Alice Nine first oneman at Liquid Rom Ebisu
January 21st, 2005

It had been significantly less than a year since Alice Nine first formed, and they were already having their first oneman, not just anywhere, but at Liquid Room. I'd never been to Liquid Room, but heard it was pretty big. The map to get there is lame... It says to go out the west exit, but the west exit has a west side and an east side, and it doesn't tell you which side to go out OR what direction to turn after you find the right side. Luckily there were tons of people obviously on their way to the live; unluckily none of them knew where they were going either!! The first two girls I sneakily followed started going in the obviously wrong direction so I turned back around. The second group of girls were on their cel phones getting directions, but the people on the phones didn't know well enough to direct them properly. Finally I spotted some who looked confident in where they were going, so I (along with 10 other people) subtly followed them to Liquid Room.

I wasn't expecting the lobby to be bigger than most livehouses I frequent combined. It was huge, with lockers and the goods table and hundreds of girls. I put my coat and heavy belongings in a locker and wandered over to see what goods they had. Near the table, I happened to see Cameron. I hadn't seen him in ages, so we talked about this and that until my number was called. I had ticket number B29 which meant that 500 people with A tickets got to go in before me, but then there were all the Bs and then tickets with no letter, so I was about in the middle. Cam didn't have a letter, so he was one of the last in. I went down stairs, through a bag check and was handed a flyer packet and the present of the evening, a video.

Liquid Room was huge. It was one big rectangular room, with raised side parts all around with tables and more standing room. It was like Shibuya Club Quattro, but possibly bigger. The front section was packed so I was pretty far back, but could still see the stage well. I knew Alice Nine was popular... when I saw them at the Area Halloween live there were obviously a good number of people there to see them... a lot as in, 50. I wasn't expecting their fanbase to balloon to over seven hundred people in a matter of months. Really shocking!

After waiting for a while, the lights went down and on the white curtain they showed Alice Nine's logo in bright light. Then they backlit the curtain so you could see their shadows, with the logo still in front, and red light patterns swirled around as the opening music swelled. It was a simple thing to do but had a big effect. Finally the curtain dropped to reveal the band in their new costumes. There were raised platforms in the back for Saga and Nao, and a big Alice Nine logo was on the back wall.

Their costumes were rather ridiculous, but they somehow managed to not look like fools in them. There are plenty of pictures of those costumes now, but there hadn't been before the live. All of them were themed with white, gold kimono fabric, and polka dots. Quite the unusual combination. I'm a Shou fan, and focused my attention most on him. He had white pants with black buckles on the legs, and a white pleated skirt over it. His shirt was polka-dot, and white jacket sloped down in the back to points, with ruffled strips of the polka-dot material on the tails and cuffs. He had gold sparkly arm covers, and his hair was spiked up. I didn't really examine the others' costumes as much, but I'm sure everyone knows what they look like by now. My first impressions of the rest of them were that Saga-sama had fake extensions on and looked rather full of himself, Tora looked like an American guy, Nao was adorable, and Hiroto was "gay gay gay gay gay." I wrote those notes after the live, but now I don't quite remember what made Hiroto more gay than usual.

Anyway... they were spectacular! I can see why they got so popular. They're such good performers, and just play really well. There was not a single screw-up in any element of the staging, it was so well-rehearsed. They said they all hadn't slept one bit, but were so full of energy. Shou was being flirty, putting his arms around the other members, whispering to them, smiling and bouncing all over. They all moved around a lot, sometimes standing up on the drum platform, standing back-to-back. Tora posed a lot, mouthed lyrics, turned in circles. Hiroto was in his own little world of drama. He just always looked overdramatic and silly. Saga acted like royalty, but in a different pretentious way than Hiroto.

The lighting at Liquid Room is fantastic also. There were so many things done with the lighting, planned perfectly, it was all so crisp and using vivid colors. There was some usage of patterned lights too. For a couple songs they lit up a disco ball above the audience. The most memorable was when the entire stage was awash with blue, and then they highlighted whoever was doing a solo in bright white light. It was all very beautiful!

They played all their songs from Namae wa mada nai and Gion Shouja, a whole bunch of new songs, and did an encore of Akai kazeguruma. They played all the Gion songs first. Shou said Gradation is an "imi ga aru kyoku" (a song with a meaning) and for us to listen. It's my favorite song of theirs, and they didn't let me down! The choreography to the beginning part Shou did was: right arm up, left arm up, flip them, then cross them, then make a saluting motion, and repeat. Akai kazeguruma had a similar one I remember the steps to but not how it matches up with the music. It involves a grasping and pulling motion, and clicking your wrists. For G3, everyone holds their fingers in the air to the lyrics (one when he says hitotsu, two at futatsu, etc) leading to a fist in the air. During Honjitsu wa seiten nari, there was no movement at all. Tora played the acoustic guitar and everyone was silent.

After a big chunk of songs, everyone parades off stage, leaving Nao behind his drums. Nao proceeded to do a not-too-impressive but amazingly lit drum solo to various background tracks, with rainbow strobe lights and the whole works. The rainbow strobe lights were perhaps my favorite lighting effect of all time.

The rest of them returned after he was done, and vaulted right back into the songs. Shou was really energetic and talkative. He didn't MC much, they just went non-stop music. During their second MC, Shou was asking us if it was hot. He questioned Nao about the temperature, but since Nao rarely talks, he made a big O sign with his arms (which in Japan is "OK"). So Shou says "Nao-sensei says it's okay!", as Nao waves arms "no" violently, and eventually conveys that it's "zero degrees". Naonao was being very shy the whole time; he didn't talk much but tried to convey things through arm motions and Shou interpreting... silly boy. For the member introduction song, Shou had us call everyone by: Nao, Saga-sama, Tora-san, Hiroto, and Sho~ou! I find it amusing that Saga is a -sama, although he sure acts like it.

For the encore, they all came back out in new Alice Nine tshirts (black with a small white logo). Shou had everyone MC. You could tell they were honestly so happy that they were playing. Hiroto almost started crying during his MC thanking everyone for coming and about how amazing it is to be having such a big oneman after not even being around for a year. He stopped talking mid-way and turned his back to the audience, everyone started yelling "you can do it!" Shou had not much else to say after Hiroto's moving speech, so he introduced Akai kazeguruma. It was still fun a second time around, and Shou had us all sing the chorus over and over again. He got quite emotional over that too.

In the end, everyone put their arms around each other, and hugged and it was super cute. Shou offered Nao the mic and he zipped his lips. Throwing of watter bottles, picks, etc.

Although I would have liked to be closer, it was really really fun. The fans seem pretty nice too... Two songs required joining hands with the person next to you, and the girls next to me (four different girls, as people were moving around) did so while smiling. It was probably different up front but there didn't seem to be any nasty girls where I was standing! And there were a ton of guys there too!

1. Time machine
2. Akai kazeguruma
~MC~
3.Gradation
4.G3
5.H.A.N.A.B.I.
6.Honjitsu wa seiten nari
~MC~
7. Gin no tsuki kuro no hoshi

~Nao time~

8. Merou ni shizunde
9. Chaos na aori (temporary title)
10. Meiji
11. Byakuya ni kuroneko
~MC~
12.Yuri wa aoku saite
13. Yami ni chiru sakura
14. Ageha
15. Hana ichi monme
Encore: Akai kazeguruma

See Cure magazine's report and pictures in Volume 19! [February 2005, Kra cover]