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| I was seated far right, favouring Wakana, 1st Flr, Row 24 Seat 78. |
But I am back in Tokyo and was back on Friday to attend the Kalafina "far on the water" tour end lives. :) Yup, the Kalafina lives are the biggest reason why I chose to come to Japan in Jan and also the biggest reason why I extended my stay by a week so that I could accommodate the 8th Anniversary lives last Friday and Saturday. Those were really awesome lives and I gushed about them endlessly for the entire weekend. :P
And now, I purposely woke up early to write about the Kalafina "far on the water" Special Final live Day 1. That's last night's live on the 30th Jan. :) I am still super high from the lives. It was a very good live and it's the reason why I had so much trouble going to sleep last night. LOL! I was reliving the emotional high in my mind all night till maybe about 2am in the morning before I fell asleep. :)
I really wanted to gush about it last night when I was still super high but I met another friend for dinner and by the time that was done and I managed to check into my hotel (yeah, I changed hotels because my travel companion has gone home), I was ultra tired. Although physically I was very tired, emotionally I was alert. It was a good feeling though but it meant that I really didn't feel like busting out the Surface Pro 3 to try and blog. I just lied in bed with the TV on and felt all shiawase that I had the privilege of being at this live.
I won't write detailed stuff. These days I much rather be enveloped in the emotional high of being at a good live then write detailed reviews on what happened during each song or if there were issues etc. Those days are long gone and I find trying to keep so many details in my head a real chore and gets in the way of the moment. So yeah, I don't remember a ton of details but I can tell you without any reservation that last night's live was a VERY good one.
Was it as good as the 8th Anniversary live? Yes, I felt last night's live was as good as my 8th Anniversary live experience but good in a different way. The 8th Anniversary live was in a very small location and everyone in there were fan club members which means everyone was pretty much relatively hardcore Kalafina and/or Kajiura Yuki fans. So the atmosphere was always going to be good because people were there to party and celebrate the moment with the girls. There was a lot of hand pumping and bouncing to the music.
The SP lives are in a MUCH larger space. While O-East can take maybe 1300 people at max capacity, the Tokyo International Forum Hall A can take 5000+ at max capacity. Acoustics seems better too but what one may lose is the atmosphere.
I've been to numerous Kalafina fans since my first in 2010 Dec at what was once called the Lemon CC Hall. And I remember that live with fondness. At that live, everyone around me stood from start to finish but there were many lives after that where people around me didn't stand or didn't groove to the music or sat in their seats. That's not to mean that they didn't enjoy these lives, they all did but Kalafina isn't your regular rock / pop band and their music with their sometimes unusual beat changes make it hard to do your usual JPop "oy oy" hand punch move. I have enjoyed many of their lives sitting down because their music can easily be enjoyed standing or sitting down. That's Kalafina's power to me.
But last night, Kalafina was really amazing. No live is absolutely perfect or CD perfect to me, especially Rock / Pop / Metal lives etc. And so, no, it was not absolutely perfect or CD perfect but I don't demand that nor want a sterile reproduction of their studio recordings. And, in my opinion, they got VERY little wrong last night. Everyone from the 3 girls in Kalafina to the FBM to Ohira-san to production people etc did an awesome job last night.
I want the emotional high of a live and Kalafina delivered it last night. I think the crowd was responded in kind too. Lots of people stood during the fast songs and lots of hand movements in time to the music and mood of many of the songs. I stood up for a lot of the live except when people around me sat because I didn't want to block the people behind me. I was totally into the music and the world around me pretty much melted away as their beautiful vocals and harmony transported me to another dimension.
I was also at the opening lives of this tour in October last year and I can say without any reserved that they were many, many times better than they were in October. It seems like the tour really gave them the opportunity to hone their skills and it really shows. Last night's live was very polish, yet they still managed to retain their sincerity and that raw emotion that only lives can give you. Yup, they were very good but they didn't feel like some boring well-oiled machine. I was soooooooooooooooooo high throughout the whole live. It was incredible. :) When the live closed and they did their usual thanks, I was close to tears because I was sooooooooooooooooooo happy and privilege to be part of this moment. Whether this is a live to remember for them, I don't know. But for me, so far these three lives have been amazing and keep getting more amazing and I hope, hope, hope that they manage to surpass it tonight. Then it would truly be the best Kalafina concert trip for me EVER!!
The setlist has been changed around since the Oct lives. I don't remember exactly because I really am not that anal. :P But this time, they ended with the title song of the live and album "far on the water". I'm not sure about the Osaka special lives but on all previous legs, they had been switching out the last song with one of their songs that wasn't from the "far on the water" album.
This time they also gave us a preview of their upcoming Spring Strings live. They sang a really, really, really lovely version of Mahiru with just the strings and the piano playing. It was LOVELY and made me sad at the same time. It is impossible for me to attend any of the strings lives and Christmas is also an expensive and difficult time for me to go on tour. Hence, I have no idea if I can ever attend any of their strings or acoustic lives. Ahhhhhhhh.... if I wasn't already committed to a trip built around my friend's wedding, I would sell my Yuki Kajiura vol.13 live ticket in Osaka and go to one of the Kalafina strings live. Sorry, Kajiura-san, much as I LOVE your music, SAO isn't my favourite OST and it looks like Keiko won't be performing at the vol.13 SAO lives....I really like YK lives with all four of the usual vocalists....and Keiko is my favourite.....I'm still moping about this.... :'( ....but I digress.
Oh, they also had the Konno Hitoshi strings at the special final lives which was really awesome. They didn't have that at the October lives. This was a pleasant surprise. :) Kalafina sounds really good with the string quartet. Really awesome!!
