First things first: I do not function well on little sleep. After last night's events, I went to bed around 9am and waking a little after noon, I was, well, not in the best condition. I wandered around Ikebukuro in a hazy state, trying to wake up. Despite this, I managed to get my ticket beforehand using all the mustered Japanese I could. When 6:00 rolled around, I found myself in a line with a bunch of other girls. And yes, "found myself" because I was practically running on auto-pilot, repeating in my head "common, wake up, you're going to a concert!" Soon enough we were ushered into Cyber, which was not nearly as crowded as last year.

At the door, we were handed with our packets a deflated balloon with an additional plastic mouthpiece at the end. Inside, girls were sitting in loose rows on the floor, filling up most of the small area. The row I was in, however, were all standing up. Oh how I wanted to be sitting down, but I could not. I was only about 5 rows back, but the space these chicks were taking up was RIDICULOUS, and I was almost in the back. There was an odd selection of people there. A lot of young people. There was actually an entire family there. A mother, a girl that looked about 14, and a girl that looked about 6. Seriously! I've never seen that before anywhere. Some girl at the front was handing out massive amounts of glow bracelets, so everyone ended up with at least one. We were given instructions to wave them around when they played "Hoshi furu yoru".

7:07 took forever to come around. Standing up in one position for a long period of time is annoying enough, but when you're running on negative hours of sleep and don't have anything to do, it's downright painful.

But eventually, the lights went down and, yay! Out comes Dear Loving. Fans stand up, but do not move. So, there are LARGE gaps of space that remain throughout. Sadly, I was pretty far away, and couldn't push forward because no one was moving.

Please pardon this live report, as it will be very un-detailed and probably contain holes due to not remembering half of what happened and not being able to find a setlist from the night. OH BUT WAIT! 6 months later, I find a setlist!! *joy*

They came out wearing the same "costumes" as I had seen them in a few days prior. First song, of course, was

1) Hoshi furu yoru ni aimashou.

Just as pretty as I remembered it, and really cool with everyone waving their glowsticks around. Following was

2) We are POJIPOKKU!

To get the audience bouncing and alert, of course. Sadly though, throughout the night, most of what they played was from "Genki Demashita" and "Anata ni sasageru ai no uta". Like stated in previous live report, Anata ni is definitely not my favorite CD, but it has its good songs. Especially Hirakata Boogie-woogie, in which Masa shakes his ass to and dances around stage. But they really needed to play more old (and better) songs :(

3) Ganbare ore!
4) Neo gang
5) Koi wa futari de ~girls to~

Yay, the first "old" song. Everyone did a different hand dance along with it, that was damn funny.

6) Fura Revolution 2003

This was a new song, which was completely insane and involved Masa doing a fruity dance, yelling "oooh" and "ahh!" fruitily, and having a fruity conversation with Yuki on a fake phone. Man, they're so crazy.

7) Boku ga kimi ni hikareta riyuu
8) Itoshii hito ga dekimashita (new song)

People don't like new songs. Well, they do, but they don't like them when they're played in large amounts live. Because, well, they don't know them!! Nothing's worse than staring blankly at the band, not being able to dance or even nod your head in recollection to! Regardless of whether they were good or not (like I can even begin to imagine what they sounded like), at least they saved them for a oneman and didn't shove them in a short set.

9) Go ahead ~hikari sasu bashou~
10) Hirakata Boogie-woogie

Yeah Masa, SHAKE THAT ASS!! WOOO!!

11) JUMP!!

During this song, possibly the coolest thing I've ever seen in a live before occurred. We were given instructions to blow the balloons up, but to pinch them shut and not tie them. They were rather unforgiving balloons, and a lot of people had trouble blowing them up. The band was very patient though, and waited until everyone was done. When they were blown up, everyone had a massive 2 foot long phallic balloon sticking in the air. All multi colored. Then they started the song, to which we shook the balloons around and jumped with them, and all that. That alone was pretty crazy and fun. Then mid-way through the song, on their cue, we all let go of our balloons at once. Because of the plastic mouthpiece, they let the air out slowly; so 200 balloons took off like rockets and flew around the live house for a good thirty seconds. It was just so cool. Everyone, especially the band, could not contain their childish glee and we all laughed throughout. You had to be there.

However, most of the night was dedicated to weird comedy skits by the band members.

