Vicarious Tales:
Ongaku Gatas Spring 2010 Concerts
at Zepp
Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan (March 27, 2010)
by P. Kristen Enos
(Originally posted April 3, '10.)
Please
no posting anywhere else without my permission!
Back to the main page
for the Tokyo Trip
Parts:
Hell, Yeah, I'm
Going!!!
Tickets! Tickets! Who
had
tickets?!
Concert Prep
Arriving
Supporting The Japanese Economy
Concerts' Tidbits
Visiting Wota-ville
Hell,
Yeah, I'm Going!!!
When it was announced
that the Japanese Idol Pop singing group Ongaku
Gatas (OG) were going to have a series of five
concerts in March, my first thought was "I am
sooo there!" This was a golden opportunity
in my eyes that I was not about to pass up for
several reasons.
After being a fan of
Hello! Project acts since 2000 (though admittedly
not for the entire time), I own many, many of their
concert DVDs but never really made the effort to see
a live performance. Well, then I became a
hardcore fan of two of their singers, Rika Ishikawa
and Hitomi "Yossy" Yoshizawa (a.k.a., IshiYoshi)
towards the end of 2008. At the time, their
main singing group, Ongaku Gatas, had just launched
a concert series for the end of the year, of which I
could only learn about on the Internet.
Yet missing the 2008
OG concerts was fine since IshiYoshi had just
launched their newly formed (non-H!P affiliated)
singing duo Hangry & Angry. And the great
thing about H&A was the marketing to international
fans, which were opportunities that I
whole-heartedly took advantage of, (which are
documented in some of my other
Vicarious Tales, with their appearances
in Seattle, Los Angeles and Paris.) I also
wanted to see them perform in their H&A concert series
in mid-February in Japan but that had fallen through
at the last minute for me.
When this latest OG
concert series were announced, there were fan rumors
that OG may dissolve after this tour. While I
definitely didn't want that to happened, I was also
disgruntled at not being able to enjoy their H&A
concerts in Paris and in Japan, so I vowed that I
would not miss this next opportunity to see
IshiYoshi "live", and as "IshiYoshi".
Well, I admit "as
'IshiYoshi'" was still TBD. Fans like myself
know very well that the last OG concert tour in late
2008 was right after the controversial dressing room
"kiss" moment in their "Come Together" video.
The public reaction was enough that someone
(management, producers, whoever in charge) minimized
interactions between the two of them in this
concert, allowing them only a final high-five at the
very end, according to the recorded DVD version.
Very, very disappointing and ultimately made me glad
that I hadn't gone to see that particular concert
series after all.
Despite the return of
the Invisible Barrier between IshiYoshi, I looked
forward to this new concert both as a performance
and as a holistic experience of what the Japanese
audience would be like, especially the hard-core
fans known as "Wota's".
Tickets!
Tickets! Who Had Tickets?!
The first challenge
was trying to get my hands on some tickets for the
afternoon and evening concerts on 3/27. (Two
concerts for the price of one trip was the extra
zing for me.) I could see that there were two
types offered: general standing tickets or what I
could read as "family" tickets. In looking at
the venue map for Zepp Tokyo, I assumed the "family"
tickets were up in the back balcony area, which is
what I really didn't want, even though I probably
could have had a good view of the crowd below for
people watching.
My preferred proxy
service would only order tickets that were won
through auctions or secondary outlets. I
wanted to make sure there wasn't anything "funny"
with my tickets so I wanted them ordered through
official channels. So I submitted an order
with a different proxy service (which required me to
pay the full price upfront as a deposit), which I
did the week the tickets were available to the
general public (approximately five weeks before the
concerts on 3/27). Now it was a matter of
waiting.
Well, a week had gone
by and after some email follow up, I found out that
the service had "technical issues" and were trying
to work through them before they could place the
order, which could not be "cancelled" according to
their general policies. That did not make me
happy, but my money was already committed to them.
However, I was not about to make travel arrangements
when I didn't have a guarantee of being able to get
to the event. (At the time, it was the only
reason why I was going to Japan.)
Yet another week had
gone by (and the concert was now a little two over
weeks away.) I was definitely not pleased
because now airfare cost had gone up considerably
but, again, I wasn't about to go if I couldn't be
guaranteed to get into the concerts.
