I tried so hard just to get through to you, but your head's so far from the realness of truth
Today I went to Like an Edison. Outside of discovering that it is a paradise of VK goods, I was finally able to find a copy of Beyond the Gate. And of course I bought it. Who could pass up MANA NAILED TO A FUCKING CROSS. No one. Absolutely no one.
[Now I can add that to my collection of inappropriate use of Christian symbolism in Jrock]
I bought Cloud. What's Jui doing on the cover, reminding me of an Indian? It came with photo cards which I haven't looked at yet, but definitely looked like the gayer than gay things Jui showed at Vidokore. I also got the poster which I also haven't looked at either for obvious reasons.
I'm quite excited, but nothing can be done until I get back home tonight, whenever that will be. Me, Monique, Hiroko, and Jen (home stay girl) are going to Asakusa tonight.
On the academic side of things, I'm still fucked for one paper, but I started thinking up a thesis for my English paper yesterday, so I just need to flesh that out and email it for approval.
I just remembered that I agreed to check this girl's English in her paper. I hope she didn't plan on like, emailing it to me this weekend... I'll have to ask her about it.
Vidoll is this weekend! It's surprising how easily I keep forgetting. It's a busy time though, what with having to leave in 2 weeks and finals and papers and money woes. Oh well. I'm going to watch some Colbert.
Post 10 of your favorite songs that begin with a letter!
I got G
1. Gekiai Merry Go Round- Psycho le Cemu
I can still say this is one of my favorite songs by them, and not just because of the Dragon Ball Z para para. There was some para para I wouldn’t be ashamed to practice all alone with the door locked and the shades down.
2. Gekka no Yasoukyoku- Malice Mizer
Putting a Malice Mizer song down almost feel like a requirement. However, This song is fun to sing, and you got to love Gackt’s voice.
3. Gloire dans le Silence- Moi Dix Mois
I’ve been enjoying this song a lot lately. I can attribute some of that to the drum part, it gets caught in the head easily.
4. Grottesca- Kozi
I don’t know if there’s a song by Kozi that I honestly don’t like.
5. Go with the Flow- Queens of the Stone Age
This has been my favorite song by them for a long time, although I only have the one album. The video was really cool, too.
6. Guerrilla Radio- Rage Against the Machine
They were probably one of the first bands I listened to as a kid that had songs that just demanded you to turn the volume up. Blame them for my premature hearing loss.
7. Gothikaroid- Vidoll
This makes it on the list particularly because I’ve always really loved the opening. The guitar makes you think it’s one type of song, the synth, or whatever it is, makes you think it’s another, and then guitar comes back in, playing something completely different from both.
8. Gothic- D’espairsRay
The bass part is perhaps the sole reason this made the list. Yay, Zero!
9. Good Old Fashioned Lover Boy- Queen
Yay for Queen! I wish I had been around when they were.
10. Got to Stay Fly- Three 6 Mafia
idk how this song beat out my other 3 options, but I do like it. Like any good rap song, I like the beat, it makes me laugh, and one of the guys makes light of himself: “DJ Paul(?) is a dog, one you do not trust/ you leave your drink around me nigga yo’ drink gonna get drunk up/ you leave your green around me believe yo’ green gonna get lit up/ you leave your girl around me and if she’s fine she’s gonna get stuffed(?)” Also, I think the entire song is about smoking weed.
Here’s my weekend, in all its longwinded glory.
So let’s start with Friday night.
There was a CIEE farewell party at the Arcadia Hotel in Ichigaya. The lot of us walked over there. A bug landed on my face and I freaked out a little.
When we got there I met up with 母さん and told her that I was going to be going to two parties the next day. She told me that a typhoon was coming, but not to worry about it until Sunday. “Oh noes! The concert!” I said. She laughed.
When we toasted at the start of the party, 母さん was like “Oh, you want some tea or something?” cuz she was pouring my drink, and I’m like “Beer, plz,” (yeah, they actually had beer. We were all surprised) and she said “Wow.” Hearing Japanese people say wow cracks me up. Then I poured her drink, tea, and spilled all over, like the overgrown child I am.
We ate and other stuff happened and I got pictures. Particularly of this adorable kid who just ran all over.
After that was over, 母さん was like “I’m going home, peace out.” A large amount of us (some already quite drunk) went over to a combini, bought some liquor, and headed over to a park. Yeah, doesn’t that sound like the sketchiest thing ever? And yet it’s totally normal for a group of like, college age kids to load up on beer and sit around in the park at 10 pm.
I got pretty drunk off the atmosphere (cuz it wasn’t 3 beers and a Chu-hi, I’ll tell you that) and had a good time singing songs. (Chu-hi, like Smirnoff Ice, but not as good.) At some point two Japanese guys in the group near us decided they needed to take off their shirts for some reason. It was a Good Thing.
Eventually we all decided to go home. Everyone grabbed their things from off a bench. A purse and a Chu-hi was left behind, I grabbed both and brought up the rear. The purse was reclaimed, but the Chu-hi wasn’t. After a couple more questions, I found out it belonged to Drunky, who wasn’t allowed to have anymore, cuz he wasn’t able to walk under his own power. (Drunky, whose real name I forgot, is Lara’s friend, and Japanese. Japanese people have very low tolerances. They have one beer and their faces are red.) Thus, I was allowed to have it, and I opened readily.
I walked over to Kevin, and little ahead, and this exchange took place:
Me: Kevin! I got free liquor!
Kevin: Please tell me you opened that yourself.
Then when I was telling him how I got it, I tried drinking and talking at the same time, for some reason, which led to me coughing a lot and Chu-hi coming out of my nose. Pineapple joy.
We got to the station and Monique had to go to the bathroom.
Monique: The [western style toilet] was occupied and the girl in there was crying, so I knew she wouldn’t be out for a while.
She eventually did pee and we went home. I think the trip was happily uneventful.
Oh yeah, Monique slapped this guy at the park. That was pretty hilarious.
Saturday I get up and it’s raining. I was going to Chiba to do some English activities with Hiroko, so I needed to be at her station at 2:30.
The last time it took me about and hour and 40 minutes to get from her station to home, so I intended to catch the 12:50 bus. Except it was raining. So the bus never came. And when it did come it was stuck in traffic. And when I got off the bus to walk the rest of the way from the stop before last, the traffic MAGICALLY CLEARED UP.
When I did get to the station it’s 55 minutes later, 1:45. The train to Tokyo is a 20 minute ride. From Tokyo to her station is another hour. I emailed and told her I can’t get there at 2:30, so she says to come at 3:30.
I end up on a train at 2:20, so I end up getting to her station about 10 minutes early, and spent the time I realizing how much I’d like to eat at Lotteria again.
She met me and we went over to the library. There weren’t as many kids there cuz of the rain, but it was cool. They introduced themselves and asked me questions, and I only answered in English. One kid was pretty good.
