D - Dark Fairy Tale tour final

It's been 3 months and I just now realised I never mentioned it, my last live gig this time around in Tokyo; D's Dark Fairy Tale tour final at Akazaka Blitz,August 29th.

Of course I got a bit lost on my way. I went straight from school to the venue and I was stressed since I only had 1h and it's a bit far away. I was also sad I didn't get to dress up as I planned (I decided not to since it was too hot and I also don't like going dressed up to school).

When I arrived in Tokyo this year I had seen D once before, and I enjoyed it so much I decided I'd go as many times I could this time around. I've said it before, and I'll say it again, I'm not a huge D fan, but I think they're one of the best live bands in visual kei and I like that they always change. This year I saw them 4 times and went to 1 instore, and I had lots of fun all of those times. This last live was fun too, but probably the least out of these 4. For once I felt like the forever changing D did a re-run!

They opened this Dark Fairy Tale theme at the free live earlier this year, where they also announced the single. That live was really good, I got to hear a lot of songs I've been wanting so experience live, like 7th Rose, but unfortunately this live felt more or less like the same setlist.

When I've seen Buck-Tick live several times in a short period of time, I've felt a bit disapointed that they keep repeating the songs from their latest album, but this time with D, I wish they would've included more songs from Wonderland Savior! The setlist was very similar to their free live, so I was happy that I got to hear 7th Rose again, and of course Dark Fairy Tale. The band was energetic as always, but unfortunately I was kind of far away from the stage, and the worst part about that is that usually in the back are the people who just want to stand and observe with their own personal space. The girl next to me headbanged like crazy to Meteo though, to the point where I couldn't help but to wonder if that's really healthy...
I did manage to get to HIDE-ZOU's side of the stage which made me happy though. I was hoping badly for them to do Toki no koe, but unfortunately they didn't... What did surprise me was the fact that they didn't do an encore, but played the whole gig in one go! I think that might be the first time I've seen a oneman live in Japan without an encore. Despite the slightly boring setlist I was happy to see them live, I Always feel very positive when I see D. You can tell they have fun on stage. It's been over half a year since the concert so truthfully I don't remember any details (nor did I see them share the setlist unfortunately), I have to update right after gigs next time (new years resolution).

This was my last concert in Japan, and it made me feel kind of sad and a bit disapointed since I was hoping for a better setlist (sorry). But I'm truly happy that I got to see D so many times, and also attend an instore! (I might make an entry about that and the other instores I went to later)

D Always update their ameblo with news about goods and this time around I guess I was lucky! For everyone who purchased goods for 5000 yen or more, you'd receive the Ruiza bonus track (I have no idea what it is as I still have not listened to it) as well as a signed poster (as long as they had any in stock). I was pretty sure I'd miss out on both as my ticket number was really bad and I ended up being one of the last to enter, but I was lucky! Usually I don't really want to buy that much stuff, but they had a new cheki case and a perfume, so I passed the 5000yen limit alright... I'm very much into perfumes, I'd love to see more bands make them (so far I only have BUCK-TICK's, The Mortal and this). The fragrance is pretty nice, not too strong, I haven't tried it one yet, just smelled the top though. I was also super happy to receive this signed Hide-Zou poster! I felt a bit bad, in the line some people before me was another foreign girl and there seems to have been some misunderstanding between her and the staff (or maybe I misunderstood the situation), but it seemed like she didn't understand that she'd receive the poster for free and ended up telling the staff no when asked which member she wanted. I feel bad to this day I didn't butt in...

D - 「Memory of the Wind」～Produced by HIDE-ZOU〜

To be honest I had no plan to attend this gig. I just didn't have anything to do during golden week and I felt kind of lonely, the best way to cure that is going to see a band. D is great live so why not. Like always during golden week D has 5 live gig, each produced by each member. I chose HIDE-ZOU's live because he's my favorite member, but also because of his title, "Memory of the Wind", it made hope they would play some "nature" songs (like Namonaki mori no yumegatari). When they entered stage, I knew I had picked the right day to attend. They all wore traditional clothing, (hakama etc) so I knew they'd play some of the asian inspired songs! The song which made me a fan of D was Ouka saki some ni keri and I also really like Huang di~Yami no umareta mukui and I've neverheard these songs live so I was overthrilled!
The set list started of pretty strong with Toki no koe, Meteo ~Mubi no toki, then I have to admit it slowly became a bit dull for me. But that was fixed during the encore when they did Huang di!

