The last couple of days:
( More live talk... )  
 

Now, off to make a phonecall and then get some sleep. I'm so glad tomorrow is Sunday @_@ Just Monday and Tuesday left, and then finally my vacation can start.
 

A few things about today's instore event....

As you can tell from the photo, Nobu wasn't there (>_<) I felt sorry for the Nobu fans (They didn't go to the previous live because he wasn't going to appear, so I guess he really is the main reason for them following the band). I had been hoping he'd take part in the talk session, but he's not able to put on his costume at the moment because of his arm, and Art Cube isn't the kind of band that will do events with casual clothing/no make-up.
Seiji is special and signed in a different colour :p (It's more visible in the actual booklet than in the photo above). I got up to him, he said "thank you", signed the booklet and went "ah! it's black D: What do I do?" But no one gave him a silver pen, so he had to continue using the black one for the rest of the sign session.

Seiji annouced that they're releasing a new CD in April (no word about it being a single or album). They might also be releasing a DVD that month. It wasn't clear whether he was talking about the DVD they'll be distributing at the sponsored event on April 16th, or another release for sale in stores. But he looked over at Tomozo (their producer; leader of Sequence Records) asking for permission to talk about it, so it might be a proper DVD release this time. We're supposed to get more information about this next month.

Sorry if this gets a bit messy. I'm writing stuff as I remember it. I ended up in the front row, much closer to the band than I had expected (leaning against the table they were seated at), so I couldn't take notes. We were about 20 people there, and sat on the floor with about 5~6 people in each row. Very uncomfortable ^^;; When we had to get up again, our legs were completely dead, everyone automatically exclaimed "ouch ouch ouch!!" and were complaining so much the band started asking "Are you guys alright? o_O"
Questions asked were mostly random, not related to the music. And instead of just answering them, they would talk about each subject for quite a while, often ending up talking about something completely different. Some questions asked that I can remember at the moment: 1. "How do I go about getting a snake?", 2. "How do you keep in shape?", 3. "How do you get your energy up?", 4. "Which artist do you respect?", 5. "What do you do on your days off?"
For that last question, Yossy started talking about spending a lot of time with Nobu, how he'd always go over to Nobu's place etc. So much he felt the need to add a "B..but I'm not gay! <_<;;" at the end of it x) The staff then asked, "What about you, M-san?", still referring to the original question, but Yossy had been talking about the other stuff for so long, Kazune reacted with a really loud "GAY?? o_o" ....lol. In addition to this, Yossy also often walks his dog, as does Shizuki.

Seiji was obviously the one answering the first question. Talking about there being a lot of different kinds of snakes, and said you had to do research before getting one, asking around various pet stores. And he then complained about snakes never doing anything, just lying around like a rope. I think it was for question 2 that Kazune started talking about yoghurt, and how he eats a lot of it every morning. For question 4, Seiji said he didn't have anyone in particular that he respects, Shizuki's answer was Shimura Ken (host of the weekly television show "Shimura Zoo"), Yossy likes Buck-Tick, and Kazune talked about classical composers.

They randomly asked if any of us had been to the US or South America, looking down at me and mrs_fujiwara  waiting for us to raise our hands. But it's embarrassing being the only ones, so we pretended not to understand. Causing them to start explaining in simpler Japanese XD Don't we stand out enough by being the only foreigners.. ^^;

I'll see if I remember more later.

(On our way out we were given a new, proper stampcard. So those of you who already got the temporary ones at previous lives should bring them to the next live. The staff girl will then give you the new card and add stamps for the lives you already got those small notes from.)

Haven't written about the lives I've been to recently. There's just been too much going on this past week. I'll try to get through my flist eventually too....

But we had fun at both the Versailles event and the live with Art Cube/Kaya/XOVER this week. Hadn't expected to see the vocalists of those three latter bands sing together on stage (They did a XOVER song. While Seiji was playing around with a toy gun thing.... I don't think that made sense to anyone), and then all leave hand in hand.

But my main point with this entry is to write about THE VELVET's sponsored event that we went to today (or, yesterday by now). Not being able to go to the one in September, it was my first big event with them, and I had been impatient to finally be able to enjoy a longer performance. And it was so much fun! ^^


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No more lives planned for the next three weeks (Though there is the Art Cube instore event to look forward to of course), but it's probably for the best as I'll have loads of other work to do the rest of this month @_@ I can't wait until spring vacation starts, about a month from now. (Why is it so late this year?)