Since time was
ticking, I had a choice to make: do I make
travel arrangements anyway and pursue other means of
getting a ticket (knowing I'll deal with my proxy
service later), or do I just give up and possibly
end up with tickets as the last minute and eat the
cost? I decided to book the trip anyway.
I originally planned to fly out of LAX on Thursday,
arrive in Tokyo on Friday and fly back on Sunday.
The only thing I didn't want to compromise on was
arriving at least one day before the Saturday
concerts so it would give me a chance to adjust a
bit to the time-difference and recover from jet lag.
Since I had no other concrete plans in Tokyo and
could make it a pretty relaxing schedule otherwise,
it felt like a good plan. It then turned out
that it was the same cost for me to fly out on
Wednesday for both airfare and hotel, so after
bargaining with The Boss, I was able to score an
extra day off in an otherwise crazy work schedule.
(Hey, I got her a "Twilight"
t-shirt at last year's San Diego Comic Con!)
Shortly after I made
my airfare and hotel arrangements, I got the
confirmation email from the proxy service that the
tickets were ordered!
I was elated that
things had finally fallen into place! The only
hiccup now was that the tickets had to be delivered
to the proxy service headquarters in Japan, and then
delivered to me before I left for Tokyo. With
the timing being so tight, the service coordinator
offered to send the tickets directly to my hotel for
when I arrived on Thursday. I admit that
option made me nervous because it meant the
possibility something could be screwed up and I
would have very little time to try to fix it.
But it was now a matter of having faith in Japanese
processes.
And then when I
ordered my "Dietrich" musical ticket, the proxy
service had to send it in the same package. So
there was even more pressure that things would work out upon
my arrival.
But luckily it worked
out, or else I wouldn't be writing my reports.
I will admit though that the ONLY word I
looked up in my Japanese-English phrase book for the
entire trip was 'tegami' (mail) for the hotel clerk,
not having seen that she already had the envelope
out and ready for me to sign when I checked in.
Silly me for doubting the Japanese system.
Concert Prep
The one thing that
really worked in my favor, even prior to me leaving
for Tokyo, was that
Hello! Store USA offered a lot of the OG
concert goods (photos and t-shirts) on their
website. Since I'm into collecting official
photos of IshiYoshi, I happily placed my order from
home so I would have less to worry about in terms of
paying for and transporting concert merchandise.
Of course, the store didn't offer the entire
selection of OG goods, so I would still have to buy
some at the venue, which also meant that I had to
pick up some extras for some online friends.
I admit I did
contemplate getting the t-shirt sets for Rika and
Yossy prior to the trip. These sets consisted
of a t-shirt and matching wristband in each woman's
official color and team number (they're all part of
a futsal team after all) and two individual photos.
While I wanted the photos, I didn't feel like paying
$40+ each for the shirts and wristbands that I had
absolutely no intention of wearing.
Despite the absolute
fiasco of the "Dietrich" play, I surprisingly woke
up without any signs of a cold. A little tired
still from jet-lag and time difference but otherwise
fine. Well, my feet and legs ached still,
which meant that I had to be sure to sit down every
time there was an opportunity.
Also having learnt my
lessons from the night before, I thoroughly used my
internet connection in my hotel room to look up (1)
where I could get cash and (2) where the concert
venue was. The cash thing would be solved by
making my own maps to a couple of potential
locations back in Shibuya (seems like I just can't
get away from that place.) The venue, on the
other hand, proved a little more challenging,
despite coming across a couple of English language
sites that tried to describe how to get there.
I went to at least three websites that had maps and
tried to analyze them, one that even had satellite
images. I finally just had to have the belief
that showing up in the area early enough and fully
prepared this time should make things work out.
Plus, it helped that
the venue, Zepp Tokyo, was just two train stops away
from my hotel so the travel time would be minimal,
allowing me to rest up as much as possible before
leaving.
Arriving
I should have known
better than to be worried about not finding the
venue. There were several people on my train
that looked suspiciously like they were going to the
same place and it would just be a matter of
following them. And I was right.