Then The Most Adorable Dad Ever came to pick us up for the BBQ that I was supposed to be attending but wasn’t sure how it was supposed to continue with all the rain. I met him the last time I was in Chiba teaching English. Tadayoshi, maybe? He speaks really good English, idk if he’s fluent, though.
The BBQ was me, Hiroko, 4 parents, 7 kids, and this home stay girl from Wisconsin.
I gave Hiroko a survey to fill out for my Japanese class project, to which she responded “That’s not a survey, is it? I’ve done some many of these stupid things. Did you write this?”
She kept lying to people and telling them I’m good at Japanese.
I got asked the study abroad student’s favorite questions, which includes “Can you use chopsticks?”, “Do you think Japanese food is healthy?”, and “Do you think Japanese is the hardest language in the world?”
There were delicious, delicious meats, edamame, and yakisoba. There was also Spam.
Apparently, some girl from Hawaii once gave Hiroko some Spam, and she didn’t really know what to do with it, so she gave it to the people who were holding the BBQ.
I ate a couple pieces. It’s salty. Who else can say the first time they had Spam was in Japan?
The kids sang songs for us and we played London Bridge is Falling Down. At 7 Tadayoshi took me to the station. At some point around 7:15, I think, I was on the train. I got to Nishi-Funabashi, transferred from subway to JR, went a couple stops to Moto-Yawata, transferred from JR back to subway, and went to Kevin’s station.
I got there around 8:30ish. He gave me directions to his house:
“Go out of exit B1, turn right, go straight, you’ll cross a bridge. After you cross the bridge, go up about 3 lights, there’s a barber shop and a ramen house. You’ll see the barber pole on your left. Turn left there, walk until you cross over another bridge, and call me.”
I was fine up until the lights part. By the third light I hadn’t seen any barber pole. I remember he said “about.” So I figured it’d be okay if I went up another light. And low and behold, there was a barber shop pole. I looked for the ramen house. There were a lot of little shops that had names that weren’t ramen, but I figured that doesn’t mean they don’t sell ramen. Turned left and walked straight. Passed an elementary school. Thought about how freaked out I would be if I were in America, walking around in the rain at night, in an unfamiliar area. Crossed a bridge, called Kevin.
He lives in a 14 story building, and not too far from me was what looked to be a 14 story building. He was saying it was on my right, which it was. But when I actually walked toward it, it was on my left. That’s when I kinda knew things weren’t jiving. Plus, I accidentally walked down the nature path by the river, so I ended up in the back of the huge building.
When we realized that we might not be in the same place, Kevin told me to start yelling his name as loud as I could, which I did. And he couldn’t hear me.
I went back to the bridge and started over. I was supposed to walk straight (i.e. perpendicular to the river. Going to the other building was parallel) so I did. And I didn’t see him, or a 14 story building. We started describing the traffic around us. It was completely different.
I went back to the bridge and asked him what side of me the elementary school should have been on. He said right, and it was one my left, so I knew I had gone up one street too far. So I took a left at the bridge, and eventually saw Kevin heading towards me. We met up and walked to his place, which was very close.
He informed me that I need to drink up some of the liquor, cuz pretty much everyone bought a bottle of something, and there was a lot there still.
When I got to his place I was extra tired. I’d been traveling for 2 hours and walking around in the rain for a half an hour of that. I had even forgotten how badly I need to go to the bathroom.
I sat down and started talking to Monique. I remembered I had to go to the bathroom, and in the meantime she got me a Chu-hi. When I came back we looked at the various bottles on the table. There was a little Chianti left, and I drank some from the bottle. Caitlin has a picture of that :\
The spread was impressive, actually. There was wine, champagne, sake, shochu (foul, nasty stuff), chu-hi, beer, and scotch. I was thrilled that there was sake. I was at about half a can of Chu-hi when Monique went to the bathroom. Then I poured myself a paper cup of sake (smaller that like, your standard paper cup, bigger then the size you use for mouth wash and stuff). I drank it in two sips and one big gulp, noticed the pistachio nuts, and grabbed another Chu-hi so I wouldn’t have to get up when I was done with the first one.
By the time Monique got back I was incredibly buzzed. I can’t say drunk, really, but I was feeling it way more than I should have.
Monique: How did you get drunk so fast?!
Me: I drank while you were in the bathroom.
That sake was magic I tell you. I had like, 2 cups of that, and 3 Chu-his and I was doing quite well for myself. Had some ridiculous conversations with Monique and Oliver, played Wii tennis, and ate little sandwiches. I also drunk called Ben on Oliver’s phone.
Later we played Kings, or “This Game Wants to Kill your Liver.” It was quite enjoyable. This may be when I had my fourth Chu-hi. Then I ran out, but the game was still going, and there weren’t anymore Chu-his left, so I did the silliest thing I could possibly do and grabbed a can of Yebisu beer (as opposed to a cup of water. I knew I didn’t want to touch anything else on the table, and I had finished the sake).
About halfway through that can my stomach asked fairly nicely if I could get rid of the beer I’d ingested, and I obliged. Then a little later it told me there was still some left, so I went back to finish the job. Me and Kevin’s toilet bonded that night.
When I came back into the living room it was about 2 am. They had unfolded the couches and put out this amazingly comfortable futon with an amazingly soft pillow. I fell asleep within a couple minutes.
The next morning I felt a little groggy and weird, which happens often after I’ve been carousing. Kevin’s h-parents put on Pokemon (Kevin’s h-brother is 5) and we all (me, Kevin, h-fam, Oliver, and Monique) watched. Kevin’s h-dad gave us some tea. He put milk in it.
Monique: Is it a good idea for you to be drinking that?
Me: My stomach will tell me when I’m done.
…
Me: Yeah, my stomach said that was a bad idea.
I removed the tea from my system and we sat around a little bit. I wanted to leave at 10:30. I had to be at Jochi at 1 pm, and I had to go back to Yokohama to get the rest of my surveys. Monique wanted to stay a little longer, and I figured that wouldn’t be a problem.
We went to the station, got on a train, and got to Otemachi, where we can walk over to the Tokyo station through an underground path. Except, for some reason, the exit we took didn’t feed into the tunnel. So we wandered around a little, and ended up having to go outside (why didn’t we want to go outside? Cuz it was still raining). We walked over to the Tokyo station and got on a train home. Monique was skeptical about the weather conditions and me being able to make it to the concert.
I got to Kawasaki at about 12:15. It was impossible at that point for me to make it home and back on time, and I had already emailed my group about said fact. I waited for the bus. And I ended up waiting for half an hour. It wasn’t raining when I got to Kawasaki, but by the time the bus came, it had started. Then I got to Yokohama. It was sunny.
I got home and THE BABIES were here, asking me if I’d had lunch. Takato was wearing a shirt and underwear. He lifted up his shirt and was like “Look!” and I’m like “At what?”
