LooP OF HEAVEN EPISODE 12
2002/02/21, Shibuya On Air West
Vanilla, Phobia, Nightmare, Fatima, D'espairs Ray, Aioria
 

Vanilla
We arrived during the middle of their set, and as seems to be usual at these On Air West things, wound up packed in the doorway for the entire thing. I think this band was Vanilla... It's a good name for them. The vocalist had a wool jacket and scarf look going on, and I was SURE I'd seen them before. I still think they looked and sounded awfully like some other band I saw at On Air... Hanoru, maybe? Well, whatever, I couldn't really see them and wasn't that impressed by their music.

After their set, everybody shuffled about and we were able to get out of the doorway. Go, scube, and Kimberly were there so we joined them.

Phobia
Cool. ^_^ They did "Kamen Butokai" again -- I think it must be a staple of their performances. Everything about their set was good... the only weird thing is that Kisui licked a lot. I don't know if this was part of the act or if that fake blood all over his face was super sticky and strawberry-flavored. In any case, he kept licking around his lips with BIG BIG licks.

Nightmare
I didn't recognize them and had forgotten who was supposed to be playing tonight, so I asked Go. He said Fatima, not having ever seen them and forgotten the names of all the bands on the ticket. (It happens.) So I mostly spent this set trying to reconcile the image that I'd had of "super-sexy" Fatima vocalist Sanaka from everybody's descriptions with the average-looking guy that was onstage. Nice looking, but not sexy. Nope. Certainly not worthy of what's been written about Sanaka, even if Sanaka has recently cut his hair and isn't looking so outlandish anymore. Finally I realized it had to be a name mixup. Anyway, Nightmare was middle-of-the-road indies visual. Honestly, I can't think of a single thing about them that you wouldn't already expect from that description.

Fatima
So yes, Sanaka actually is super-sexy, and you don't need to worry that you'll mistake him for anybody else even if you've never seen him before. ^^; He had short hair and very little makeup, which had the effect of making him look a little like a younger, taller, and thinner Hyde. The rest of the band ranged from boring visual-style suits to actual fashion DON'Ts. Both the guitarists looked like walking examples of what nobody should ever wear. Lots of dead furry things piled on one shoulder, and sequined sparkly stuff all over the rest of the costume, and hair and makeup that was totally unsuited to their face and body types. They were BOTH wearing variations on this. These two guys are SO in need of a makeover it isn't even funny. But whatever, nobody was looking at them anyway. Sanaka is the star of the show.

What did Sanaka do? Well, he wasn't wearing the infamous catsuit, just a red stretchy tank top and long denim gal skirt with a black leather jacket and some belts. It doesn't sound like such a wild outfit. What he did with it, though... The first part of the set was pretty mild. He didn't do anything except slide his hand down the front of his skirt and fondle himself a bit once. But then as the set progressed, he jumped up on the drum riser and spread his legs wide, pulled the skirt slit open to reveal thigh-high stockings, and did something to his groin area that I couldn't see because everybody in front of me suddenly stood on their toes to get a good view of this. At the end of the set, he pulled at the jacket like he was going to do a striptease, then vanished to the floor. So again, I didn't get to see what he did. (-_-;) When he stood up some time later, the jacket was gone and the tank top was pushed completely down by his belts. I can only imagine that whatever he did down there, it must have been pretty interesting.

Musically, Fatima wasn't so hot. They don't really have either melody or heaviness. (^^;) I don't suppose many people are into them for the music, though...

The Scent of Fatima
For some reason, the scents at Japanese concerts have never been quite what I expected. I'm used to smelling everything from rancid sweat to beer to cigarette/marijuana smoke, but you rarely smell any of these at Japanese shows.

Anyway, after Fatima's set Go and I moved up toward front and center to get a good place for D'espairs Ray, and there was an extremely strong smell in the air... It smelled like... fish... except... a little different somehow... (^^;;;) I couldn't believe it. The air was ripe with the scent. Maybe somebody brought food. Japanese people eat a lot of fish, after all. But... there would have had to be an awful lot of smashed fish in people's handbags to make that kind of smell, and I just don't think that many girls brought lunch to the show... You know what I'm getting at, right? It's unbelievable. You go to a punk concert, and it smells like male sweat. The Dead Pop Stars make the room smell like Vidal Sassoon shampoo. Sanaka gets onstage, and the room reeks of fish. What is the world coming to?

D'espairs Ray
I'm not exactly sure what they did. See, I was standing there to get a good view of them, and then the crowd went nuts. At which point I concluded that this was Therapy, a way of working out frustration, and I decided that I might as well get into it too. Like when you're on a crowded train and irritated and annoyed as all heck at being crushed, but you have to stand there silent and patient. It's just as crowded in the front during a D'espairs Ray set, but you're allowed to beat people up during the show! Yeah! Somebody in back whangs you on the head with their elbow during a running flying leap? Jump on the poor schmuck in front of you! Kick that fist in the air! Dude, when this kind of thing happens in America I get killed 'cause I'm so small, but it's fun when everybody else is tiny too. So it was cool. ^_^ I'm kind of sore and bruised, though...

We thought this would probably be the end of the show. When we arrived, Go said that Aioria had already been on and done a little 2-song set. That was really surprising and disappointing, as they were the band I came to see... So we were going to leave after D'espairs Ray. Go, Kimberly, and scube went outside while I went to collect my coat from the pile, but then Emmet noticed that not everybody was going out. I asked the girl at the ticket counter if the show was over, and she told me that Aioria was going to play next. Whoo-hoo! ^_^ Emmet went outside to get them, but for some reason I didn't understand (even if you're tired, Aioria is awesome!) they decided not to come back in. (I think.) As usual, I parked myself in front of Michiru.

Aioria
Well... this is the third time I've seen them now, and except for a slightly different set list, this was a lot like the other two shows... At the two previous ones, they did "Ibara no Mori", but not tonight. Instead, they did "Matataki". "Hana Kotoba" and "Fantasia" were performed as usual. There was another song that I've only heard at lives, and one more that maybe I never heard before. Hm... "Hana Kotoba" is more fun each time I see it. I think it's replacing "Fantasia" as my favorite. The hand-waving thing is so much fun... For the pre-chorus, you wave your arm with your fingers in a kind of gun-shape, but not that high; and when it switches to the chorus, you stick all the fingers out and wave your arm at full height back and forth. (Just so you know, in case you like to wave your arms when you listen to music at home. ^^;) The chorus is a lot bouncier live than on the recorded version. Oh, and I'm finally getting the hang of the para-para! I guess if one does anything enough times, even an uncoordinated klutz like me will figure it out eventually.

By the way, Misa plays all kinds of things. He uses a different instrument for each song, including a keyboard-on-a-stick thing. Misa also does all the backup vocals... the only thing Michiru uses his microphone stand for is to hang his sachet bag of candy.

 

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