Three-Body Problem Tees & February Fish

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For the first time since 2008, it has been announced that Buck-Tick will undertake a pure and exclusive Fish Tanker's Only Tour. Those of you who've been following NGS for a while may remember our coverage of the 2008 Fish Tanker's Only Tour, which is best remembered for the fan costume design contest, which culminated in this most unfortunate outcome:

As can be observed from the stills above, the plasticky sheen of the white lace frothing about Mr. Sakurai's neck proclaims its pride in being the single ugliest garment ever worn by one of the world's most beautiful people. (And in case you're wondering about the second-ugliest one, it's this, right here. Is a scarf-on-head fetish still tickled when the Scarf in Question is a leopard-print babushka? Judging by the second photo, the answer to that question would appear to be "yes.")

In any case, it's been a while since Buck-Tick have deigned to mount a standalone fanclub-only tour, and we can only speculate as to what sartorial creativities they hold in store this time. For those of you desperate to find out, it's not too late to join Fish Tank: according to Buck-Tick's website, if you join Fish Tank through Fish Tank Web by no later than October 15th, you will be able to enter the ticket lottery for this tour. However, since the process of joining takes a certain amount of time, the sooner you join, the better - and this goes double for overseas fans using non-Japanese credit cards. If you want to join, join today! To aid you in your decision, here are the tour particulars:

Buck-Tick Fish Tanker's Only Tour 2017

January 21st (Saturday) - Club Citta' Kawasaki

January 22nd (Sunday) - Nagoya Diamond Hall

January 28th (Saturday) - Zepp EpicFail Tokyo

January 29th (Sunday) - Sendai Rensa

February 4th (Saturday) - Fukuoka Drum Logos

February 5th (Sunday) - Osaka Namba Hatch

Tickets are 7500 yen each, tax included. A separate drink charge will apply at the door. All fans will receive a free gift upon exiting the venue, and let's hope it's not as ugly as last time. The lottery for tickets is open from noon on October 5th at to 11:59PM October 16th, Japan time. There may be a second lottery, but don't count on it. If you want tickets, it's best to get them now. And for the record, this is a standing tour. For more information on standing tours, read this article.

We've already put a pretty thorough explanation of Fish Tank only rules and procedures up over on NGS, so if you're considering attending this tour, go read it. But we'll mention it again here: Fish Tanker's Only tours are only open to members of Fish Tank. That is to say, if you want to attend, you have to apply for a ticket using your own Fish Tank membership. You can't apply on behalf of someone else, even if that someone else is also a Fish Tank member. Therefore, the rule is one ticket per fan per show. Tickets are non-transferable (i.e., you can't give your ticket to someone else, even if that someone else is also a Fish Tank member) and non-refundable (i.e., they won't give you your money back if for some reason you become unable to attend the show.) Furthermore, before entering the venue, all fans must submit to an ID check, where they present their Fish Tank ID cards and a valid photo ID (for overseas fans, this is limited to either a passport or a Residence Card.) Forget your IDs? Tough, no going in the venue...so if you're planning on attending this tour, make sure you come fully prepared!

In general, there's not much difference between a Fish Tank only show and a regular show, except that at Fish Tank only shows, the band are more likely to play old or obscure songs from their back catalog, because they can be reasonably sure most of the fans will know them. Sometimes the crowds at Fish Tank only shows are more violent than at regular shows, but other times, they're better behaved - it depends on the day. The band have also been known to play reels of exclusive behind-the-scenes video footage (studio footage, PV making-of footage, etc.) before the show starts and between encores.

If you're a member of Fish Tank but you're uncertain about how to apply/pay for tickets and you'd like our help, drop us an email at themadaristocrat at gmail.

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In addition, Buck-Tick have added an extra show to their Atom Miraiha No. 9 tour. This show will take place on Monday, November 21st, in Kumamoto at club B.9 V1. Tickets are 7000 yen each and go on general sale on November 5th. Unlike all the other stops on the Atom Miraiha No. 9 tour, this gig alone is a standing gig. Presumably, Buck-Tick are doing this as a favor to Kumamoto, which is still recovering from the massive earthquakes in April...word is that the damage down there is still pretty bad, since there are only so many construction companies and they can't repair all the buildings at once. If you're interested in attending this show, drop us an email.

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For those of you wondering if Buck-Tick will also mount a general-admission standing tour to support Atom Miraiha No. 9 - I'm sure they will, but they probably won't announce it until the December issue of FT. Since 2017 is their 30th anniversary year, it's highly possible that a general admission standing tour will be connected to their 30th anniversary activities in some way. Then again, they may do multiple tours, since the electronic, beat-driven nature of the album lends itself much more natural to a live house setting than a hall setting, and they did about five tours to support Mona Lisa Overdrive. Cayce's prediction: either they do a short general admission standing tour in March-April, followed by a third Parade Tour in June-July, or they combine the Atom Miraiha standing tour with 30th anniversary stuff and keep going from spring into early summer. Past patterns indicate that they're likely to do a 30th anniversary festival in September of 2017. Stay tuned.

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Meanwhile, in other news, Mr. Sakurai will be appearing on the cover of Rock & Read magazine, issue 68, due out on October 21st. This will be the fourth time Mr. Sakurai has appeared on the cover of this particular magazine, which is exclusively devoted to in-depth individual interviews with male musicians (mostly in the visual kei genre) ripe for the ladies to swoon over (#sexism.) Despite the fact that this magazine is clearly capitalizing on the money-making power of the idol culture which has now permeated even the Japanese rock fan scene, emphasizing cult-like body and personality worship of specific band members over music appreciation and a diversity of musical interests, the interviews are of good quality, so if you can ignore the somewhat troubling undercurrent of sexual fetishism at work here, it's a magazine worth buying. If you'd like our help in purchasing a copy for yourself, just send us an email. We haven't really been keeping track, but we're pretty sure that at this point, Sakurai has appeared on the cover of Rock & Read more times than anyone else, so I think we can assume that he either sells more issues than anyone else, or someone who works at Rock & Read has a massive crush on him (or let's face it, probably both. And we'll bet our favorite The Mortal t-shirt that the person with the crush is a grown-ass heterosexual male.)

And speaking of massive things, the production of the current issue of Massive magazine, which features Buck-Tick on the cover, has been delayed by two weeks, and will therefore be released on October 6th #MercuryRetrograde #geturshittogether.

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In still further news, in anticipation of the start of Buck-Tick's Atom Miraiha No. 9 hall tour this Saturday, Tower Records Online will be selling two designs of Atom Miraiha No. 9 tour t-shirts: a black version and a white version. Reservations for the t-shirts will be open until 11:59 PM on Thursday, October 6th, Japan time, so if you'd like our help in reserving one, let us know asap. T-shirts come in sizes small, medium, and large, and are 3500 yen each. In a novel move, both designs are available in three body types: a standard t-shirt body, a Dolman sleeve body, and an A-line hipster nuGoth body. One t-shirt, three bodies. If you've got a problem with this, we've got no solution for you.

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