I told 母さん that’d I’d been doing some drinking, so all I wanted was some plain toast and cold water.
She gave me a popsicle, too. She told me they're for babies. When she asked me if I was still going to the concert I told her I wasn’t sure cuz of the weather. She told me the typhoon had passed and not to worry about it. I was like “Yeah, but what about in Tokyo?” And she’s like “It’ll be fine.”
When I went downstairs to leave, Hayato kept saying “unko” and I wasn’t sure why till he walked over to the bathroom.
Then when I was leaving, 母さん came downstairs and said bye, as she was headed outside for some reason. When I was getting my shoes on I heard Takato run downstairs.
Takato: Byebye!
Me: Byebye- You are naked.
母さん: Haha!
So that was unexpected.
Then I left for school, and I didn’t get there until 2:45.
We worked on our project for about 2 hours. I debated with myself about the weather, since it was really dark in Tokyo, and whether or not I should go to the show. I decided I would and I took my leave and headed for Ikebukuro. On the way my mp3 player died.
I got there and bought my ticket. Either they disregarded my name being on the reserve list twice, or one of the reservation services didn’t work.
It was 5:30, and doors didn’t open till 6. I remembered I was hungry. I also remembered I was really broke. I had enough change in my coin purse to buy an onigiri, and I ate it while this pigeon stared me down. It was delicious. Then it made me more hungry, which was sad.
At some point I realized that this woman seemed to be saying something about ticket numbers a ways away from me. For whatever reason, when you first crowd around waiting for the queue at Ikebukuro Cyber, you do it at this concrete place a little ways from the live house, not in front of the live house itself (probably to keep people from crowding the street, in retrospect. Minor streets in Japan don’t have sidewalks, and most of the streets in Japan are minor streets, it seems). I was suspicious of this, since I saw the type of people there, which included a girl with blue hair, two girls dressed like Alice from Alice in Wonderland, and a white guy I was incidentally on the look out for. I walked over and asked some girls if this was for Exist Trace and they said yes.
The woman looking at tickets saw my number, was surprised for some reason, and moved me up to like 6 or 7 people behind the head of the line. I don’t know what happened there. Then we queued up along the live house and waited for a long time. It started to rain. We finally got in around 6:30, which was when the show was supposed to start. I grabbed Allie a photo book, which left me with only the change in my wallet and the money I needed to put on my Suica to get home (I should have visited the bank before I went, but it’s a good thing I went broke, as I probably would have bought a cd).
The live house is really, really small. Add a Japanese audience to that fact and there was plenty of standing room.
There was this really adorable kid standing in front of me. I wanted to like, pet his hair, he was so cute.
I saw Jimmy there. He’s a guy who’s blog Allie reads. He goes to all the Exist Trace shows, and I don’t blame him. He also must speak fluent Japanese, cuz I saw him chatting and meeting all sorts of people, including Old Guy.
Old Guy is this Japanese guy who was there, obviously. I can’t rightly determine his age. He looked younger without his glasses on, I found out later, but with them on, I thought that maybe, attempting to follow the add 10 years rule, he could be in his late 30s. I couldn’t conceive of him being older than 40, but he def. wasn’t in his 20s, I bet. The more interesting thing about Old Guy was that he had outfits for each band (and he did para para). So he came in one outfit. And then since Isolation was playing, he put on this white shirt with like, detachable sleeves and stuff, and he had a hospital arm badge tied on one arm (Jimmy tied it for him, actually), and a white bandage with fake blood on it on the other. I was like ?, but when Isolation came on it made sense. Then, after they left, he changed into his other outfit, which was like, a dress shirt with a black vest type thing that reminded me of something you’d buy at Moi-Meme-Moitie.
The show finally started at about 7:15, 45 minutes late.
The guys in Isolation came out one by one. The bassist came out first and did something that made me want to laugh but I can’t remember it anymore. I think cuz he was wearing the leg things that like, Jui would wear. You know what I mean. The guitarist who would be standing closest to me came out next. He like, licked his lips a lot and smiled real big. I had to try real hard to not chortle. Their drummer was fat. I was surprised. They should get him some meth. Their vocalist is not attractive, so good luck with that. Their one guitarist had a veil thing over this mouth.
At first I was quite intrigued by the guitarist in front of me. But after a bit I noticed he was just too pretty. Which was too bad, cuz I really approved of his make-up (the tried and true black eyelids with some sort of pink at the edges).
Then I looked over at the bassist. He was a more masculine improvement, and he had dimples when he would smile. Then he open-mouth smiled, which is the test of hotness for the Japanese population. He didn’t fare too well.
Everyone but the drummer was wearing white lab coats with fake blood all over. That made me want to laugh, too.
Their music wasn’t bad. They only played two songs, though, which was unfortunate. And the vocalist talked for so long after the first song. Asking if it was raining, asking who was from outside of Tokyo*, making fun of/with the other band members.
The second song they did kinda weird. They would like, pause it and say something, then start it back up again, which is probably how it’s written, but I wasn’t expecting it. At some point the vocalist noticed Old Guy, who was in the front row. He said something to him which I think had the word “ruuru” in it. I like to imagine he said “You’re old. We have rules against that.”
Then they left, and I’m like “That was only like 15 minutes.” Thinking that I wouldn’t wait too long for them to set up the stage, I stood around trying not to stare at Jimmy or the American girl with the awful hair cut. And I continued to do this for an hour. An hour of my life wasted.
Instead of the normal fare of random music that you probably aren’t familiar with, they played classical music. So I got to hear like, stringed quartets and stuff. It didn’t make the waiting easier.
When they were finally ready, they dimmed the lights, turned on the projector, and some music. There was a black curtain, and behind that, a white curtain. The pulled back the black curtain and showed this film. I was like “Is this German metal?” And I don’t know if it was, but a bunch of the words ended with -sch*spit* noises. It’s hard to articulate.
The video was like, some clouds, and a hallway, and a tree lined path, and I’m like “Is this a Windows ’95 screensaver or something?” Then it showed a picture of each member, fade that out, backlight the curtain, and you could see that member standing there on the box thing. It was pretty cool. At the end they did it with them all. But they were all in position to play, so the drummer wasn’t there.
I was blown away by a number of things about the show. The first was that they’re really good. The second is that Miko and Omi are really hot. The third was the drummer. Some of their songs in particular had fantastic beats and I’m still thinking about how much I need to get my hands on their music.
There was strobe lighting! I don’t know why I bullet pointed this here. They had really awesome, uber-fast strobes, too, that made it so much more impossible for any motion to look fluid, it was so awesome. It was so fast that it almost looked like the drummer wasn’t moving.
Now I talk about the members individually. Sorry, I don’t know the drummer’s or the bassist’s names.
