole song! The other guys went on carts through the arena.
18. OSAKA RAINY BLUES - Subaru was at the center stage so instead of watching Shota on the main stage, I was watching him. The biggest reason was because he was staring at Ryo, who was on the back stage, the whole time! I don’t know what was up with them but Subaru and Ryo were making a lot of eye contact. Even during Burlee, I saw them making eye contact!
19. ZUKKOKE OTOKOMICHI - I just danced around to this song because the guys were scattered and the band members left early, haha.
20. BAND SESSION & DO YOU AGREE? - They’ve brought back the dancing to this song so they were all on the main stage.
21. GORI GORI - Subaru was on the center stage throughout the song so I was watching him the whole time. Reminded me of the J-Rock lives! I feel like I was watching more of the K8-Subaru in Kumamoto. In Hiroshima, I felt like he was still in J-Rock mode and he was kinda trying to remember what it was like to be in K8 mode... at least that's what I felt by looking at him.
22. JYONETSU PARTY - This song is growing on me. It’s so much better listening to it live!
23. ROLLING COASTER - The band sounded a lot better this time around. Yoko looks so happy while he's playing this song :-)
EN1. MUGENDAI
EN2. SAITE IKIYO
DOUBLE EN. WAHAHA (Just the second show)
When they thanked the guys for coming, I turned around and clapped at the guy sitting next to me. He was surprised, lol. Overall, the people around me were so quiet! No one went crazy when the guys came around, so I didn't have to be annoyed at any point. Very important thing to enjoy the full concert!!
Honestly I don’t remember much from the encores because in both shows it was getting really hot and I was feeling a bit sick, haha!! I watched every move and didn’t miss a beat, but still I was tired, haha. Hina waved like crazy and I was laughing a lot with Maru at one point when he was doing a weird move; I don’t know why but these days I feel like Maru’s a friend of mine or something, lol. All his actions come so natural to me! I felt like I was having a good laugh with my co-workers at work or something! He would be a great friend of mine; our birthdays are only a week apart and we're the same age, too!
I always have a lot of fun at the concerts I go to in Kyushu (so far I've been to Kumamoto, Kagoshima, and a few times in Fukuoka). Something is very magical down there :-) Can’t wait for my next trip down there (which won't be too far away... :-D)!!