Hope you all had nice holidays and a good start to 2010 (^o^)

Yesterday's countdown live was longer than last year's. It ended with a couple of encores by Panic Channel about 4 in the morning. There were also less people there than last time, and as the most interesting bands played before 8pm, a lot of people left before the actual countdown.


XOVER was scheduled to appear, while Ⅶ-Sense was added last minute. But on the day of the live, XOVER seemed to have cancelled, and weren't playing afterall. Some of Kouichi's equipment was there though. The amp behind erina said 'Kouichi guitar master'.

Unfortunately their set was quite short; only three songs before they took off (None of them came out to talk or sell anything etc.) The songs they played were two rock tunes and one ballad. It's amusing to see them all looking so serious, except Mikage smiling broadly in the back ^^ He looks slightly out of place.
For those of you who can read Japanese, he has a column in the HOLIDAY magazine (click on the image to enlarge):




Their music sounded pretty generic rock, but they're still a new band, so I'm not giving up on them yet. And of course, the vocals are better than a lot of other groups. I'm sure they'll appear at Art Cube's lives, so it won't be too difficult keeping track of them. And I'm happy for Juka, finally having a band of his own; hopefully it'll last a bit longer than his other projects. And he's looking good, btw. Gained some weight since I last saw him, which suits him more. He was wearing one of his fur trimmed jackets, black shirt and tight black pants, and the usual necklace. His hair looked a more whitish blonde, than silver.

It's getting late, and I'll have to get up early, so this'll be short...

Went to Art Cube's last live of 2009 on the 22nd. Setlist shorter than usual:
1. 螺旋月 (rasenzuki)
2. Pain～ Wing・・・
3. Soaring awakening
4. 虹化鏡 (kougekyou)

Though the majority of the regulars aren't going to the lives anymore, we still managed to fill the front row, so the live was quite enjoyable. (It really affects a live performance if there's only a couple of people present showing any interest in what's going on on stage). They announced the South American tour (Or, at least that they are going to Brazil... Why no mention of the other countries? o.o) Seiji talked about samba, and tried incorporating it with his regular dancing during the guitar solo x) We were also given a stamp card, allowing us to collect stamps at the forthcoming lives. Once we've gathered enough of them, they'll give us a gift ^^

I wonder how many will go to the instore event next month. Apart from myself, I know of 4 others who are planning on attending. Picked up my copy of the mini-album in the afternoon, and got ticket #5. This might turn out to be one slightly embarrassing event (@_@)
If you're in Tokyo in January and have some interest: the event is taking place at Jishuban (Shinjuku) on January 23rd. They'll first do a talk event answering questions from fans, followed by a sign and handshake session.


And...
( not related to Art Cube, but... )

Why do I tend to get sick right before oneman lives? (>_<) Fortunately I didn't have to go out yesterday, and was able to stay inside all day so my fever went down. But despite still feeling like a zombie when I woke up this morning, I definitely didn't want to miss Art Cube's 2nd anniversary oneman :)

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mrs_fujiwara already posted a nice report of last night's event, but as there are some THE VELVET fans who don't follow that journal and won't have that entry popping up on your friends list, I'll post a small summary here as well.




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I feel like I should write a little regarding tonight's Art Cube live, considering how last week's live was....


Today's live was so much better! Three of the other jouren showed up, making us a total of five people. We're still missing several girls though, including all the other Seiji fans, so it felt a bit lonely. But the general atmosphere was a lot better this time during their performance. No large group of random people (not AC fans) trying to occupy the front row for no apparent reason, so I was able to return to the center spot, in front of Seiji (^o^) Unfortunately it doesn't seem like any of us have the contact information of the missing people, so we have no way of asking them what happened. Maybe they'll come to the oneman in December.

I was hoping the setlist would be similar to last week's (though I wouldn't mind the addition of False Praye), and it turned out to be identical:
1. 虹化鏡 (kougekyou)
2. Pain～ Wing・・・
3. Blue Heaven
4. (new song)
5. 失楽蝶 (shitsurakuchou)

They had some sound problems, causing them to appear on stage a bit late (They were the last band playing, so it didn't cause any major delays anyway), but they've had very few technical problems these last few months compared to last spring/early summer. During the live, Seiji also had a bit of trouble with his voice, forcing him to pause during some parts of the songs. This, on the other hand, tends to happen quite frequently. Hopefully it's nothing to worry about.

I wonder if this was the last we'll see of the current costumes for a while? They've changed costumes for every oneman so far, and they're not doing any more lives until their upcoming anniversary oneman on December 12th now.