Miko looks so much prettier in person. She has a nose and everything (victim of over contrast). Her head and face actually look a different shape that some of the pictures that I’ve seen of her, and I think her new hairstyle totally helps. She had on this really cool dress. It was ruffled and layered and had a bow on the back. And it was strapless, which meant you could like, watch her shoulders and stuff move when she played (I like watching the stuff in your back move around). She looked kinda, tall, too, but that could have just been in relation to everyone else. Or she could have been wearing gigantic shoes, like Omi. I don’t think she was. At one point her and Omi switched sides, and she was bouncing around, and there’s this grate thingie over her head, and Jou’s like “Watch out for that grate thing,” and Miko’s like “I know,” and I’m like “Aw.”
I think I spent most of my time watching Omi. Sometimes only cuz she was blocking my view of the drummer. She’s got some good hair, right now. Reminded me of Tsukasa circa Kogoeru Yoru ni Saita Hana. Good eye make-up, as I’m a huge fan of black lids. She also had a really nice stomach. I’d explain why, but I can’t do it without coming off as a creepy homo (which is usually what happens when I try to explain my attraction to any body part, minus the homo). I made eye contact with her at least once, I think. I’d say she was going for the angry musician look, but I’m not too sure.
I think the Drummer was amazing. Well, I’m not a drummer, but I’m pretty certain that I can say she’s really good. And she was like, bouncing around all over the place, it was so awesome. I don’t know how she stayed in her seat. I really had a good time watching her. It’s a shame drummers are always so far away. Also, I looked at her once in between a song and she was breathing so heavily. Poor drummers must be so tired after a show. And I bet that’s how Tero keeps the weight from all that cake off.
I don’t have too much to say about the Bassist. She didn’t move around too much. I wanted to see her face, but it was really hard cuz her hair was all in the way. She had a bass solo though, and that made me quite happy.
I like how Jou looks now more than how she looked before. She was wearing these black boots. Her, Hizumi, and Jui have taken on the black boots and I think it’s a good thing. She was wearing this black outfit but under certain lights it looked burgundy, and for a second there I thought it actually was burgundy cuz her belt still looked black. It was very weird. It wasn’t very easy to hear her over the other instruments, but I’m sure live houses that hold 50 people really don’t give the best audio. I liked her voice though. And she talked kind of quietly. And I don’t know what she was saying, but it didn’t have the same sort of attitude as the guys I’ve seen. That was just my impression, anyway.
There was this catwalk that went out into the audience. The thing about catwalks, is that they’re really nice and impressive when the crowd is dying to touch you. This wasn’t really the case, but they did the best they could with it. Jou went on it a couple times and Miko went on it once.
Either they can’t escape the fact that they’re girls, or this isn’t abnormal in indies, I haven’t seen enough shows to know which. But a couple times they threw in the some choreographed moves. They first time was at the beginning of the show. Everyone, minus drummer, was standing in a line, and they like, twirled backwards together. And like, some other time they all put their right hands up at the same time and took a step backward or something.
Now, I’m not gonna hate, cuz sometimes shit happens, but I still want to think that if it took you an hour to set up for the next band, absolutely nothing should go wrong. On the contrary, little things did happen throughout the show. I did, however, get to appreciate their fast-acting Roadie.
1. Not too far into the show, Jou’s mic died and Roadie handed her a corded one before she, or I, for that matter, even noticed. During one song the cord hit one of the Alices in the head.
2. Something happened with Miko’s guitar, and her and Roadie had to switch out during a song. They didn’t stop the song or anything, which was nice. At some point one of the two of them was holding this really awesome blue guitar and I’m like “Oh, is that what she’s switching to?” But she ended up rejoining the song with a different guitar.
3. I didn’t see how this started, but at one point, Roadie was leaning on the stage fiddling with Miko’s dress. I guess her bow was falling off or something?
4. I didn’t notice this one, either, but Roadie came on stage and had to mess around with one of the cymbals, cuz it seemed that the stand was loose. He ended up giving her a new stand in between songs.
I don’t want to talk about para para too much, but there was a difference here worth mentioning. First off, there was this one para para which including everyone in the front row (6-8 people) hopping onto the stage (about a yard), kneeling, and like, waving their head around or whatever. Secondly, they didn’t seem to have a para para half the time. So basically someone in the front of audience would do something and everyone around would start to do it, too. Example: During some song everyone’s standing around, cuz they were just done shaking their heads or something and were out of para para. Then this blonde girl in the front was like “I’m gonna do ‘Twists an orange off a tree branch while avoiding a fly that’s flying around your head’ para para.” And everyone around her notices and does it, too.
Also, since I was alone I wasn’t sure on my gaijin conduct. I hate para para, and there wasn’t enough people to “blend” into, so I wasn’t sure what to do. I decided I’d watch Jimmy and do what he did, which was nothing. I bobbed my head though. I was like “Should I smile? Would that make it look like I was having a good time?” I opted not to, though, as it could be misinterpreted *coughcoughallie*
They did two encores, which amounted to 3 songs. I didn’t really want to be there too much longer. It was getting late and I already wouldn’t be able to catch the last bus home, but I didn’t want them to get off without playing for very long, esp. considering how long we had to wait. Their set ended up being an hour and 20 minutes, which I’m okay with.
Some girls brought small bouquets of flowers, and gave one to each member. The drummer had already left the stage, so Jou took hers. I don’t remember what the others did, but when Omi got handed hers, she gave the girl who gave it to her a kiss on the hand. I thought that was interesting sociologically, and cuz I was slightly envious.
Also: when Omi left the stage, I forget when, but I think the last time, her guitar was still making guitar noises, and she was the last one off stage, and she kinda looked into the audience and did a sneer type thing and like, took the guitar off and just dropped it on the stage and walked off and I’m like “HOT.”
After the show I went to use my drink ticket. They had two menus, drink ticket only and drink ticket plus 100 yen. The drink ticket only menu was mostly non-alcoholic, so I ended up with a cup of Pepsi that cost me 600 yen.
Then I went home. I looked at the flyer thingies they gave me. It included a poster for Karakuri. Allie, can I really sell these things for money? Maybe only if people know who they are, I guess.
*I’m fairly certain that’s what was going on. He was like “If you’re from outside of Tokyo, clap.” Me and some other people clapped. “If you’re from outside of Kanto, clap.” I think Old Guy clapped. I thought that was crazy.
My favorite part about this past weekend was that not only did I not shower, but I spent two days of it in mostly the same clothes. I didn’t get time to shower until Sunday night and Saturday I didn’t want to take the time out to change clothes, so I just changed shirts. It made me feel all young and adult, running all over the city, going to parties, crashing at a friend’s house, changing just a shirt and then running off to a concert. And all this in spite of a typhoon going on around me and the threat of being stranded somewhere due to the trains stopping (though, fortunately, that never happened in my neck of the woods).
links:
What the duck?!
