"All Genre Event 2005 * Haru no Jin"
April 13, 2005
Shibuya O-East
This was surreal. o_o
Tonight's lineup:
Kra
A bunch of comedians
Lareine
More comedians
Asuka
Kra's one of the typical sorts of up-and-coming young visual bands. Cute, punky, energetic, some melodic parts for the CDs, some aerobic stuff for concerts. They're good at it, but I would have a difficult time distinguishing from any other of the 100 bands which fit that same description. Kra was okay on O-East's big stage, neither good nor bad. They didn't give the feeling of filling it with their presence, but they also didn't seem completely overwhelmed by it. The one thing which really grabbed my attention is their bass player. He plays with his fingers, not a pick, and makes full use of the expanded flexibility that technique allows. Oh yeah, and during one of their MCs they talked about Kamijo's hair, awed by the long curls.
No surprise, Kra had an army of sakuing teenage girls supporting them. I noticed that there were a number of genial middle-aged men scattered through the audience as well... I knew they weren't Lareine fans so I wondered if they might be Kra's uncles, or something like that.
After Kra's set, the little stage on the right opened up for the first batch of comedians. They must have been pretty funny because the whole audience was laughing, but for the most part, I found the comedians pretty boring due to poor Japanese skills. I have a hard enough time with normal Japanese speech -- comedians' super-fast and slangy Japanese is almost completely incomprehensible. About the only thing I could figure out is that ALL the comedians were impressed/amused by the sakuing Kra fans. The comedians couldn't get over the sakus. They kept telling the fans to do it. The MCs did a talking/comedy/interview segment with Kra at the end.
Lareine was scheduled for next. The Fleur had a bit of difficulty getting some of the Kra fans out of the saizen and it created problems for the proper distribution of fans. But eventually the Kra fans did finally leave so that the Fleur could plant themselves on the rail. I wound up front row near the center, not that it really means anything for a Lareine set at O-East. There's a gap between the rail and stage so no one's getting close anyway.
When the curtains opened, it was a pleasant surprise because unlike the inexperienced Kra, Lareine EASILY dominates a large stage like that. The brightly colored "Never Cage" costumes make each member distinct and highly visible. They know how to move to make use of the space. Many of the livehouses they play nowadays are too small for their staging skills and they seem cramped, so it was a real pleasure to see them in a place where they have room to breathe.
The set was a short one. "Gerbe", "Tenshi ni koishita shoujo no yume", "Urei no hana ga tsuzuru ai", and "Lillie Charlotte". Well, 3 of those songs are old ones that had the staging planned back when Lareine routinely played large livehouses so they were good matches. In small livehouses they have to delay and modify the choreography; this time it flowed very smoothly. For "Tenshi", they again had bubble snow. It was really beautiful tonight! The lights over the stage were dimmed so that it was black, with white lights coming from the audience direction to catch the falling snow. Best stage snow I've ever seen. And this time they had the good sense to only run the snow machine at the beginning and end of the song so that the fans in front didn't get drowned by it. There were piles of their symbolic flowers scattered around Kazumi's drums (probably the same flowers tossed by Fleur at past concerts, I guess Kamijo doesn't eat all the plastic flowers he gets), daisies on Emiru's microphone, lilies on Mayu's. At the end of the set, each of them took one of their symbol flowers and they went to the middle of the stage to touch them together, and then came to the stage front. All of them tossed their flowers except Kamijo. -__-
Then more comedians on the small stage. X_X; I went for a long cigarette break, figuring it would be much like the previous comedy segment... 2 or 3 comedy groups, then the MC guys talking to the bands. Bingo, sorta.
The MC brought out a couple of the leaders of the comedy groups, Kra's pink-haired drummer, and Kamijo who entered eating a flower. (The flower was the blue plastic-and-silk kind, NOT edible, and one of the MCs made him stop.) They were supposed to answer strange questions in a funny way. It became clear immediately that Kamijo was not going to lose to the comedians, taking advantage of his flamboyant appearance to get the other guys accusing EACH OTHER of being gay. *LOL* Too bad for me, Kamijo and Pink-san were the only two guys on that stage speaking like normal people so while I could sorta figure out what they said, it still didn't make any sense without the context of the rest of the conversation. x_x Well, Pink-san was only MOSTLY normal... he couldn't resist a "Bonjour honey!" *LOL*
Then, argh, the main stage got taken over by yet more groups of comedians. I went in and out, waiting for the next band interview or a session thing. It was worthwhile because there was a band interview. The MC said he'd give us a hint...
*Lareine fans inch closer, sure that they deserve more of their guys*
MC: The hint is... "Bara!" ("Rose")
*Lareine fans rush the small stage, whipping flowers out of bags*
It was only Kamijo who came out for the interview. I wonder if no one else in the band feels confident enough to stand up to a comedian MC? But Kamijo did a good job. He has a HUGE advantage when it comes to saying funny things because of the way he looks... glamorous, ethereal, too delicate to brush his own hair out of his eyes. So even if he says something really boring and mundane, it's hilarious because it doesn't match the image. But he's also shameless when it comes to overdoing the persona to turn it into parody. *LOL*
MC: What do you like to eat?
Kamijo: Unagi... and natto rice.
Audience: HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!! *dying of laughter because this ridiculously glamorous person mentioned ordinary natto rice*
MC: Do you play sports?
Audience: *giggles*
Kamijo: Yes, tennis!
Audience: HAHAHAHA!!!!!!
MC: *blinking* HOW do you play tennis like that? o_O
Audience: *giggles*
Kamijo: *foppishly flicks his wrist in a parody of whacking a racket, with a falsetto "oh!" as it strikes the ball*
vAudience: *shrieks and falls over dead from comedy overload*
The last musical act was Asuka. Adult contemporary ballads with a modern "acoustic" arrangement and a female singer. This was who all those mysterious middle-aged men came to see! Asuka wasn't really to my taste but the male fans certainly enjoyed the performance in their own mellow way.