PureBOYS in Fukuoka
Yesterday, I had the opportunity to see the PureBOYS perform in Canal City here in Fukuoka.
Now, I didn't have a ticket. Tickets for the handshake event...were gone. You needed to get one the release date and by the time I heard about this event, it was nearly a week later. Still, we were invited to come and watch from the upper stories of Canal City, which is basically a large, open-air shopping mall.
So, I arrived there just after 10am and the place was milling with fangirls. I followed the groups and could tell that the event was going to take place around the central matsuri float. I decided to camp out on floor 1 (the event was on the basement level), just to the right of the middle. There were girls everywhere, but being a gaijin and taller than 95% of Japanese girls (even in their heels), it was okay to have girls in front of me since I could still see.
View of the fangirls. The large object on the right is a matsuri float. The PureBOYS "stage" was down underneath that.
It was sooooo hot. Everyone was fanning themselves and dripping sweat. Annoying old people kept poking their heads through to see what was going on. The old woman who wiggled under my SWEATY ARMPIT took the cake.
The wait wasn't too bad. I could pick up bits of conversations around me--mostly about Ba-chon (sometimes called Baba-sensei by my friends to the left) and Kei-chan. Some about Ouji or Yuichi. The girls actually asked me, in broken English, which PureBOY was my favourite. Prior to this, I had asked if this was the PureBOYS thing in Japangrish. It was and they seemed surprised. Out of what looked like a couple thousand females (and some random males) spread out over three or four floors, I was the ONLY gaijin.
Anyway, so I said my favourites were Ba-chon and Hiromi and they squeeed and we sorta-talked about how Hiromi was small, but cute!! And how Yuichi was so tall and they asked where I was from and I said I was Canadian and tried to say I was an exchange student at Kyudai, but I'm not sure they got that. I didn't get much of what they said either. ;)
After the fountain show at 11am, about 11:05 they COME OUT and we SQUEED AND SCREAMED!!! The spot was actually pretty decent. I had a good view--please don't ask for photos from these idol events because guess what? IT'S ALMOST ALWAYS A NO PHOTO POLICY!
Just fyi.
Amesuta is the same policy, as was Masa's Live and Kentaro's birthday event.
There was a sound check around 10:30, so I knew the song order already (pleasantly surprised at the first!). All the PureBOYS were wearing white, with black and/or grey accents. Baba, on the far left (most of the time) had, of course, grey and white camo pants. Ouji had a scarf. Kei-chan had on these tuxedo-like pants with a black stripe down the side. God, he's hot.
Hiromi had on boots!!!! and a black, tight shirt under a white vest. Tight white pants and that little guy is built for his size, if you catch my drift...;)
Yuichi had a tie on, Takuya...I forget and Kouhei was, as ever, also in boots with black leggings.
They all look so good IRL. Seriously. doingfirst can vouch that pictures and magazine spreads do not do them justice, truly. Yuichi in particular. His gummy smile in real life is utterly adorable.
The first song was Kampai, which THRILLED the audience. Of course, I sang along too. THE COWBOY SHUFFLE! THEY DID THE COWBOY SHUFFLE! It wasn't as good as the PV, but it was so exciting it didn't matter. Takuya and Yuichi...don't dance all that well. More like an awkward shuffle...possibly due to their large feet. Baba tends to bop more than anything. Kei-chan is GOOD and Kouhei...okay, didn't pay too much attention, but he was pretty good also. Ouji varied--he shuffled at times, but was really good at others.
BUT OH HOW HIROMI CAN DANCE!
I was REALLY surprised by that. He was probably the best of the group, as good if not better than Kei-chan, and he seemed to be having a grand ol' time out there. Good for him!
They were, for the most part, arranged like this:
(left to right)
Baba Ouji Kei-chan Yuichi Hiromi Takuya Kouhei
I had the best view of Yuichi/Hiromi/Takuya. Mostly the latter two, but that worked out.
Ahem.
ALL of the PureBOYS definitely noticed me. I was only one floor up and next to the very very loud girls constantly screaming, mostly for Yuichi and Hiromi (I think they screamed for Hiromi for me, aw, thanks girls!), but for all of them in turn, really. Anyway. During...Psyche na Heart, when Baba wandered over to our side and switched with Ouji (the other five were in the middle, dancing and backup vocals, mostly), Baba totally smiled at me.