HIDE-ZOU also had a solo song, and that was very interesting. I haven't attended these gigs before but I assume all of them have. It's a bit disapointing the songs aren't released though, I'd love to hear a recording of that song! Beside the songs, each member also designs an original merch, HIDE-ZOU had a japanese teacup, witha  drawing of him, and it said "You know me?". Now that might seem random BUT, in Japanese that kind of teacup is called "yuunomi", pronounced very similar to "you know me" in english. It was very cute but I ended up not buying it because I have no idea how I should carry it home in my already overfilled bag.

This gig took place at Takadanobaba Area, a club I feel a bit emotionally attached to, hehe. Although I do hate the fact that their bar close so unless you buy a drink before the gig you've wasted the 500yen drink fee you have to pay by the entrance. Takadanobaba is also a nice area, I will write a bit about it later in another entry.

ーSEー

1.風がめくる頁

2.メテオ〜夢寐の刻〜

3.鬨の声

〜MC〜

4.桜花咲きそめにけり

5.NEO JAPANESQUE

6.我が敵は我にあり

〜MC〜

7.翠緑の翼

8.NOCTURNAL

～HIDE-ZOU solo コーナー～

9.Memento〜風のレイピア〜

10.Solitude〜最後の手紙〜

〜MC〜

11.空中庭園

12.悪夢喰らい

13.Humanoid

〜MC〜

14.鳥籠御殿〜L'Oiseau bleu〜

〜Encore〜

Night-ship"D"

DEAD ROCK

皇帝〜闇に生まれた報い〜

黒竜

風がめくる頁

〜End SE〜

D - 14th Anniversary Special Premium "Free" Live (Dark fairy tale)

On April 23rd D held a free live at Zepp Tokyo on the artificial island Odaiba. The free live was to celebrate their14th Anniversary. The tickets were handed out for free on a flyer which could be taken at most visual kei shops, or they were also handed out at their oneman live in January. However, if you wanted a good entrance number and a secured place at the live you could pre-book a ticket through pia. It was still free but you had to pay the administration fees. I chose this option and ended up paying 500yen for my ticket, which I thought was totally worth it concidering how much a normal ticket costs.

Since it was a free live I didn't have that much expectations regarding the length of the live. I've seen a lot smaller bands offer free live tickets for gigs lasting 1 hour, so for D which are a kind of big visual kei band I assumed it would be a rather short live. Oh was I wrong.

Eventhough I pre-ordered my ticket I ended up with a B-number, so about 700 people entered before me :P It sounds like a lot but Zepp is kind of big, I've had worse numbers there so it was ok. I also bought the D flags for this occassion! I mentioned that a nice fan lend me one of her flags last time, so I felt like it was time to get my own set now. I also got some costume chekis.
I wasn't aware of the system D has with chekis, but both at this live and the next (which I haven't written about yet) you could buy a ticket for chekis before the live, and then you go and pick them up afterwards. With this system you buy a set, so you get 1 cheki of each member, all in or out of costume, it's your choice. They come in a nice little envelope which states the date and live, so it makes a nice memory!

Since Zepp is kind of big I was really suprised to see it seemed kind of full! I'm glad that many showed up and hopefully some who's never seen D enjoyed the concert and will go to their later too!
The stage was amazingly decorated with flowers, real and actually big ones made from fabric or similar attached to the background, matching their new dark fairytale costumes. I have to say the new theme really appealed to me, I'm glad to see that D's fantasy doesn't seem to cease.
There seem to have been some electronic issues, all of a sudden some projection started eventhough the club was all lit up. It was just for a moment though and it was turned off immediatly. Short after the club was lit down and the projection was turned on for real. What it showed was a music video, the members were all dressed in their new outfits, and as most can figure out, it was the PV for their new single Dark Fairy Tale.
I just don't get how they can keep releasing so much stuff! D really never takes a break (even when they do :P). The song was very typical D, to be honest, to me nothing special. Better than Happy Unbirthday but not a top notch song. The PV was fun though, and I have to admit I love their costumes.

After the PV the members came out on stage and the first song up was 7th Rose! I really like that and I haven't heard it live before so I got really hyped. Like always D are very energetic on stage and the fans too, that's what I love about their lives. Eventhough I'm not a great fan (I follow them and have most of their full length albums but not fanatic) their lives are one of the best in the visual kei scene in my opinion.
As the evening went on I realised that eventhough it was a free live, it was just as good and long as a normal live with D. And what was great about the setlist was that it really reflected their anniversary! I assumed they would play a lot of songs from Wonderland Saviour, being their most recent album but the set list offered a wide variety of songs. To follow the nature/fairytale theme they acctually played Namonaki mori no yumegatari which is one of my favorite songs! It was great live of course, and from that single they also played Sankaku oyane to awarena koguma. The first half of the concert was just full of my favorite songs, so I couldn't have been more pleased. Also, Yami yori kurai doukoku akapera to bara yori akai jounetsu no aria, how can Asagi sing that so well live!?