I also quickly saw
why I had some difficulty figuring out the location
of the building from the various maps because it was
part of a huge complex of shops and convention
center-like show rooms. (Toyota had several mini-cars
out on display.) My first view of the venue
came when I was on the second floor of the giant
glass building that had the car show and then stepped
outside through one of the main exits. The
walkway overlooked the front of the venue, where
several concert-goers were already gathered in
preparation for the 3p afternoon show that would
have the doors open at 2p, and it was now about
1:30.
Since I had to walk
down a set of stairs, I could easily see the layout
of waiting people in the main area outside the front
door as well as a long line that led up to the tiny
merchandise table.
As for getting goods,
my original plan was to buy them after the first
concert and take them back to my hotel before the
evening concert. However, I immediately saw
all of the available lockers next to the venue that
showed I wouldn't have to make that trip after all.
And that I could pass the time "productively" by
waiting in the merch line.
While I stood in
line, because we were still outside and it was
daylight out, I could easily people watch behind my
sunglasses and leather cap. I was surprised to see
more women than I had expected (from probably
exaggerated stories about the wota-fandom.) In
fact, I would estimate that it was about 20% women,
hardly as gender-skewed as the "Dietrich" musical
was, but still noticeably favoring one gender over
the other in terms of attendance.
It was then when I
noticed what was apparently a fan ritual in action:
people were coming with or buying t-shirts of their
favorite OG singer. As I mentioned earlier,
each girl's merchandise was unique to a color and
number combo: the older ones with Yossy as
purple/10, Rika as dark pink/9, Mai "Mai-chan"
Satoda as orange/11 and Asami "Konkon" Konno as
medium pink/12. And then there were the three
younger women (the Eggs) that I personally don't pay that much
attention to.
So the crowds started
to morph into those color-schemes, most of them
favoring the senior young women as individual fans
or in small clusters. While I think most of
them favored Yossy, the colors really started to
blur after a while so it seemed each singer had a
significant fan-presence that was noteworthy.
The most surprising thing to me was that Rika seemed
to have a lot of female fans, which I had heard was
very rare for her given that she has such a huge
male following, being the photo book queen that she
is.
It was interesting to
note that there were hand-written stickers on the
merchandise display that the
XL size t-shirts for Yossy, Mai-chan, Konkon and
even the generic black Gatas tour shirt were all
sold out. But it could be due to
underestimating fan demand and not bringing enough.
No surprise that there seemed to be plenty of Rika
merch on standby. And it also explained why I
saw several fans in were wearing shirts that looked
significantly too small for them.
Well, I began to
rethink my "no t-shirt" stance. However, if I
did anything like that, I still had to keep in my
spirit of being a true IshiYoshi fan, meaning that
whatever support I showed was evenly split between
the two young women. Even if no one else
noticed, it mattered to me in my own goofy, would-be
wota way.
Since I was there for
two concerts, I decided to buy the t-shirt sets for
Rika and Yossy after all, but wear Yossy's t-shirt
at the afternoon concert and Rika's in the evening.
Plus, I would wear both wristbands.
Now was the challenge
of actually getting my hands on merchandise as the
line slowly crawled forward and the time started to
tick by.
Meanwhile, because
more people started to arrive, I couldn't see how
the line looked for getting into the actual venue.
I hadn't seen people lined up when I arrived, which
is very different from my usual concert experience
of knowing people who'll line up for five or six
hours in advance in order to get the best seat
possible. I studied my own ticket and saw that
I had regular standing tickets, but unlike the
"Dietrich" tickets which had a specified row and
seat number, I only saw a single four digit number
on each ticket, in the mid-1,000 range. Since
I had heard the venue could hold up to a maximum of
2,500 people in the standing area, I figured that
the ticket number was reflecting the priority based
on purchase time.
I had heard that the
entry process for Japanese venues was different. However, because I was in the merch
line with a determination to get at least one
t-shirt set before the concert, I could only hear
some man on a bullhorn shouting instructions to the
crowd. He would make announcements that
sounded like numbers, at which I noticed a few
people in the merch line vacating their spot in
favor for getting into the venue. In fact, I
was within ten people of the merchandise table when
the young woman behind me perked up at the bullhorn
announcement and quickly darted out of the line
towards the main entrance.