Baba also has picked up some sweet hip motions from Masa, let me say that! (^-^)v
Ouji...he smiled periodically. Hiromi CONSTANTLY! Bless him! He was really comfortable performing, surprisingly. I waved and flailed and he'd look up and smile again. Yuichi, yes. Takuya, I think so. Kouhei was mostly off in Kouhei-land. Kei-chan REALLY knows how to work the crowd. He's such a flirt. Constantly smiling and waving and winking and making them swoon and when he waved at me at the end and I waved back. Yes, I was under his Kei-chan spell too!
Ouji's also pretty good at working the crowd and making them feel connected. Kouhei would run up and down and touch/high-five hands, which the fangirls adored. Baba doesn't need to. He knows he doesn't need to, too. All he has to do is stand and look nice and we'll swoon.
They talked between songs, informally, more or less like Amesuta. Kouhei said that it was so hot here. (It was 32 celsius/felt like 42 celsius and they were performing outside). During the last song Kouhei looked sweaty in the hair region.
It was so nice to see all seven together! And unlike Amesuta, we could see them for more than 5/10 minutes, even if we weren't as close.
Ouji did his schpeel during Psyche na Heart. Yes, it's as sexually arousing live as on the CD and in the PV.
The fountains came on at 11:30 and the PureBOYS seemed amused. Especially Kouhei.
The last song was Kimi no Te. We swayed and sang with the PureBOYS and thank god the PB fans are nowhere near as intense as Masa--at least the Fukuoka ones. The "concert" part was more like a mini-concert and done by about 11:45. But for a FREE concert, I was impressed. They're all very professional and thankful to their fans and their dancing...you could tell they definitely worked hard, even if they weren't always 100% in sync or if Yuichi's arms were kinda limp sometimes, or Ouji's dancing was off and on.
Considering that a) I suspect they flew in late last night after Amesuta or ridiculously early that morning and b) they were flying out to ANOTHER event in Osaka a couple hours later, it was impressive.
After they left the stage, the staff-san started to set up for the handshaking tables. The PureBOYS were just off to the far right, but I couldn't see. However, they came back, Kei-chan waved at me, etc etc, and the lines of girls started. My ameblog friend Mako (who I actually did not meet at the event, though we had discussed online trying to) emailed me later and said her hand was wet and so were all of the PureBOYS'! Awwwww!
Promotional info outside the Canal City HMV for the PureBOYS event. No, they were not dressed in those outfits.
So, that was Canal City. And me seeing the PureBOYS for free. It's so nice of them to treat their fans to events like this and I hope they continue to do so in the future.
Now, I didn't have a ticket. Tickets for the handshake event...were gone. You needed to get one the release date and by the time I heard about this event, it was nearly a week later. Still, we were invited to come and watch from the upper stories of Canal City, which is basically a large, open-air shopping mall.
So, I arrived there just after 10am and the place was milling with fangirls. I followed the groups and could tell that the event was going to take place around the central matsuri float. I decided to camp out on floor 1 (the event was on the basement level), just to the right of the middle. There were girls everywhere, but being a gaijin and taller than 95% of Japanese girls (even in their heels), it was okay to have girls in front of me since I could still see.
View of the fangirls. The large object on the right is a matsuri float. The PureBOYS "stage" was down underneath that.
It was sooooo hot. Everyone was fanning themselves and dripping sweat. Annoying old people kept poking their heads through to see what was going on. The old woman who wiggled under my SWEATY ARMPIT took the cake.
The wait wasn't too bad. I could pick up bits of conversations around me--mostly about Ba-chon (sometimes called Baba-sensei by my friends to the left) and Kei-chan. Some about Ouji or Yuichi. The girls actually asked me, in broken English, which PureBOY was my favourite. Prior to this, I had asked if this was the PureBOYS thing in Japangrish. It was and they seemed surprised. Out of what looked like a couple thousand females (and some random males) spread out over three or four floors, I was the ONLY gaijin.
Anyway, so I said my favourites were Ba-chon and Hiromi and they squeeed and we sorta-talked about how Hiromi was small, but cute!! And how Yuichi was so tall and they asked where I was from and I said I was Canadian and tried to say I was an exchange student at Kyudai, but I'm not sure they got that. I didn't get much of what they said either. ;)
After the fountain show at 11am, about 11:05 they COME OUT and we SQUEED AND SCREAMED!!! The spot was actually pretty decent. I had a good view--please don't ask for photos from these idol events because guess what? IT'S ALMOST ALWAYS A NO PHOTO POLICY!
Just fyi.
Amesuta is the same policy, as was Masa's Live and Kentaro's birthday event.