BBC Sentenced To Identifying And Correcting Every Lie In History By Decree Of An Angry Queen
This shirt reminds me of Emily
[Now I can add that to my collection of inappropriate use of Christian symbolism in Jrock]
I bought Cloud. What's Jui doing on the cover, reminding me of an Indian? It came with photo cards which I haven't looked at yet, but definitely looked like the gayer than gay things Jui showed at Vidokore. I also got the poster which I also haven't looked at either for obvious reasons.
I'm quite excited, but nothing can be done until I get back home tonight, whenever that will be. Me, Monique, Hiroko, and Jen (home stay girl) are going to Asakusa tonight.
On the academic side of things, I'm still fucked for one paper, but I started thinking up a thesis for my English paper yesterday, so I just need to flesh that out and email it for approval.
I just remembered that I agreed to check this girl's English in her paper. I hope she didn't plan on like, emailing it to me this weekend... I'll have to ask her about it.
Vidoll is this weekend! It's surprising how easily I keep forgetting. It's a busy time though, what with having to leave in 2 weeks and finals and papers and money woes. Oh well. I'm going to watch some Colbert.
Post 10 of your favorite songs that begin with a letter!
I got G
1. Gekiai Merry Go Round- Psycho le Cemu
I can still say this is one of my favorite songs by them, and not just because of the Dragon Ball Z para para. There was some para para I wouldn’t be ashamed to practice all alone with the door locked and the shades down.
2. Gekka no Yasoukyoku- Malice Mizer
Putting a Malice Mizer song down almost feel like a requirement. However, This song is fun to sing, and you got to love Gackt’s voice.
3. Gloire dans le Silence- Moi Dix Mois
I’ve been enjoying this song a lot lately. I can attribute some of that to the drum part, it gets caught in the head easily.
4. Grottesca- Kozi
I don’t know if there’s a song by Kozi that I honestly don’t like.
5. Go with the Flow- Queens of the Stone Age
This has been my favorite song by them for a long time, although I only have the one album. The video was really cool, too.
6. Guerrilla Radio- Rage Against the Machine
They were probably one of the first bands I listened to as a kid that had songs that just demanded you to turn the volume up. Blame them for my premature hearing loss.
7. Gothikaroid- Vidoll
This makes it on the list particularly because I’ve always really loved the opening. The guitar makes you think it’s one type of song, the synth, or whatever it is, makes you think it’s another, and then guitar comes back in, playing something completely different from both.
8. Gothic- D’espairsRay
The bass part is perhaps the sole reason this made the list. Yay, Zero!
9. Good Old Fashioned Lover Boy- Queen
Yay for Queen! I wish I had been around when they were.
10. Got to Stay Fly- Three 6 Mafia
idk how this song beat out my other 3 options, but I do like it. Like any good rap song, I like the beat, it makes me laugh, and one of the guys makes light of himself: “DJ Paul(?) is a dog, one you do not trust/ you leave your drink around me nigga yo’ drink gonna get drunk up/ you leave your green around me believe yo’ green gonna get lit up/ you leave your girl around me and if she’s fine she’s gonna get stuffed(?)” Also, I think the entire song is about smoking weed.
Here’s my weekend, in all its longwinded glory.
So let’s start with Friday night.
There was a CIEE farewell party at the Arcadia Hotel in Ichigaya. The lot of us walked over there. A bug landed on my face and I freaked out a little.
When we got there I met up with 母さん and told her that I was going to be going to two parties the next day. She told me that a typhoon was coming, but not to worry about it until Sunday. “Oh noes! The concert!” I said. She laughed.
When we toasted at the start of the party, 母さん was like “Oh, you want some tea or something?” cuz she was pouring my drink, and I’m like “Beer, plz,” (yeah, they actually had beer. We were all surprised) and she said “Wow.” Hearing Japanese people say wow cracks me up. Then I poured her drink, tea, and spilled all over, like the overgrown child I am.
We ate and other stuff happened and I got pictures. Particularly of this adorable kid who just ran all over.
After that was over, 母さん was like “I’m going home, peace out.” A large amount of us (some already quite drunk) went over to a combini, bought some liquor, and headed over to a park. Yeah, doesn’t that sound like the sketchiest thing ever? And yet it’s totally normal for a group of like, college age kids to load up on beer and sit around in the park at 10 pm.
I got pretty drunk off the atmosphere (cuz it wasn’t 3 beers and a Chu-hi, I’ll tell you that) and had a good time singing songs. (Chu-hi, like Smirnoff Ice, but not as good.) At some point two Japanese guys in the group near us decided they needed to take off their shirts for some reason. It was a Good Thing.
Eventually we all decided to go home. Everyone grabbed their things from off a bench. A purse and a Chu-hi was left behind, I grabbed both and brought up the rear. The purse was reclaimed, but the Chu-hi wasn’t. After a couple more questions, I found out it belonged to Drunky, who wasn’t allowed to have anymore, cuz he wasn’t able to walk under his own power. (Drunky, whose real name I forgot, is Lara’s friend, and Japanese. Japanese people have very low tolerances. They have one beer and their faces are red.) Thus, I was allowed to have it, and I opened readily.
I walked over to Kevin, and little ahead, and this exchange took place:
Me: Kevin! I got free liquor!
Kevin: Please tell me you opened that yourself.
Then when I was telling him how I got it, I tried drinking and talking at the same time, for some reason, which led to me coughing a lot and Chu-hi coming out of my nose. Pineapple joy.
We got to the station and Monique had to go to the bathroom.
Monique: The [western style toilet] was occupied and the girl in there was crying, so I knew she wouldn’t be out for a while.
She eventually did pee and we went home. I think the trip was happily uneventful.
Oh yeah, Monique slapped this guy at the park. That was pretty hilarious.
Saturday I get up and it’s raining. I was going to Chiba to do some English activities with Hiroko, so I needed to be at her station at 2:30.
The last time it took me about and hour and 40 minutes to get from her station to home, so I intended to catch the 12:50 bus. Except it was raining. So the bus never came. And when it did come it was stuck in traffic. And when I got off the bus to walk the rest of the way from the stop before last, the traffic MAGICALLY CLEARED UP.
When I did get to the station it’s 55 minutes later, 1:45. The train to Tokyo is a 20 minute ride. From Tokyo to her station is another hour. I emailed and told her I can’t get there at 2:30, so she says to come at 3:30.
I end up on a train at 2:20, so I end up getting to her station about 10 minutes early, and spent the time I realizing how much I’d like to eat at Lotteria again.
She met me and we went over to the library. There weren’t as many kids there cuz of the rain, but it was cool. They introduced themselves and asked me questions, and I only answered in English. One kid was pretty good.