Supporting the Japanese Economy
I had to admit I was
becoming nervous as the time slowly ticked by and I
crept closer to the merch table. I was ready to abandon the line if it would be
too close to the start of the concert time.
And I was concerned that all of the available
lockers were going to be taken.
With fifteen minutes
to spare, I finally reached the merch table myself,
(and I made certain that I could still see some
available lockers nearby.)
Now, I may not be
able to speak any coherent Japanese, I knew my
numbers from one to ten. And it helped that
there were display pictures that buyers could point
at. However, in my nervousness at the small amount
of time left, I could only blurt out English numbers
while pointing to the items that I wanted.
Luckily, after some
struggles, she understood and repeated my order back
to me in her best English: "Pa-to tsu and pa-to
tsu-ri photo se-to". And to reinforce her
understanding, I replied, "Yes, pa-to ni (2) and
pa-to san (3) photo se-to." Which admittedly
caused her to blink and laugh as if to say "Why
didn't you say that in the first place?!"
I was now armed with a
shit-load of concert goods: several large
photos, limited edition CD singles with matching
handkerchiefs(?!) and the t-shirt sets. I then ran to the nearby
cluster of lockers to claim an empty one, and ripped
open the t-shirt bags. Now in my final concert
attire of my leather cap, Yossy's t-shirt (over my own polo
shirt) and both wristbands, I couldn't help but
briefly think that I did not look.... cool.
BUT, I blended in and further committed myself
to making the most of The Moment.
Rushing Inside!
Without waiting
further, I closed the locker and ran into the
concert hall with five minutes to spare, even after
they did the expected bag check for recording
devices. (In anticipation of this, I had put my
own camera into the locker as well.)
Because I was rushing
to get in, apparently the protocol of finding my
"exact" standing spot didn't feel mandatory since
everyone else was already in their prime places.
I stepped into the fairly full concert hall and
immediately noticed that while it was standing room
only, each row had stalls people could lean against.
With that, I immediately saw a nearby small chained
off that had a printed sign with a few kanji
characters but the main one I recognized was "onna"
(woman.) And sure enough, there were several
women inside this area. (Later on it was
pointed out to me that this was probably the area
for the "family" tickets.)
While I'm sure my
real standing spot was much closer to the stage, I
decided to stand in the back of this area, which was
possible since it wasn't full.
Having heard stories
of women and children only cars on subways to protect
them from molesters, I couldn't help but wonder if
this area was created for that reason. But as
time went on, I realized there was actually a very
practical benefit to it as well since it was one
step up from the main floor. I may have been
one of the taller women in the venue, but I wasn't
taller than a lot of the men. So standing in
this area actually allowed me a decent view of the
stage even though I stood behind the other women.
At the least, I could see the band members from the
waist up if they all stood at the front of the
stage, which would be more than worth it.
I also noticed that,
like the other concert goers, most of the women also
wore t-shirts of their favorite girls.
Unsurprisingly, there were several purple shirts
that reinforced the knowledge that Yossy was
extremely popular among women and men.
Mai-chan's was the next
largest group, which surprised me because I knew she
was popular but I didn't know it was among the
women. (Though thinking about it, I shouldn't
be surprised: she's very quick witted,
charismatic and striking. That's definitely a
combination that women would like and admire.)
And then,
surprisingly, I noticed that Rika had the third
strongest presence in the women's section. So
much for her not having many female fans.
Although it was funny
to note that the fan clusters didn't really mix:
each group seemed to be focused on supporting one
woman, though I did see someone in a Yossy shirt do
the dual wristband thing too, but with Mai-chan's
orange/11.
The other thing I
noticed were the different camera people placed
throughout the venue, which reinforced my hope that
the concert would indeed be filmed for DVD release,
as most Hello! Project concerts are. It also
made me a little more relaxed about having to focus
on the actual concert itself since I knew I could
rely on seeing video footage later if I missed
something or wasn't able to see that clearly.
The most unfortunate
thing about the venue that I noticed right away was
that there weren't any video screens up, so you were
forced to focus on the stage in order to see
anything. So it was critical to get a good
view over or around whoever was in front of you.
But the great thing
about making the concert just in time was that I
didn't have to wait long for the show to begin.
