Rainy day in Nishikujo, I got there way too early and ended up wandering around to find a print club booth, and after still having an hour and a half, I decided to go to Osaka to window shop. I arrived back at Brand New around opening time, and stood up the stairs with a handful of other people. While I was standing there, a cute guy in a red+black checkered punk getup was wandering around handing out packets of tissues with a band on it. It was his band, Style, and he was asking people to pay attention to his set. Aww.

Once the doors finally opened I found that they had lost my reservation. Only 4 people had reserved tickets, 8 tickets in total, but there was no reason why they shouldn't have my reservation... So I stared blankly at the staff lady until she ran into a back room for a few minutes and returned with a ticket in her hand, crossed out "8" and wrote "9", and filled my name in, apologizing. Heh. I'm speeeecial.

Brand New changed a bunch since last time I was there. They switched the nice spaced-out headbang bars in the front to giant metal monstrosities that spread from wall to wall. There was also no stage table thing, but rather some boxy stage extension that served pretty much the same purpose. And also, I guess because of the (small) crowd expectancy, most of the place was packed with tables and chairs. There was room in the front for only 3~4 rows of fans. The place was pretty empty, and there was a surprising amount of guys in the audience too.

I staked out a table in the middle and waited for Cari. Once she arrived, we flipped through our packets and that cute band guy came around again. He said hi to us and basically the same thing as before, to watch their set.

First band was Blaze Ability. We remained at the table for their set, as there were only 5 fans up front and we would stick out like nothing else, especially if we didn't know the music and so on. But they were a pretty cool band. T-shirts and jeans wearing, however. The vocalist's shirt said "AFROMANTIC" which just amused me. He had a really good voice. Their guitarist looked like a SexMachineguns reject. Old and big nasty hair. They would dance in unison, and the fans would dance along. It was cute. Their music was rocky punk, catchy but nothing memorable.

Style was next, so we granted the cute guy's wishes and went to the front to watch them. The girls surrounding us were going INSANE, screaming and hollering and dancing. I think they all knew each other, and they were doing some weird warm-up chant thing. Then Style came out, and just furthered their insanity. They were SO fun! Soooo happy and crazy, didn't stand in one place the entire time. The cute guy was in fact their bassist, whose name was Tommy. The vocalist Yuji was kinda old and creepy, but very lively. Guitarist Mako was very feminine and sexy, in tight black revealing clothes. The drummer, Dai, was just sorta there. There were all sorts of crazy dances they did, turning around and clapping and arm waving and headbanging. At one point they actually had this thing where the fans would turn and face each other, and do this choreographed patty-cake type clapping game to the song. I've never seen anything quite like it. But they were, by far, one of the most energetic bands I've ever seen, if not the most.

Halfway through their set, You from Bang-Doll came out to the audience area in full costume and houseplant hair, and watched the band. Tommy was trying to make everyone watching do this one dance sorta thing. They would move their arm parallel to the ground, about chest level towards the left, then swing it up in the air. Meanwhile saying something that sounded like "kyou kyou!" but I don't really know what. Tommy would make these exaggerated angry faces at anyone who didn't do it, even imitating one girl who was crossing her arms. He was so adorable. At the end, Yuji brought out a big sign with the kanji "saikou" (the best) on it. He would point at the members and yell really fast and hold up the sign. Like "We're the best!!" Music-wise, they sounded pretty much like the first band. It was high-energy music but once again, nothing too memorable. It was all the stuff that went along with the music that made it one of the most fun sets I've ever seen.

When the Style fans left, I planted myself right in the middle with the bar, and went insane while Bang-Doll took forever and a day to set up. Waiting a year to see them was just too much for me. I had been geeky and made it secret that I was appearing there, they didn't know I was in Japan, although the staff losing my reservations and having to ask backstage kinda spoiled it. Either way I was nervous as to how they'd react. x_x; There weren't as many fans there as there were for Style, but they were all visual-type girls (most of the other people there were just "normal") and a lot of them had some alcoholic drink in their hands. One girl tapped Cari on the shoulder and said in perfect English, "Do you know what band is up next? Do you like them?!" I think she was pissed we were in the front. Not like it matters, she was right next to us. Anyway, the girls were half-heartedly screaming names, mostly "Hiki Hiki Hiki!" which is some silly abbreviation for Hiroki, and "You-sama!". One girl said something like "Oh, poor Ryo-suke, no one's yelling for him", and uninterestedly yelled his name too. First and only time I've heard name-yelping for them (I hate it, so much). Damn Osaka girls.

Curtains opened and I started screaming for fun, and each member came out individually. They were wearing basically what they were in the site picture, only Ikumi thankfully lost the snakeskin horror tracksuit and was wearing his former costume of red PVC and black stuff. Yet has grown a god-awful goatee of some sorts. I don't know which is worse. Ryo-suke had an additional vinyl patch on his shirtsleeve that was the logo thing for their upcoming CD release. They started off with a song I didn't know, but it didn't matter because headbanging needs no choreography. W00t. Headbanging is so fun. We all did it throughout the entire set. Except for a brand-new song, which was really slow... Well, slow by their standards. But it was a really good song. I was kinda sad, because they actually played ALL new/not-on-CD songs except Downing (which was awesome, btw), and I love being able to sing along or at least recognize songs. A few of the newer songs involved Ryou with his harmonica. Him playing that is so amusing.