"ENCORE" 1 = Hoshi to mikadzuki

After clothing changes (Masa now has a blue tshirt with STAR written on it), onto the next act. Masa and Yuki come out and perform their side-project type band, which I now know is called "Hoshi to mikadzuki". Yuki has only an acoustic guitar, and Masa has only his lovely voice. They were actually bordering on disturbingly serious, with the lights dimmed and quiet, quiet songs. They played "Anata ni sasageru ai no uta" (HATE HATE HATE) but changed the lyrics so each verse was about a member of his family (cutely retitled "Kazoku ni sasageru ai no uta"), which was just downright cute and made up for the suckiness of the song. It was cheesy like "He's 50 years old but still likes young girls, and Pocari Sweat drink"... stuff like that. Someone's father was in the guest seats, so it could have been his. They also played the fruitiest of all fruity songs, I don't know WHERE it came from but he called it "Happy birthday to my dear friend" and it was as corny as it sounds. Just... oh dear god I can't begin to describe it. Plus an additional song titled "Thank you my father".... They frighten me sometimes.

Takuya did perhaps the most unnecessarily unsettling performance. He came out with his hair in a topknot, displaying his wide forehead, and really large, really geeky glasses. Then he proceeded to do the voice of TERROR that we hear at the end of "Loose Vision"; the rap singer Shaggy of Japan voice. He does this dance to go along with it, standing alone on the stage with no music, making letters with his arms like a member of the Village People. And he does this... for a reeeealllly long time. This is what we call ENCORE 2 = Takuya is a freak. I am so utterly confused, along with a good number of other people. One girl, however, is grinning like a maniac and doing the dance with him. Later I learn it was a "bonus song" off the Hoshi furu fanclub only CD. Curse the existence of that! I WANT IT (but not for that song, shudder).

Kuro also did a bass solo comedy performance. He would strum it and say "K – U – R – O Kurochan!!" and after a few more times, moved on to "M – A – S – A MASA!", and after "Y – U – K – I Yuki!", he finally gets to "T – A – K – U... eh?!" Everyone bursts out laughing. And he figures something out. I don't remember the rest of his act, but it was a lot cuter and a hell of a lot less scary than Takuya's.

There were, of course, the Happy Birthday Kuro shenanigans. Well, it was less shenanigans and more just cuteness. There was a cake, and a heartfelt speech, yadda yadda. Kuro turns 25 in a few days.

Let's see... what else? I caught Kuro's bass pick!! It was truly awesome. I looked at him, he looked at me, he tossed the pick RIGHT at me, and I caught it. It is the cutest pick I've ever seen too. It's neon yellow with blue metallic lettering. On one side it says "Kuro – Dear Loving", and on the back is this little drawing of a cutesy rabbit holding a heart. Aww. I will treasure it.

For one song, I don't remember which, they had us moving around. He commanded we jump in circles, and everyone warily did it, then realized it was damn fun (except a few losers who just stood there), and then would suddenly say to change directions, and everyone was running into each other and it was quite enjoyable.

ENCORE THREE

1) Let's go

This one, I probably enjoyed the most. The song in general is pretty damn cool, and we all had to jump with our fists in the air 7 times (or was it 8? I was always a beat off, heh) to the "Go! Go! Go!", and then for the "tsubasa o hirogeta" line you did the arm spreading motion and yeah, it's neat. I am always compelled to do it when I listen to the song now.

As a finale, once again there was Hoshi furu yoru. I want that song damnit. They had the disco ball turning, and everyone was all smiley, and then the music guy messed up and cued the music too soon. They looked confused and laughed, but it was shut off and they did the ending "we are positive, we are pop..." with the heart-shaped hands and all. Then, we were all told to hold hands. Awkward and random, but we did so. Then, we all jumped in the air together. Yay. :F

When the curtain was closed for good, they put the music on, which was the Hoshi furu yoru CD (always taunting me), which I got to hear the entirety of while waiting for drinks. Cyber, as cool as it is, will always annoy me with the overpriced drinks. 600yen at the door, and an additional charge if you want anything besides a Coke. They had new slushies, which were an additional 400 yen. Who in their right mind would pay 1000yen for a slushie?! That's about nine dollars! And no alcohol! I can never just settle for a Coke, and picked a member's custom drink... I dunno who's, Yuki or Takuya, and they charged me an extra 100 yen and I rolled my eyes but accepted my alcohol happily. It was.. what? Gin, gingerale, lemon, and cinnamon? Or something exceedingly bizarre as that. Good though.

In short? Definitely fun. Normal concert? Definitely not. I sometimes wondered if I was actually watching a band and not some ridiculous Japanese variety show. They really changed a lot in the year. It was rather disappointing not to hear their old songs, which I love best, but their new songs seem to embody their crazy fun spirit more. One thing's for sure, this band isn't one to go see if you don't know anything about them. You would be so confused.