Concerts' Tidbits
Because I had
attended two concerts that totaled to over four
hours of OG, things have kind of blurred already.
So I'm just going to write down the significant
points, whether or not I think they were in the
first concert that was filmed. However, please
note that I couldn't view the second concert as well
since I stood towards the back and unfortunately
behind a very tall guy who just had to wave his damn
glow stick every where.
- Once the opening
music began, two people dressed in white,
including head coverings came out waving tall
poles with white flags. Since this is not
such an unusual thing for the kind of
tongue-in-cheek sports pageantry about OG, the
audience seemed to take it in stride.
However, I was trying to figure out if these
flag-bearers were Rika and Yossy in disguise,
who'll then whip off the white outfits and
reveal themselves. But no, OG suddenly
walked on in the back of the stage so we were
assured that the flag-bearers really were just
flag-bearers.
- The point of the
orange handkerchiefs that were sold with the
CD single suddenly became clear as everyone on
stage (and a lot of the fans) held them out for
the opening number, which was the special
release single "Ready! Kick Off!"
Given how many orange swirls were seen in the
audience, it should be viewed that it was a successful
marketing campaign. I had to admit that I
was surprised at how in synch the audience
seemed to be with the handkerchief swirling but
then I guess the moves were pretty simple to
learn quickly given also that there was not a
promotion video to give anyone choreograph
instructions. (Not being my thing, I
didn't bother to pay THAT much attention to the
complexity of the swirling -- having left my own
handkerchief in my locker for both concerts.)
- I SWEAR it
looked like Yossy slipped in one of the opening
numbers of the afternoon concert! At one
point in the song, all seven of the singers came
to the front of the stage to do their
high-energy dance step, where I could only see
them from the waist-up. All of a sudden,
Yossy suddenly disappeared, and then was back,
but laughing her ass off and looking around.
However, everyone else was focused on dancing so
she quickly fell back into the groove of things.
Because I like to give equal viewing time
between IshiYoshi, I had to admit my focus went
more to Yossy whenever they did something with a
little more complicated dance routine to see if
she would do anything else "creative." And
she did, but they were minor and weren't as
glaring.
- As for the fan
rumors about OG possibly breaking up due to
conflicting schedules and different priorities of
the members, you wouldn't notice that if you
based such an assessment on the expressions of
the girls themselves. Everyone was smiling
and genuinely having a great time. I could
see
it be a case that if management said, "Well, I want
to schedule the next concert series (insert
dates here)", all of them would find a way
to make their schedules work to support it.
- Rika especially
seemed to be having a great time, smiling from
ear to ear every time I looked at her (which was
a lot.) Not surprising that of all of her
current projects, this is the only one that goes
back to her passion for the singing group that
launched her career. (I'm sure Yossy felt
the same but she was probably concentrating on
trying to dance correctly.)
- "Sexy Boy" a la
"Mr. Moonlight": Okay, I'm sure several
people have already seen the bootleg concert
photos on the 'net of Yossy wearing a white hat
and a baggy brown coat. The point of the
accessories was to show that Yossy was
the Sexy Boy, reaffirming her pimp-daddy role in
the group. However, the difference this
time being that all of the other six women in OG
were in the number flirted with her like
crazy! (Unlike the one where she was
pimping a couple of the younger ones in the
"Come Together" concert.) Rika and
Mai-chan were having a GREAT time with this
song! At the beginning, Yossy blows a kiss
at Rika and a couple of others, but Rika was in
the main position, which made the IshiYoshi fan
in me scream inside (and I probably actually did
outside.) A little bit later, Yossy comes
up front and center on the stage and Rika struts
over from the side and puts her arm over Yossy's
shoulder and hooks her leg across Yossy's
thighs! And I'm thinking: OH
HELL YEAH!!!!! A few beats later,
Mai-chan gets into the act too by wrapping
herself around Yossy's bare leg vamp style.
And the others are swooning and blowing kisses
like crazy. And the audience seemed to
love it all! (I'm now drooling for the DVD
release for that number alone!)
- Rika was trying
her best to promote the idea of her being 16
(again), and having a new nickname of "Ri-chan",
which the audience seemed to love since they
chanted it for a bit.