Then The Most Adorable Dad Ever came to pick us up for the BBQ that I was supposed to be attending but wasn’t sure how it was supposed to continue with all the rain. I met him the last time I was in Chiba teaching English. Tadayoshi, maybe? He speaks really good English, idk if he’s fluent, though.
The BBQ was me, Hiroko, 4 parents, 7 kids, and this home stay girl from Wisconsin.
I gave Hiroko a survey to fill out for my Japanese class project, to which she responded “That’s not a survey, is it? I’ve done some many of these stupid things. Did you write this?”
She kept lying to people and telling them I’m good at Japanese.
I got asked the study abroad student’s favorite questions, which includes “Can you use chopsticks?”, “Do you think Japanese food is healthy?”, and “Do you think Japanese is the hardest language in the world?”
There were delicious, delicious meats, edamame, and yakisoba. There was also Spam.
Apparently, some girl from Hawaii once gave Hiroko some Spam, and she didn’t really know what to do with it, so she gave it to the people who were holding the BBQ.
I ate a couple pieces. It’s salty. Who else can say the first time they had Spam was in Japan?
The kids sang songs for us and we played London Bridge is Falling Down. At 7 Tadayoshi took me to the station. At some point around 7:15, I think, I was on the train. I got to Nishi-Funabashi, transferred from subway to JR, went a couple stops to Moto-Yawata, transferred from JR back to subway, and went to Kevin’s station.
I got there around 8:30ish. He gave me directions to his house:
“Go out of exit B1, turn right, go straight, you’ll cross a bridge. After you cross the bridge, go up about 3 lights, there’s a barber shop and a ramen house. You’ll see the barber pole on your left. Turn left there, walk until you cross over another bridge, and call me.”
I was fine up until the lights part. By the third light I hadn’t seen any barber pole. I remember he said “about.” So I figured it’d be okay if I went up another light. And low and behold, there was a barber shop pole. I looked for the ramen house. There were a lot of little shops that had names that weren’t ramen, but I figured that doesn’t mean they don’t sell ramen. Turned left and walked straight. Passed an elementary school. Thought about how freaked out I would be if I were in America, walking around in the rain at night, in an unfamiliar area. Crossed a bridge, called Kevin.
He lives in a 14 story building, and not too far from me was what looked to be a 14 story building. He was saying it was on my right, which it was. But when I actually walked toward it, it was on my left. That’s when I kinda knew things weren’t jiving. Plus, I accidentally walked down the nature path by the river, so I ended up in the back of the huge building.
When we realized that we might not be in the same place, Kevin told me to start yelling his name as loud as I could, which I did. And he couldn’t hear me.
I went back to the bridge and started over. I was supposed to walk straight (i.e. perpendicular to the river. Going to the other building was parallel) so I did. And I didn’t see him, or a 14 story building. We started describing the traffic around us. It was completely different.
I went back to the bridge and asked him what side of me the elementary school should have been on. He said right, and it was one my left, so I knew I had gone up one street too far. So I took a left at the bridge, and eventually saw Kevin heading towards me. We met up and walked to his place, which was very close.
He informed me that I need to drink up some of the liquor, cuz pretty much everyone bought a bottle of something, and there was a lot there still.
When I got to his place I was extra tired. I’d been traveling for 2 hours and walking around in the rain for a half an hour of that. I had even forgotten how badly I need to go to the bathroom.
I sat down and started talking to Monique. I remembered I had to go to the bathroom, and in the meantime she got me a Chu-hi. When I came back we looked at the various bottles on the table. There was a little Chianti left, and I drank some from the bottle. Caitlin has a picture of that :\
The spread was impressive, actually. There was wine, champagne, sake, shochu (foul, nasty stuff), chu-hi, beer, and scotch. I was thrilled that there was sake. I was at about half a can of Chu-hi when Monique went to the bathroom. Then I poured myself a paper cup of sake (smaller that like, your standard paper cup, bigger then the size you use for mouth wash and stuff). I drank it in two sips and one big gulp, noticed the pistachio nuts, and grabbed another Chu-hi so I wouldn’t have to get up when I was done with the first one.
By the time Monique got back I was incredibly buzzed. I can’t say drunk, really, but I was feeling it way more than I should have.
Monique: How did you get drunk so fast?!
Me: I drank while you were in the bathroom.
That sake was magic I tell you. I had like, 2 cups of that, and 3 Chu-his and I was doing quite well for myself. Had some ridiculous conversations with Monique and Oliver, played Wii tennis, and ate little sandwiches. I also drunk called Ben on Oliver’s phone.
Later we played Kings, or “This Game Wants to Kill your Liver.” It was quite enjoyable. This may be when I had my fourth Chu-hi. Then I ran out, but the game was still going, and there weren’t anymore Chu-his left, so I did the silliest thing I could possibly do and grabbed a can of Yebisu beer (as opposed to a cup of water. I knew I didn’t want to touch anything else on the table, and I had finished the sake).
About halfway through that can my stomach asked fairly nicely if I could get rid of the beer I’d ingested, and I obliged. Then a little later it told me there was still some left, so I went back to finish the job. Me and Kevin’s toilet bonded that night.
When I came back into the living room it was about 2 am. They had unfolded the couches and put out this amazingly comfortable futon with an amazingly soft pillow. I fell asleep within a couple minutes.
The next morning I felt a little groggy and weird, which happens often after I’ve been carousing. Kevin’s h-parents put on Pokemon (Kevin’s h-brother is 5) and we all (me, Kevin, h-fam, Oliver, and Monique) watched. Kevin’s h-dad gave us some tea. He put milk in it.
Monique: Is it a good idea for you to be drinking that?
Me: My stomach will tell me when I’m done.
…
Me: Yeah, my stomach said that was a bad idea.
I removed the tea from my system and we sat around a little bit. I wanted to leave at 10:30. I had to be at Jochi at 1 pm, and I had to go back to Yokohama to get the rest of my surveys. Monique wanted to stay a little longer, and I figured that wouldn’t be a problem.
We went to the station, got on a train, and got to Otemachi, where we can walk over to the Tokyo station through an underground path. Except, for some reason, the exit we took didn’t feed into the tunnel. So we wandered around a little, and ended up having to go outside (why didn’t we want to go outside? Cuz it was still raining). We walked over to the Tokyo station and got on a train home. Monique was skeptical about the weather conditions and me being able to make it to the concert.
I got to Kawasaki at about 12:15. It was impossible at that point for me to make it home and back on time, and I had already emailed my group about said fact. I waited for the bus. And I ended up waiting for half an hour. It wasn’t raining when I got to Kawasaki, but by the time the bus came, it had started. Then I got to Yokohama. It was sunny.
I got home and THE BABIES were here, asking me if I’d had lunch. Takato was wearing a shirt and underwear. He lifted up his shirt and was like “Look!” and I’m like “At what?”
I told 母さん that’d I’d been doing some drinking, so all I wanted was some plain toast and cold water.
