Japan Trip Feb/Mar 2015 ~ Day 3 p5 - Kalafina LIVE THE BEST 2015 “Red Day - thoughts

My tix for Red Day, my seat is different for Blue Day.

I am still feeling high and happy from yesterday's live. :)  I really felt that Kalafina sounded so good yesterday.  Maybe even better than the time when I saw them for the After Eden Special live in the Tokyo Dome City Hall which I thought they were amazing too.

We aren't allowed to take photos in the Budokan itself, of course, most Japanese lives that I've been to both in Japan and in Singapore don't allow that.  They don't even allow a photo of the empty stage. :(

The Budokan is big!! Well, it is the biggest concert venue that I have ever attended, so it's BIG for me. :)
I really didn't do much except line up for goods and had coffee & lunch at a café nearby while my friends and I waited for the live to begin.... I even forgot to take a photo of my lunch!! LOL

The queue for the goods was pretty long and it took me 1 1/2 hours before I was able to buy goods.  I had gone early before they started the scheduled start for the buying of goods because I hoped to get that out of the way and also because I didn't know where the Budokan was and I thought we may get lost while looking for it.  In the end, it wasn't very hard, we just followed the signs and the crowd. :P Crowd management was very good and they started selling early so as to prevent the crowd from swelling too badly I think.  That was nice of them because while the sun was out, it was still cold when we were in the shadows so I was more than happy for them to start early so that we could leave and rest somewhere.

I got what I wanted and felt that I could afford and we went to have coffee and later lunch when Itsuko, my Japanese friend arrived. :)

The live itself was really amazing.  I really enjoyed it!!!

The stage was kind of pretty.  In the beginning, there was this huge frame that was hung over a HD screen and when the live began, they played images on the screen as Kalafina came up through the trap doors at the back.  It was very cool, to be honest!  It really looked very pretty.

This is the setlist from Kalafina's blog. source

prelude～misterioso
テトテトメトメ
fantasia
--MC--
Lacrimosa
輝く空の静寂には
ARIA
believe
--MC--
moonfesta～ムーンフェスタ～
neverending
ひかりふる
光の旋律
～when the fairy tale ends～ (inst)
fairytale
oblivious
Kyrie
consolation
音楽
--MC--
夢の大地

--EN--
overture～Eden
胸の行方
--MC--
ring your bell ※新曲
アレルヤ
To be honest, I like all their songs.  I don't remember not liking any of Kalafina's songs.  I like them in varying degrees of course but I still like them all. :)  So no matter what the setlist is, I think I would have been happy to hear any song live., :) 

And there have some songs which I don't perhaps like as much as the rest which I later ended up liking a lot because they sang it soooooo well at a live that I was fortunate to attend that every time that I hear it in the future, I would recall how much I enjoyed it at a live that I would always have a much better feel for the song that I originally had. Last time it was Yane no Mukou Ni, this time it was Moonfesta which I never disliked but didn't like as much as their other songs.  I really remembered thinking how much I enjoyed this song at this live now. :)

I really really, really liked Tetoteometome at this live too. I like this song but it wasn't ever on my top ten Kalafina songs list. I liked it lots at this live.  And maybe I enjoyed their dance movements too. Hahahaha.... Kalafina "danced" more than they have at any other live that I remember.  They had choreographed dance movements and I actually like it.  I am one of those who don't ever want Kalafina to dance like the idol groups do at their lives. It is hard enough for them to sing and harmonise at their lives, it would be near impossible for them to do that if they had to do a breathless dance routine too.  Their kind of dancing is more like a Madonna-style "strike a pose" type dancing in her song "Vogue" plus simple popping type dance moves combined it seems.  It actually like it.  It worked for me.

I can't remember which song they were singing when they played with striking poses in the spotlight. I really liked what they were doing there too.

My favourite at this live was Keiko again.  But Keiko is my favourite almost all the time, so I will always be biased. I just love her deep and powerful voice and I love it when she really gets into it in songs like Mune no Yukue and Alleluia. :P 

It pleased me greatly when my friend whom I dragged all the way from Singapore to Japan to experience Kalafina's live told me at the end of the live that if she was to pick the one she liked best it would be Keiko too.  She said she liked deeper voices and loved Keiko's voice control and particularly liked her in songs like Mune no Yukue.  I didn't even tell her previously that I liked Keiko best.  Hahaha... I don't know, it just made me happy to hear that.  My friend also really like Tetometometome too.  She said she liked how the opening and the middle bit was so different in "genre" but still managed to work very nicely together.  She's a drummer so she said she was watching the Satou Kyoichi a lot. :)  She said that as a drummer, she knew was also fascinated by how fast the beat was for a lot of the songs, yet how Kalafina managed to sing them "slower" but it all still worked beautifully.  I am pleased my friend who knew almost nothing about Kalafina enjoyed this live. :)  She's not attending tonight's, it's her first time in Japan and Tokyo, so we agreed previously that she should spend time checking out Tokyo on the second night.

Kalafina also sang their new song "Ring Your Bell".  To be honest, I don't remember it in great detail.  It was just like how it was with "Magia" when I was privileged enough to be at the live where they announced the song and sang it for the first time.  At that time, I even thought that Keiko was the lead when the lead was actually Hikaru.  I remember lots of harmony, I remember thinking it was interesting and not like their recent songs, I remember not being able to figure out who was the lead and I remember thinking that parts of it sounded kind of classical to me.

Also, I think it was right around this time when Keiko was asked a question by Wakana.  I don't remember the details but it had something to do with ikemen in the audience I think because when Keiko asked for the "joshi" (women) in the audience and several raised their hands, she said, "daisuki!!"  OMG, I was like..... I am going to faint with delight from all that cuteness :P  Lately, they've been really playing up the "yuri" thing in Kalafina.  I can't say I dislike it. :P 

Also, Akagi Rie and Konno Hitoshi had a chance to take centre stage too when they and the front band members + Konno Hitoshi's Strings played ~ when the fairy tale ends ~ (inst).  It was really good!!!!  I am soooooo looking forward to Kajiura Yuki's vol.12 soundtrack special lives too now. :)



Okay... it looks like my friend, who has gotten up from bed, is almost ready.  I need to go.  I'm going to take her to Harajuku before I head to the live today. :)

This post is a little rambling... but in short... let's just say I LOVED yesterday's live.  I thought that they were spellbindingly mesmerizing... all THREE of them combined soooooo well and I have only fallen more in love with them and their lives. :)

Let's hope tonight's live will be as awesome, if not more awesome.

cheers :)
p.s. I'm sure there are spelling and grammar errors... please forgive any glaring errors, I have never been good with proofreading, nor do I have the time to do it now. :P  Bye!!

P.p.s BTW... I counted maybe six cameras....I think there will be a BD / DVD release. Fingers crossed. :)