The later half of the setlist, one song written by each member was played. Asagi would first present the song and say who wrote it and also some other things about it. So, it started with Hiroki and Desert Warrior! I feel like the setlist was very well thought. Not only did they chose songs to follow the nature theme, they also included songs from all of their career and on top of that one song from each member. Hands down to D, they know how to make a good live.
There seemed to have been some technical problems later too, at some point staff came to help Ruiza with his guitar equipment. It looked rather funny as Ruiza turned around and the staff member lifted his skirt to be able to help with the thing connected to the guitar (not a technical person so I have no idea what it's called), and I could hear some fans laughing (he has some great legs though).
I was happily surprised to hear that they played Kurobara no kishi again! It's one of my favorite songs on Kingdom and it's really fun live, hopefully I'll get to hear it once more before leaving Japan. (I noticed though that some people looked a bit scared seeing the parapara for it, I assume those girls weren't D fans, hehe)

As a last song of the main setlist they played Dark fairy tale, and Hide-Zou was supposed to show us the moves. There was some headbanging in the beginning and then for the chorus Asagi asked what everyone should do and Hide-Zou thought we could go for the "fancy hand movements" (as I like to call it :P), so in a very feminine manner he began showing with his hands and people laughed a bit, Asagi too.

Like always they all say some words to the fans and wave goodbye for a rather long time before leaving stage. I think that's really sweet, especially Asagi which I sometimes feel can come across as a bit stiff. He really stays on each side of the stage for a long time to wave to everyone.

This was a great live, and too bad for those who couldn't attend or chose not to, you really missed something. Please go see D if you get the chance, if you're into visual kei I'm sure you won't be disapointed!

―SE―

7th Rose

闇の国のアリス

闇より暗い慟哭のアカペラと薔薇より赤い情熱のアリア

光の庭～名もなき森の夢語り

～MC～

Night-ship”D”

花摘みの乙女

～MC～

三角お屋根と哀れな子熊

～MC～

Vampire missa

花惑

～MC～

Lost breath

ードラムソロー

Desert Warrior

In the name of Justice

鬨の声

～MC～

GOD'S CHILD

～MC～

君が見る夢の中

～MC～

Leukocyte

黒薔薇の騎士

～MC～

Dark fairy tale　

Encore

太陽を葬る日

Wonderland Savior～太陽と月の歯車～

Pride

Dearest you

EDEN

春の宴

D at Shinjuku Blaze

On Thursday I went to D's  release concert for Kingdom at a sold out Shinjuku Blaze.

I planned on seeing D in 2012 but ended up not getting a ticket, which was one of the worst decisions I ever made, because I love Namonaki mori no yumegatari which was released then, so I decided to try my best getting a ticket for their tour, but they didn't have any Tokyo gigs during my stay :P So when I saw this release concert I was very happy and acctually went to Lawson 3 minutes after the release of the tickets. I got ticket B-7, which I thought was a great number (it usually is). This was not :P

I've never been to Shinjuku Blaze but with a little googling I saw that it has the capacity for 800people. I arrived just on time, because I had to go pay a visit to Closet Child eventhough I go there about once a week :P and I acctually got myself a copy of D's Dark Wings, with Tsunehito's trading card *_*

I seriously bet about 500 people was lining up outside of Shinjuku Blaze, that's how crowded it was! I listened very carefully as they called out the numbers, and when they were betweek A 150-200 I felt like it would be my turn soon....but NO. I have no idea what kind of system D has but A tickets acctually went all the way up until 600! There went my "great ticket"...

I try not to go to the merch table before concerts because I just want to get a good place, so I squeezed my way to the middle on the left side somewhere, and D was a bit late I might add :P I hate waiting especially when you stand with 800 people.

Finally the venue got dark and the new PV for Shuuen -uchuu e no kai ki- began to play on a screen. I have to say, wtf happened to D's PV's? XD I'm sorry but it doesn't really make it for me with all these western people and random storylines I don't get. Asagi handed over a baby to some old guy, Tsunehito was some sort of princess, HIDE-ZOU played guitar, Ruiza was some overnatural being and Hiroki was almost dead or something, I have no idea what was going on, but the song was suprisingly good. I usually don't like D's slow songs, but this really had a bit of that extra.