- In the evening MC
between Rika and Mai, Rika got the audience to
sing Happy Birthday to Mai (which was a few days
away.) It almost looked like Mai wiped
some tears away after that.
- When she wasn't
trying to hyper-dance, Yossy seemed very
comfortable and having fun.
- Rika in the
white shirt and black short shorts or mini-skirt
(too far away to see) was a great combo! I
caught myself looking at her... garter belt
quite a bit.
- Mai,
unsurprisingly, was very quick witted in all of
her Intro and MC moments. It made me
really regret that I didn't understand Japanese
more than a few words here and there.
- Rika was also in
top wit form, making several comments that had a
lot of audience members burst out in laughter.
- Yossy wasn't
left behind in the wit department but she seemed
willing to let the other members take the
spotlight as she would interject a comment or
two every once in a while.
- Much to many
fans' delight, Konkon got to take the spotlight
when she facilitated the MC quizzes, which I
hope someone does a translation. Of
course, the fun was that everyone's answer
either got a bell or a buzz sound effect.
- In the afternoon
MC, one of the quiz questions was name a song
from MM first best album. I remember OGs
were lined up with a couple of the younger ones
answering first and then Yossy started listing
songs that weren't on that album, at which she
got several buzzes, and it clearly baffled
everyone. And then someone pointed out the
question was MM's first BEST album. Then
she provided a correct answer. But of
course, she became the subject of teasing by an Egg
for being their leader and captain.
- Another
afternoon MC involved them having to list
various countries (unfortunately, I don't know
the actual question.) Mai was last and
caused a moment of surprise and laughter when
she blurted out "Hawaii" but then quickly
covered herself by blurting out more appropriate
answer.
- They all
answered correctly when asked what countries
have hosted the World Cup (I think that was
question -- I heard "World Cup".)
- In the evening
MC, Nocchi (one of the eggs) was challenged with
identifying the anime character type of each
member. From what I could pick out, Yossy
was the "boy" and Rika was the "tsundere"
(seemingly cold but secretly affectionate and
soft-hearted). I'm sure with a stronger
Japanese ear could translate the others but
those are the ones I picked up.
- Another evening
MC question was to identify from the top ten
(something) prefectures. Rika was second
to the last and then Mai. Rika bombed out
after giving two guess, and then blurted out an
apology to Mai-chan before answer "Hokkaido"
(Mai's home prefecture), which caused everyone
to burst out in laughter. And also caused
Mai-chan to struggle with coming up with her own
answer, with some bad guesses before eventually
getting it right.
- An evening MC
question was name a release from V-U-Den, which
was appropriate for Rika to jump up and down in
excitement even though she was last in line to
answer. A couple of bad guesses from an
egg or two but they all got it. Frankly,
it would've hysterical if Rika (former V-U-Den
leader)
had missed that one.
- In an evening MC
moment with Yossy, Rika and one of the eggs,
Yossy started to talk about diving. And
then she described something as "kawaii" (cute)
but with the hand-wave of a gay man saying
"darling." Rika immediately picked up on
that and imitated her (but described it as an
old lady move.) I laughed my ass off
anyway though I don't think most of the audience
got it since it was such quick moment.
- In the afternoon
MC version of that trio, Yossy and Rika got into
some sort of cross teasing session about their
hometowns since Saitama (Yossy's) and Kanagawa
(Rika's) was brought up by both of them.
The egg in the middle seemed a little left out
of that IshiYoshi moment.
- As you could
tell by my write-up: IshiYoshi was back
with a vengeance! As if to say "We're
sooooo sorry that you missed out on IshiYoshi
goodness in the 'Come Together' tour so we're
making up for it big time!"
- In the evening
concert, while most of the camera crew were
gone, I did notice that the person operating the
central camera seemed to be filming filler shots
(like of people who weren't the primary focus of
a speaking or music moment.)
I also have to admit
that I struggled to focus on the second concert
because my feet and legs were absolutely killing me,
and it didn't help that I had to almost stand on my
tiptoes to be able to see the stage most of the
time. I'm sure I would have been a lot more
observant and focused if I hadn't been distracted
with checking my watch almost every five minutes to
see how much more of the two hour show I would have
to physically endure before being able to sit down
again.