She gave me a popsicle, too. She told me they're for babies. When she asked me if I was still going to the concert I told her I wasn’t sure cuz of the weather. She told me the typhoon had passed and not to worry about it. I was like “Yeah, but what about in Tokyo?” And she’s like “It’ll be fine.”
When I went downstairs to leave, Hayato kept saying “unko” and I wasn’t sure why till he walked over to the bathroom.
Then when I was leaving, 母さん came downstairs and said bye, as she was headed outside for some reason. When I was getting my shoes on I heard Takato run downstairs.
Takato: Byebye!
Me: Byebye- You are naked.
母さん: Haha!
So that was unexpected.
Then I left for school, and I didn’t get there until 2:45.
We worked on our project for about 2 hours. I debated with myself about the weather, since it was really dark in Tokyo, and whether or not I should go to the show. I decided I would and I took my leave and headed for Ikebukuro. On the way my mp3 player died.
I got there and bought my ticket. Either they disregarded my name being on the reserve list twice, or one of the reservation services didn’t work.
It was 5:30, and doors didn’t open till 6. I remembered I was hungry. I also remembered I was really broke. I had enough change in my coin purse to buy an onigiri, and I ate it while this pigeon stared me down. It was delicious. Then it made me more hungry, which was sad.
At some point I realized that this woman seemed to be saying something about ticket numbers a ways away from me. For whatever reason, when you first crowd around waiting for the queue at Ikebukuro Cyber, you do it at this concrete place a little ways from the live house, not in front of the live house itself (probably to keep people from crowding the street, in retrospect. Minor streets in Japan don’t have sidewalks, and most of the streets in Japan are minor streets, it seems). I was suspicious of this, since I saw the type of people there, which included a girl with blue hair, two girls dressed like Alice from Alice in Wonderland, and a white guy I was incidentally on the look out for. I walked over and asked some girls if this was for Exist Trace and they said yes.
The woman looking at tickets saw my number, was surprised for some reason, and moved me up to like 6 or 7 people behind the head of the line. I don’t know what happened there. Then we queued up along the live house and waited for a long time. It started to rain. We finally got in around 6:30, which was when the show was supposed to start. I grabbed Allie a photo book, which left me with only the change in my wallet and the money I needed to put on my Suica to get home (I should have visited the bank before I went, but it’s a good thing I went broke, as I probably would have bought a cd).
The live house is really, really small. Add a Japanese audience to that fact and there was plenty of standing room.
There was this really adorable kid standing in front of me. I wanted to like, pet his hair, he was so cute.
I saw Jimmy there. He’s a guy who’s blog Allie reads. He goes to all the Exist Trace shows, and I don’t blame him. He also must speak fluent Japanese, cuz I saw him chatting and meeting all sorts of people, including Old Guy.
Old Guy is this Japanese guy who was there, obviously. I can’t rightly determine his age. He looked younger without his glasses on, I found out later, but with them on, I thought that maybe, attempting to follow the add 10 years rule, he could be in his late 30s. I couldn’t conceive of him being older than 40, but he def. wasn’t in his 20s, I bet. The more interesting thing about Old Guy was that he had outfits for each band (and he did para para). So he came in one outfit. And then since Isolation was playing, he put on this white shirt with like, detachable sleeves and stuff, and he had a hospital arm badge tied on one arm (Jimmy tied it for him, actually), and a white bandage with fake blood on it on the other. I was like ?, but when Isolation came on it made sense. Then, after they left, he changed into his other outfit, which was like, a dress shirt with a black vest type thing that reminded me of something you’d buy at Moi-Meme-Moitie.
The show finally started at about 7:15, 45 minutes late.
The guys in Isolation came out one by one. The bassist came out first and did something that made me want to laugh but I can’t remember it anymore. I think cuz he was wearing the leg things that like, Jui would wear. You know what I mean. The guitarist who would be standing closest to me came out next. He like, licked his lips a lot and smiled real big. I had to try real hard to not chortle. Their drummer was fat. I was surprised. They should get him some meth. Their vocalist is not attractive, so good luck with that. Their one guitarist had a veil thing over this mouth.
At first I was quite intrigued by the guitarist in front of me. But after a bit I noticed he was just too pretty. Which was too bad, cuz I really approved of his make-up (the tried and true black eyelids with some sort of pink at the edges).
Then I looked over at the bassist. He was a more masculine improvement, and he had dimples when he would smile. Then he open-mouth smiled, which is the test of hotness for the Japanese population. He didn’t fare too well.
Everyone but the drummer was wearing white lab coats with fake blood all over. That made me want to laugh, too.
Their music wasn’t bad. They only played two songs, though, which was unfortunate. And the vocalist talked for so long after the first song. Asking if it was raining, asking who was from outside of Tokyo*, making fun of/with the other band members.
The second song they did kinda weird. They would like, pause it and say something, then start it back up again, which is probably how it’s written, but I wasn’t expecting it. At some point the vocalist noticed Old Guy, who was in the front row. He said something to him which I think had the word “ruuru” in it. I like to imagine he said “You’re old. We have rules against that.”
Then they left, and I’m like “That was only like 15 minutes.” Thinking that I wouldn’t wait too long for them to set up the stage, I stood around trying not to stare at Jimmy or the American girl with the awful hair cut. And I continued to do this for an hour. An hour of my life wasted.
Instead of the normal fare of random music that you probably aren’t familiar with, they played classical music. So I got to hear like, stringed quartets and stuff. It didn’t make the waiting easier.
When they were finally ready, they dimmed the lights, turned on the projector, and some music. There was a black curtain, and behind that, a white curtain. The pulled back the black curtain and showed this film. I was like “Is this German metal?” And I don’t know if it was, but a bunch of the words ended with -sch*spit* noises. It’s hard to articulate.
The video was like, some clouds, and a hallway, and a tree lined path, and I’m like “Is this a Windows ’95 screensaver or something?” Then it showed a picture of each member, fade that out, backlight the curtain, and you could see that member standing there on the box thing. It was pretty cool. At the end they did it with them all. But they were all in position to play, so the drummer wasn’t there.
I was blown away by a number of things about the show. The first was that they’re really good. The second is that Miko and Omi are really hot. The third was the drummer. Some of their songs in particular had fantastic beats and I’m still thinking about how much I need to get my hands on their music.
There was strobe lighting! I don’t know why I bullet pointed this here. They had really awesome, uber-fast strobes, too, that made it so much more impossible for any motion to look fluid, it was so awesome. It was so fast that it almost looked like the drummer wasn’t moving.
Now I talk about the members individually. Sorry, I don’t know the drummer’s or the bassist’s names.