I got kind of hyped, seeing the shadow of HIDE-ZOU, and then finally the concert began for real.
They played all the songs from Kingdom straight up, so I only recognised the singles, and I have to say Dark Wings was pretty awesome live. Even if I like certain bands, if I haven't seen them live I have no idea what movements the band wants people to do, but D was pretty good with guidance XD (Like when Asagi demands the crowd to bow with his handmovement)

I was lucky though, since this was a completly new album and most of the people had not heard it yet (Asagi asked if some had listened to it yet and some acctually raised their hands...), so they told us a lot of what they wanted us to do during certain songs. Best part was when Asagi said HIDE-ZOU would show saru no dansu (monkey dance), he looked so adorable, and it was fun seeing Asagi laugh for a change.

To be honest I don't really have any idea which member in D who's the most popular among fans. In the west it seems like Asagi (of course) and Tsunehito has a lot of fans, so I was kind of suprised to notice that people seemed to be shouting for everyone equally, and that Hiroki had a lot of fans because he seems a bit forgotten among western fans. It was also highly amusing to listen to the 2 "older" women (around 30-40) behind me who commented on how cute Ruiza was as soon as he came to the front on the stage.

Hiroki had a pretty interesting drumsolo, and later the other members, except for Asagi, joined him in a really great performance.
They ended with Shuuen -uchuu e no kai ki- and then they went off but of course people shouted for an encore so we got to hear old favorites like Night Ship D (I felt so bad for not having flags T_T), Eden and of course Toki no Koe! I've seen live videos of Toki no Koe so many times and it looks awesome live, so I was very happ they played that, it was just as fun IRL as in the videos *_*

They took a lot of time to wave good bye to everyone, that was sweet of them. Tsunehito was very energetic all evening, he even headbanged his minihat off :P He came to the front of the stage a lot, encouraging people to shout, and I have no idea if he doesn't care or just doesn't think about it, but he often puts one leg on the speaker and since his skirt for the Kingdom look is short on one side we got to see all of his cute tiny tigh (I'm curious if those at the front row saw up to his underwear...what underwear does he have under all of those fluffy skirts...)
My fangirlheart was completly melted by HIDE-ZOU this evening though. He was so adorable, and sososo much prettier IRL than on the promophotos! I really don't get the overphtoshoped pictures of all VK bands, they look so much better IRL! I mean how can anyone say no to:

The concert itself was really good, it was not as much fun to get out of Shinjuku Blaze though :P I still hadn't used my drink ticket and I tried to aim for the bar, but there were so much people I was sort of pulled away... and then I looked at the line for the merch and just felt paniced so I just left... I really wanted to get the Kingdom pamphlet =( but I can't stand that much people in that small venue.
Eventhough I enjoyed them, I felt like most of the songs on Kingdom just didn't do it for me. I'll of course listen to it again, but yeah, sorry but I felt a bit meh.

I'd love to see D again, but I doubt that will happen since they'll go on hiatus next year... so I'm happy I at least got this chance!


Next up is ZIZ in 2 weeks!

October

I'm kind of amazed that Japan starts Halloween so early. Stores are full of pumpkins and witches eventhough October just began. Halloween parties are also all over October (what happened to the fact it's acctually a holiday at the end of the month?), and yet Tokyo is so hot I feel like I'm on a trip to hell (I'm really bad with heat, and cold acctually).

I'm still on a hideous jetlag, so as soon as I lie down I'm lying there for probably 2-3 hours trying to sleep. But of course that can't stop me when it comes to seeing my bands. This morning I set my alarm so that I'd be ready to go down to Lawson at 10 a.m, to get a ticket to D's concert at Shinjuku BLAZE in November!

Shinjuku BLAZE isn't that big so I wanted to be sure I'd get a ticket, but their webpage was down and when I got to the Loppi machine it stoped working because too many were buying tickets at the same time :P But I got my ticket and that's what's important!

To be honest I've been a bit disapointed in D's latest releases but they have some really amazing songs from their previous albums and since they're going on hiatus I really want to see them (to be frank, many bands say they go on hiatus and then you never see them again).

Tomorrow though, I'll be seeing The Velvet for the first time! I've planned on going to one of their livegigs since the first time I went to Tokyo and then something else has come in the way. But tomorrow I'm finally off to see Bera and Mimi! I'm really looking forward to it.