Visiting
Wota-ville
I decided to put my
observations that were fan driven in its own
section. Mostly because I know a lot of people
visiting this page would only be interested in the
concert portion.
Before you proceed,
I'm fully aware of the fact that I would seem like
an incredible hypocrite when I write about the
other fan behaviors since, after all, I traveled
across the Pacific just to attend these concerts
myself. However, as I always say about my fan
observations when I go to San Diego Comic Con each
year, I can speak of nerds because I am one myself.
- A lot of the fans either brought or
purchased glow sticks for the concert, of course
in the colors to match one of the girl's.
These were damn annoying if you're standing
right behind a taller person who just had to
wave it all over the place. Luckily, wotas
do tire out towards the end of the two hour
concert so I was able to see more during then.
- Every time one of the girls either spoke or
sung a key line, you'd see glow sticks in her
color pop out from the crowd.
- A few patches of very enthusiastic fans
really wanted to make sure they were noticed.
For example, Mai had some clusters of fans in
the audience and every time she spoke in the MC,
when everyone else was standing and listening,
these fans would jump up and down and wave their
glow sticks spastically, like fish gathered at
the top of a fish tank at feeding time.
- One fan in the women's section pulled out
this glow stick mid-concert that glowed such a
bright yellow (or was it just a very bright
orange?) that she could direct airplanes with
it. Everyone around her, even her friends,
all reacted like "What the ****?!"
- In one of the evening MCs with Mai, someone
on stage said something where the response was
to say "nevermind" and wave away the
comment with your hand. The
audience responded on cue and Mai actually
pointed how pretty it was to see the glow sticks
wave like that.
- Every once in a
while during a song, somebody would start
whooping and a lot of other people joined in.
Now mind you, these whooping sessions had
absolutely nothing to do with the song at the
moment. People are still singing and
dancing on stage and I'm wondering if these
people in the crowd are even listening.
After Sakura Con last year, in one of their
Japanese interviews where they were asked about
the differences between American and Japanese
audiences, Yossy made a comment about how
American audiences really got into the music.
I can see where she got that impression.
- And speaking of
Sakura Con, when I was outside in between
concerts, I almost walked head on into another
woman. We stopped and stared at each other
in that "you look really familiar" kind of way.
Then we recognized each other from the various
H&A events in the U.S. and France and let out a
cry of recognition and shook hands.
Unfortunately, her English was as limited as my
Japanese so it wasn't like we could stand and
chat. But it was good to see a familiar
face following the IshiYoshi trail (though she
was dressed in her Yossy T.)
- On a lot of the
H!P concert DVDs, you can hear audience call out
something during songs but unless you have a really good ear, you
usually can't make out what they're saying.
It turns out that they're shouting out the
nickname of the woman who sang the previous
lyric in the song. But there's obviously
an art to it because they didn't shout all the
time, only when the song lends itself to it
without conflicting with someone else's singing.
- And no, a good
majority clearly could not dance -- most usually
moving to memorized choreography. It
reminded me of the comments Tsuku made at his
panel at Anime Expo last year about how the
Japanese people really needed to learn what
rhythm was about. But as I've commented on
other sites: wotas aren't meant to dance.
And without them, our young women would not be
where they are.
- At the end of
both concerts, even after the encores were over,
people started the "Gatas" (clap clap clap)
chants over and over.
- When the concert
was over, because my legs and feet were dying, I
actually tried to leave with the main crowd.
To my surprise, people actually pushed to get
out, which caused me to be alarmed in my common
sense awareness about safety.
- On the way back
to the train station, there was a couple of
tables of concert photos for sale. I was
interested in them at first but it looked quite
suspicious for pics to be sold so far away from
the venue, yet in convenient to the paths of
leaving wotas. As much as I like getting
photos, I'm not about to support such an obvious
bootleg set up. Plus, they weren't that
good of photos. Bootlegs after all.
And so ends my report
of an event definitely worth attending despite all
of the drama around it. And if you have access
to a proxy service, the DVD is already available for
pre-order through the official
M-Line fan club or
e-Line Up! until May 15th. (And of
course, there are Japan auction possibilities too.)
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