I'm getting good at the hand movements for Identify and Ongaku. :) Identify is really an awesome song, so fun at the lives. :) It's still my favourite song from the "far on the water" album. Musunde Hiraku keeps growing on me with every live rendition. Even Hokage has grown on me after the lives. They really do perform Hokage really well at the lives, I felt that even in October. Usumurasaki, soooo sensuous live. :P And Ongaku....which live would be complete without Ongaku. It's really a rocking song and they are getting really good at it these days. For years, I always felt that they had issues with this song but these days they seem to be resolving a lot of those issues bit by bit till Ongaku sound really cool at all the lives I've heard them so far on this trip. Ongaku is really one of the songs that get the crowd really going. The energy is really high in this song and Kalafina really seem to enjoy singing this song which is why I usually discount any issues they've had with it because they were't really trying to sing it perfect, they were trying to get us really rocking with them. And Ongaku has that kind of power and is even more powerful now that they seem to be really singing this song well!!
There were no cameras last night. Well, at least none that I could see, except for one small roving handheld camera which I think was probably being used for news or a possible docu or for archival purposes. PLEASE!!!!! Have cameras tonight, I would LOVE to buy the live BD of the "far on the water" lives!!!
Okay.....I think I'll stop rambling now. It's about time I showered and kind of pack my bags a little to try and figure out how I can get all these concert goods home. :)
But before that..... concert goods unboxings!!!!! :)
Kalafina released a new photo book for the lives and it's really nice and most fans would be quite happy with it. :) Because it's a PHOTO book and not a concert pamphlet, there is no text in this release except for things like the title of the tour and the credit pages. It's full page color and contains many photos of them at the lives on this tour. You get all the different costumes they used at the lives too.
So.... here you go photos. :)
The above are photos of the photo book with the plastic wrap on and off. It's a soft cover release with a matte finish for the cover. It's about 60 pages from cover to cover. I say "about" because I'm not sure if I counted it correctly. :P But it should be about there. :) It's a lovely release and I think most fans would be pleased to own this. If you do find it sold at a reasonable price on one of the online stores in the future, I do recommend it to fans. :)
Also, the other thing they released is the parka. It comes in three colors and.... oh.... I just remembered that Hikaru did a really cute job introducing this and the photo book. She was commenting that the Keiko and Wakana had nice and normal photos of them with their arms stretched out normally etc and she had a back arch rocker style photo!!!! She demonstrated it all in a very funny fashion. LOL. She also said that the parka comes in three colors, I think she said "hazel?" grey, "hazel?" blue and oatmeal..... or simply grey, blue and white.... it's hard to explain it here but the way she said it was very funny. :) These goods introduction at the Kalafina lives have become one of the highlights of the lives. Hikaru's really good at them now and very funny. I still remember the days when both Keiko and Wakana had to try hard to get Hikaru to chat more at a live. :) She's really come a long way, hasn't she? Actually, they all have. They really sound so good now. :)
Okay.... photos of the parka. :) I bought a grey L. And I need to caution all here. The L is kind of a Japanese L. Meaning, it was kinda fitting for me. So if you prefer a looser fit, you might want to go a size up. :)
It's a really comfortable hoodie. And I'm really happy that I got it. I like the blue one too and had a hard time picking between the two. But I had to go with grey in the end because Keiko modeled the grey hoodie at the two 8th Anniversary lives. So... um.... no choice for me.... I have to go with what Keiko wore. :P Well.... to be honest, if she had modeled the oatmeal hoodie, I would still have picked grey or blue because I really don't like white or off white clothes that much. :P Still, between grey and blue, it was a hard decision. Thank you Keiko for helping me make that choice. :P Oh and for those who might be wondering, Hikaru modeled the blue hoodie and Wakana modeled the oatmeal hoodie.
And this is me modelling the hoodie. Yes, I am sacrificing myself here to show you that the L is quite fitting for me when it's zipped up. I usually have no problems with their L size shirts. Sadly, I do have a weight issue which my doctor isn't happy about but some medical issues and my huge love for food conspire to keep me happily plump. :P
Anyway... here you go.... me in a very comfortable Kalafina hoodie. My first one too. :)
That's it for all the new goods this time. :)
I had to buy a new wristband AGAIN!! Because I keep forgetting to bring them to the lives with me. :'( And I was DETERMINED to wear the wristband at least once at the lives because Keiko mentioned in October that she liked seeing them on our wrist at the lives. Maybe they mentioned it again at the 8th Anniversary lives, I forget. But anyway, I just HAD to wear it at this live. So I bought the black wristband this time. :) It's pretty nice anyway. So I'm happy to wear it. It's now packed in my bag with my loose page from the pamphlet I got in Oct. I need to have this wrist band tonight and also to get my memorial stamp. :)
Finally, I don't remember if I posted up the messages that the three girls left for fans at the lives in October. To be brutally honest, I don't know if they are the same messages from then because I forgot to read them in Oct. Even if I did post them up, I probably didn't really read them because I was really in a hurry back then. They used the same mini-posters and cards to write these messages as those in Oct 2015. *sweat I suck as a fan. *sweat. (horror!!!)
So here are the messages from them! :) In case they are different and in case I never posted them up in Oct 2015, here you go. :P :P :P Please forgive me!! :D
Okay... that's it!!
Here's hoping yet again that tonight's live will surpass all the lives I've been to and that there will be cameras tonight!!! :)
cheers
p.s. I'm not going to proof read yet.... I need to get going. This post took a while to write. :P So forgive any glaring spelling and grammar mistakes and also any lapse in logic etc. :)
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