They all acted fairly distant towards the fans, just posing on the box but not high-fiving or anything cheesy like that. But they were quite smiley. You the most, Ryou the least. At one point, though, we all had our fists in the air, and Ryou ran by knocking ours with his. They did put their legs up on the bars a lot (crotches in face!), and Ryou did this crazy split with one leg on the box and one on the speaker, which was pretty damn far away. He did a lot of ninja kicking and boxing with an invisible partner. The coolest thing, I thought, was for the song "Delaz" during the instrumental part, Ryou finished singing and went towards the back, and Gou came up front and did a solo, then went towards the back, then Ikumi and You came up together, and did this little dueling guitars thing. It was really neat. <3

Oh, and the background vocal chorus thing for Downing is purely laughable. Everyone knows it too. The looks You and Ikumi were giving each other as they sang "lo-li lo-li lock izu mai soul la la la la la la la" were PRICELESS.

And they all cracked open their massive cans of BEER, and did a kampai!, to which the girls in the front who had their drinks held them up too. The whole band reeked of alcohol, you could smell it from so far away. They're hilarious. Altogether they played I think 5 songs, and ran offstage without throwing so much as a pick. I think they're uncomfortable in Osaka, the fans are weird.

R...cafe' was next, and we could tell by the surge of Lolitas pushing us out of the way as soon as Bang-Doll was over, that they were gonna be cutesy. Completely worn out, we went back to our table and got drinks (somehow I think Japanese alcohol manages to be completely non-alcoholic, even in bottles). All the Style members were wandering around the fan area, talking to people. Tommy came up to us and thanked us for participating, asked to fill out their enquette, then we asked him for a picture. It was so funny, we said "shashin" (photo), but because of the noise, he was like "sushi!?" But we got our pictures, and it was cool. We talked for quite a while, then he said after the live there would be a group photo thing, and to join them. Mako was also thanking people, and Dai was going around petting girls on the head. So weird. Anyway, R...café' looked pretty normal, except Hitomichan (ex-Karuarozetto) who was wearing tight-ass neon yellow pants and a silly looking stationmaster type striped hat. "He looks like a Hot-Dog-on-a-Stick Employee." Their intro music was Enya. Their music was cutesy.

I didn't pay much attention to their set, as I was caught up writing Style's enquette and complaining about my neck pain. I did manage to get a picture of Hitomichan, though. I was hoping Bang-Doll members would come out, as I had screen printed them t-shirts as a gift, and wanted to give it to them in person. But none of them showed, or were even out in the merch area. One thing that was rather memorable about R...cafe' (besides their annoying to type name), was that they would do a dual vocals thing, where the vocalist would sing something, then Hitomichan would. Hitomichan was sooo goofy and was bouncing all around stage. Gawd he's cute. They got the whole audience boucing in unison. I kinda regret not paying them more attention, especially after my extreme devotion to Karuarozetto (and affinity towards Hitomichan), but eh, so it goes.

After they were finished, Cari wanted to get some food so I stood out in the merch area waiting for her and figured out what to buy. I ended up just with a Bang-Doll photoset. While I was out there, the next band, SELFRUSH, started. Their first song was some old English big-band ska cover, the one with lyrics like "This cat's shakin' on a hot tin roof". Totally bizarre. We went back in for the rest of the set, but really didn't watch it. Their vocalist looked like he was trying to cosplay Baroque's vocalist. They seemed to have a fairly good fan turnout, but they played so long, by the end there were only a few straggling people at the front. Most of their fans left! Seriously!

Meanwhile, halfway through the set, You entered the audience area again. Cari was trying to convince me to give him the present then, but he was watching the band and it would be rude to everyone if I just went and harassed him then. But then he left again. Grr. After a while, I noticed from the constant door opening and closing, that he was in fact still there, standing in the merch room. Along with Ryou. I started freaking out from nervousness, and Cari grabbed my arm and dragged me out, practically throwing me into You. He was like "Harooo!" in that cute Japanese way, and I was just @____@ not knowing what the hell to do. So Ryou told him I was Krys, and You asked which one of us (me or Cari) and he pointed and nodded and it was awkward for a few seconds. Then I handed Ryou the present, and said it was for everyone. He was like "Naaaaani kore?!" (whaaaat is this?!) then I gave him a cheesy note I wrote along with it. Then he asked me in perfect English when I came to Japan (which completely FLOORED me, coming from Mr. "I can't speak any English"), and we chatted for a little bit and took pictures and then I scurried back off.

SELFRUSH just like, didn't know how to end a set. They went on forever. They weren't too bad, just kinda ska-ish (I despise ska). When they finally ended, Style and their fans gathered around the stage for a picture. Tommy told me that he was actually born in New Jersey and Tommy was his real name, yet he didn't know where Connecticut was. Silly Japanese boys. So everyone posed and they took a few pictures, and rearranged ourselves and took a few more pictures, then we were all handed pieces of paper to write our addresses on so they could send the pictures. Dai figured the silly foreigners needed help writing their addresses, so he and a staff girl stood around and gave us a special treatment. When we finally decided it was time to go, we went to say goodbye to Tommy. He shook our hands a million times and said we have to see them again, and so on. Ahhh he's so cute I can't get over it! Style is the friendliest band in the WORLD.

We gathered up our bags and started heading towards the door, when I noticed Ikumi standing right inside the door, wearing one of the t-shirts I just gave them. I flipped, but Yuji and Dai were standing by the door and I had to regain my composure to say goodbye to them. They thanked us, and Dai did this ghetto brotha handshake, which was pretty damn funny. Once we got to the door, I saw that not only Ikumi, but Hiroki and Gou were all standing there, all changed out of costume and wearing my shirts. They all started talking to me at once, saying hello and thank you... I was just completely shocked. Gou smiled really goofily, like what Japanese homeys on the street do when they want to talk to the strange foreigners, and shook my hand. He really amuses me. Hiroki, hiding behind his sunglasses, grinned and threw a bunch of English words together to form some sort of thank you. It was the coolest thing ever!

My money went to: Bang-Doll
My money should have gone to: <3 <3
Goods: Bang-Doll photoset
Souvenirs: lots of pictures and loooove XD