My live report of Kishidan Banpaku is up over at Not Greatest Site. I'm sorry if I come across as grumpy in this report...but then, if Grumpy Cat could become a celebrity on nothing but the strength of his grumpiness, surely you can forgive Cayce now and again. It's just a little hard, when coming to the festivals of others, not to wish I was coming to Buck-Tick's festival instead. There were no intentional puns or word plays, dirty or otherwise, in that sentence.
It's just that you know, coming to a non-Buck-Tick festival is a bit of an anti-climax together, all told.
Also, in this instance, "hide with spread beaver" should have been called "negative hide plus spread beaver." Because believe you me, Hideto Hide was not there. And crazed pink-haired Hideto Hide fans...don't get on my case about the caps vs. lowercase thing. Always spelling "hide" in all lowercase is effing confusing. Also I have to find some way of distinguishing Hideto Hide from Sexy Beast Hide, so caps it is.
I respect Mr Matsumoto's work as much as I respect that of Messrs Sakurai, Imai, Hoshino, Higuchi and Yagami; I even visited his grave to pay my respects on my first trip to Japan.
ReplyDeleteBut... I also wholeheartedly agree with Cayce that by now, Mr Matsumoto is undoubtedly pushing the rock envelope on an entirely other plane of existence. I don't think he'd ever want to rest in peace, but I can't help but think that he'd prefer to see the essence of what he left behind channelled into new and wild directions, rather than have it preserved forever in aspic.
Thanks for the review, as always, and I'm glad that at least the vodka and *ahem* nuts flowed freely. And the samurai pic is delicious.
Thank you!
ReplyDeleteI was enjoying reading your report as usual!
There is no grumpiness at all, but if you call it so.. please stay grumpy.
- M
Lol, thanks for pointing out how ridiculous the name was. They didn't even have a webpage in English, and they call it a World’s Fair?
ReplyDeleteI’m sorry you didn't enjoy it very much. I think you caught the worst bands (HY, Nogizaka). Though, being there since the beginning (I only missed out on the first band, Scandal), I can confirm that, by far the most enthusiastic and noisy crowds were Buck-Tick’s and Man With a Mission’s fans. So each of these bands should have been the headline. I laughed at your description of B-T fans looking like Vikings about to ravage the otaku land, especially when Nogizaka’s set was over. And you’re so right about B-T fangirls being fearless BiTches. I followed a pack of tall, older and intimidating-looking B-T fanboys, trusting them to get me to the front, until I realized they were, ironically, following a couple of young&skinny fangirls leading the hoard and shoving the defenseless otakus out of the way. It was pretty funny.
Hide’s set was such a disappointment. It would have been so much better if they had just found a copy-cat vocalist and played like a tribute cover band, because that lineup was amazing. Those videos were completely unnecessary, and just ruined the whole experience for me.
(And omg yes, Sakurai appearing during Doubt’ to sing would be freaking glorious).
Amazing report Cayce. I loved your jokes, and everything you said was so on point. Especially the part about the t-shirts being sold out since morning! D: I’m still bitter about not being able to buy the t-shirt I wanted. It never happened to me at a festival before!