Miko looks so much prettier in person. She has a nose and everything (victim of over contrast). Her head and face actually look a different shape that some of the pictures that I’ve seen of her, and I think her new hairstyle totally helps. She had on this really cool dress. It was ruffled and layered and had a bow on the back. And it was strapless, which meant you could like, watch her shoulders and stuff move when she played (I like watching the stuff in your back move around). She looked kinda, tall, too, but that could have just been in relation to everyone else. Or she could have been wearing gigantic shoes, like Omi. I don’t think she was. At one point her and Omi switched sides, and she was bouncing around, and there’s this grate thingie over her head, and Jou’s like “Watch out for that grate thing,” and Miko’s like “I know,” and I’m like “Aw.”
I think I spent most of my time watching Omi. Sometimes only cuz she was blocking my view of the drummer. She’s got some good hair, right now. Reminded me of Tsukasa circa Kogoeru Yoru ni Saita Hana. Good eye make-up, as I’m a huge fan of black lids. She also had a really nice stomach. I’d explain why, but I can’t do it without coming off as a creepy homo (which is usually what happens when I try to explain my attraction to any body part, minus the homo). I made eye contact with her at least once, I think. I’d say she was going for the angry musician look, but I’m not too sure.
I think the Drummer was amazing. Well, I’m not a drummer, but I’m pretty certain that I can say she’s really good. And she was like, bouncing around all over the place, it was so awesome. I don’t know how she stayed in her seat. I really had a good time watching her. It’s a shame drummers are always so far away. Also, I looked at her once in between a song and she was breathing so heavily. Poor drummers must be so tired after a show. And I bet that’s how Tero keeps the weight from all that cake off.
I don’t have too much to say about the Bassist. She didn’t move around too much. I wanted to see her face, but it was really hard cuz her hair was all in the way. She had a bass solo though, and that made me quite happy.
I like how Jou looks now more than how she looked before. She was wearing these black boots. Her, Hizumi, and Jui have taken on the black boots and I think it’s a good thing. She was wearing this black outfit but under certain lights it looked burgundy, and for a second there I thought it actually was burgundy cuz her belt still looked black. It was very weird. It wasn’t very easy to hear her over the other instruments, but I’m sure live houses that hold 50 people really don’t give the best audio. I liked her voice though. And she talked kind of quietly. And I don’t know what she was saying, but it didn’t have the same sort of attitude as the guys I’ve seen. That was just my impression, anyway.
There was this catwalk that went out into the audience. The thing about catwalks, is that they’re really nice and impressive when the crowd is dying to touch you. This wasn’t really the case, but they did the best they could with it. Jou went on it a couple times and Miko went on it once.
Either they can’t escape the fact that they’re girls, or this isn’t abnormal in indies, I haven’t seen enough shows to know which. But a couple times they threw in the some choreographed moves. They first time was at the beginning of the show. Everyone, minus drummer, was standing in a line, and they like, twirled backwards together. And like, some other time they all put their right hands up at the same time and took a step backward or something.
Now, I’m not gonna hate, cuz sometimes shit happens, but I still want to think that if it took you an hour to set up for the next band, absolutely nothing should go wrong. On the contrary, little things did happen throughout the show. I did, however, get to appreciate their fast-acting Roadie.
1. Not too far into the show, Jou’s mic died and Roadie handed her a corded one before she, or I, for that matter, even noticed. During one song the cord hit one of the Alices in the head.
2. Something happened with Miko’s guitar, and her and Roadie had to switch out during a song. They didn’t stop the song or anything, which was nice. At some point one of the two of them was holding this really awesome blue guitar and I’m like “Oh, is that what she’s switching to?” But she ended up rejoining the song with a different guitar.
3. I didn’t see how this started, but at one point, Roadie was leaning on the stage fiddling with Miko’s dress. I guess her bow was falling off or something?
4. I didn’t notice this one, either, but Roadie came on stage and had to mess around with one of the cymbals, cuz it seemed that the stand was loose. He ended up giving her a new stand in between songs.
I don’t want to talk about para para too much, but there was a difference here worth mentioning. First off, there was this one para para which including everyone in the front row (6-8 people) hopping onto the stage (about a yard), kneeling, and like, waving their head around or whatever. Secondly, they didn’t seem to have a para para half the time. So basically someone in the front of audience would do something and everyone around would start to do it, too. Example: During some song everyone’s standing around, cuz they were just done shaking their heads or something and were out of para para. Then this blonde girl in the front was like “I’m gonna do ‘Twists an orange off a tree branch while avoiding a fly that’s flying around your head’ para para.” And everyone around her notices and does it, too.
Also, since I was alone I wasn’t sure on my gaijin conduct. I hate para para, and there wasn’t enough people to “blend” into, so I wasn’t sure what to do. I decided I’d watch Jimmy and do what he did, which was nothing. I bobbed my head though. I was like “Should I smile? Would that make it look like I was having a good time?” I opted not to, though, as it could be misinterpreted *coughcoughallie*
They did two encores, which amounted to 3 songs. I didn’t really want to be there too much longer. It was getting late and I already wouldn’t be able to catch the last bus home, but I didn’t want them to get off without playing for very long, esp. considering how long we had to wait. Their set ended up being an hour and 20 minutes, which I’m okay with.
Some girls brought small bouquets of flowers, and gave one to each member. The drummer had already left the stage, so Jou took hers. I don’t remember what the others did, but when Omi got handed hers, she gave the girl who gave it to her a kiss on the hand. I thought that was interesting sociologically, and cuz I was slightly envious.
Also: when Omi left the stage, I forget when, but I think the last time, her guitar was still making guitar noises, and she was the last one off stage, and she kinda looked into the audience and did a sneer type thing and like, took the guitar off and just dropped it on the stage and walked off and I’m like “HOT.”
After the show I went to use my drink ticket. They had two menus, drink ticket only and drink ticket plus 100 yen. The drink ticket only menu was mostly non-alcoholic, so I ended up with a cup of Pepsi that cost me 600 yen.
Then I went home. I looked at the flyer thingies they gave me. It included a poster for Karakuri. Allie, can I really sell these things for money? Maybe only if people know who they are, I guess.
*I’m fairly certain that’s what was going on. He was like “If you’re from outside of Tokyo, clap.” Me and some other people clapped. “If you’re from outside of Kanto, clap.” I think Old Guy clapped. I thought that was crazy.
My favorite part about this past weekend was that not only did I not shower, but I spent two days of it in mostly the same clothes. I didn’t get time to shower until Sunday night and Saturday I didn’t want to take the time out to change clothes, so I just changed shirts. It made me feel all young and adult, running all over the city, going to parties, crashing at a friend’s house, changing just a shirt and then running off to a concert. And all this in spite of a typhoon going on around me and the threat of being stranded somewhere due to the trains stopping (though, fortunately, that never happened in my neck of the woods).
links:
What the duck?!
BBC Sentenced To Identifying And Correcting Every Lie In History By Decree Of An Angry Queen
This shirt reminds me of Emily