There was a sound check around 10:30, so I knew the song order already (pleasantly surprised at the first!). All the PureBOYS were wearing white, with black and/or grey accents. Baba, on the far left (most of the time) had, of course, grey and white camo pants. Ouji had a scarf. Kei-chan had on these tuxedo-like pants with a black stripe down the side. God, he's hot.
Hiromi had on boots!!!! and a black, tight shirt under a white vest. Tight white pants and that little guy is built for his size, if you catch my drift...;)
Yuichi had a tie on, Takuya...I forget and Kouhei was, as ever, also in boots with black leggings.
They all look so good IRL. Seriously. doingfirst can vouch that pictures and magazine spreads do not do them justice, truly. Yuichi in particular. His gummy smile in real life is utterly adorable.
The first song was Kampai, which THRILLED the audience. Of course, I sang along too. THE COWBOY SHUFFLE! THEY DID THE COWBOY SHUFFLE! It wasn't as good as the PV, but it was so exciting it didn't matter. Takuya and Yuichi...don't dance all that well. More like an awkward shuffle...possibly due to their large feet. Baba tends to bop more than anything. Kei-chan is GOOD and Kouhei...okay, didn't pay too much attention, but he was pretty good also. Ouji varied--he shuffled at times, but was really good at others.
BUT OH HOW HIROMI CAN DANCE!
I was REALLY surprised by that. He was probably the best of the group, as good if not better than Kei-chan, and he seemed to be having a grand ol' time out there. Good for him!
They were, for the most part, arranged like this:
(left to right)
Baba Ouji Kei-chan Yuichi Hiromi Takuya Kouhei
I had the best view of Yuichi/Hiromi/Takuya. Mostly the latter two, but that worked out.
Ahem.
ALL of the PureBOYS definitely noticed me. I was only one floor up and next to the very very loud girls constantly screaming, mostly for Yuichi and Hiromi (I think they screamed for Hiromi for me, aw, thanks girls!), but for all of them in turn, really. Anyway. During...Psyche na Heart, when Baba wandered over to our side and switched with Ouji (the other five were in the middle, dancing and backup vocals, mostly), Baba totally smiled at me.
Baba also has picked up some sweet hip motions from Masa, let me say that! (^-^)v
Ouji...he smiled periodically. Hiromi CONSTANTLY! Bless him! He was really comfortable performing, surprisingly. I waved and flailed and he'd look up and smile again. Yuichi, yes. Takuya, I think so. Kouhei was mostly off in Kouhei-land. Kei-chan REALLY knows how to work the crowd. He's such a flirt. Constantly smiling and waving and winking and making them swoon and when he waved at me at the end and I waved back. Yes, I was under his Kei-chan spell too!
Ouji's also pretty good at working the crowd and making them feel connected. Kouhei would run up and down and touch/high-five hands, which the fangirls adored. Baba doesn't need to. He knows he doesn't need to, too. All he has to do is stand and look nice and we'll swoon.
They talked between songs, informally, more or less like Amesuta. Kouhei said that it was so hot here. (It was 32 celsius/felt like 42 celsius and they were performing outside). During the last song Kouhei looked sweaty in the hair region.
It was so nice to see all seven together! And unlike Amesuta, we could see them for more than 5/10 minutes, even if we weren't as close.
Ouji did his schpeel during Psyche na Heart. Yes, it's as sexually arousing live as on the CD and in the PV.
The fountains came on at 11:30 and the PureBOYS seemed amused. Especially Kouhei.
The last song was Kimi no Te. We swayed and sang with the PureBOYS and thank god the PB fans are nowhere near as intense as Masa--at least the Fukuoka ones. The "concert" part was more like a mini-concert and done by about 11:45. But for a FREE concert, I was impressed. They're all very professional and thankful to their fans and their dancing...you could tell they definitely worked hard, even if they weren't always 100% in sync or if Yuichi's arms were kinda limp sometimes, or Ouji's dancing was off and on.
Considering that a) I suspect they flew in late last night after Amesuta or ridiculously early that morning and b) they were flying out to ANOTHER event in Osaka a couple hours later, it was impressive.
After they left the stage, the staff-san started to set up for the handshaking tables. The PureBOYS were just off to the far right, but I couldn't see. However, they came back, Kei-chan waved at me, etc etc, and the lines of girls started. My ameblog friend Mako (who I actually did not meet at the event, though we had discussed online trying to) emailed me later and said her hand was wet and so were all of the PureBOYS'! Awwwww!
Promotional info outside the Canal City HMV for the PureBOYS event. No, they were not dressed in those outfits.
So, that was Canal City. And me seeing the PureBOYS for free. It's so nice of them to treat their fans to events like this and I hope they continue to do so in the future.