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zero-ek · 5 months

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A couple other live concerts and a couple other thoughts on them

Yo!

So this is coming after another post concerning other concerts, i had to break it off cause i reached the image limit on that one lol, plus i felt like it'd be more thematically concise to separate these guys into their own post. So yeah, anyway, here's part one.

Also also because these don't allow screenshots i did my best to describe every highlight, but because of that this became a huge block of text, just a heads up.

3. Natsume Itsuki – Parallel Shot

(See the KV here cause i don't want Hanagata to be mad at me)

Dang, it’s been a month already....

So, good news, I’m not as moody as I’ve been the previous days, so thankfully i did get to enjoy myself watching this concert a lot more, however...

You see, this was, as per usual, a two performance concert (which by the way if you know it I’d really like to know why that is a thing), and usually with these both performances are mostly the same, with some minor changes to the setlist and whatnot. Now while they did stream both parts this time (usually only the nighttime one is available), I’m kinda on a budget, so, thinking i wouldn’t be missing out on much, i got the nighttime one, since it’s the one i normally go for.

Tamu, however, decided that this time there’d be a storyline playing through both performances, and pretty much built the entire experience around it, the song choices, the breaks and everything. So while it was by all means an awesome performance, i was left really itching because i didn’t get the full picture.

I did watch her post-concert talk and the daytime performance watchalong, so i do sort of have an idea of what went on, but dang it I’m feeling so sad that i didn’t actually get to see it, especially since in hindsight, i really want to know how the songs she sang in the daytime part sound like live. But hey, the chance’s already been missed, not much i can do about it now.

Oh, before we get into the actual live, i gotta mention this:

Look. at. This!

I’ve known about this outfit since her first live 8 months ago or so, but she hadn’t posted any pics of it until now so i totally forgot about it. I still can’t believe not only that she actually had this made, but that it looks as good as it does.

First song was “Struggle of Egos”, the theme for this concert, and like, i cannot begin to explain how absolutely m a s s i v e this song sounds live, like it’s incredible. Tamu’s singing is also a lot “shoutier” live, which only makes the performance even rawer (hey hey actually if you wanna check it out for yourself she does show the first couple songs on her watchalong stream so you can go see that I’m not lying)

Also, it might just be the camera framing but the venue looks huge! Like i actually got a little jumpscared by how big it looked, especially with that massive screen behind her (looking it up, it says it’s 618 inches, or 15 meters in diameter!). Also i really love the camera angles, there is a crew operating them manually, so there’s a lot of dynamic shots and very precise closeups.

She then sang her solo version of “Tsuisou no Ragnarok”, which is her collab song with Nakucha under Gree Entertainment. I mention this because firstly on looking up what Gree is exactly i learned that they also work with Assault Lily, which now has me convinced that everything I’ve ever been interested in is run by the same like 10 people or something how the heck do i keep running into the same things like this? But more importantly i gotta mention that I’m really happy that Hifumi seems to be making a hard push for these two lately, i get the impression that they saw how banging they’ve been with La Prière this past two years and realized it’s worth getting them out there. Also, as an Eufolie enjoyer I’m just happy in general that these two are doing stuff together again (even if it isn’t jazz).

She performed “Happy Enforcer” and “Spider Girl” with the dancers from the last concert, and she mentioned afterwards that she messed up pretty hard her dance parts, but honestly those girls were going extremely hard, i gotta commend her for managing to keep up and sing at the same time.

So, for the story, or what i understood of it: it seems that 3D Tamu is actually a separate entity than utaite Tamu, and while they should normally coexist as like perfect mirrors of one another, something went wrong and 3D Tamu started to be loaded up into utaite Tamu’s body instead. 3D Tamu then asks if she could take the opportunity to borrow her body so she can see the real world, which real Tamu accepts, but something seems off.

The now 3D-Tamu-in-real-Tamu’s-body then sang some covers, the highlight for me being “Unravel”. I’ve heard this song like a million times by now, but I’ve never heard it sung in the context of a live concert, and Tamu’s main vocal character being the raw energy her voice has gave me some of the most intense chills I’ve felt in a little while.

The two Tamus talk a little more, and turns out some time loop shenanigans are going on, 3D Tamu is purposefully trying to hijack real Tamu’s body and wants to keep this concert on repeat endlessly. So, from what i could piece together, the daytime performance was the first loop, in which she successfully took over and reset everything.

The robot cat thingie, which i actually don’t know the name of someone help (Future Zero note: apparently he’s called "War Criminal Cat" lmao) managed to remember everything though, and asked the audience to help break the loop and stop 3D Tamu. They do, and that sends the concert, which apparently was exactly the same as the daytime performance so far, off course. It seems that 3D Tamu is on Banana mentality, so real Tamu talks about how the uniqueness of each performance is what makes live concerts exciting to try to talk her out of it.

And like, starting from here until pretty much the end of the concert, she sings a battery of some of her most intense songs, which, looking at the setlist, seems to mirror the more pop-y vibes from the daytime setlist, which i imagine were 3D Tamu’s picks. Particular highlight to “Fragment of Qualia”, i adore that song and was so hyped to hear it live, hearing it with the huge venue acoustics and the crowd cheering was already amazing through the stream, i can’t even imagine how crazy it must’ve been to actually be there.

Also, i gotta mention, the entire concert has been pretty much high gear only so far, like, there’s been calmer songs, but overall it’s been high intensity all the way.

Finally, 3D Tamu is about to be expunged from real Tamu’s head, so as a final request, she asks real Tamu to shoot her with her gun, claiming she wants to at least go out with a bang. Real Tamu shoots... and misses, saying that you shouldn’t want to go out with a bang, but with beauty.

The two of them sing “Ai to CodeQ...” together, before 3D Tamu disappears for good. I’m like 99% sure that the entire story of this concert was written around and as a build up to this song, like, I’d say it’s even more of a theme song than “Struggle of Egos” is. I will admit that it’s not as much of a favourite for me, but it’s that thing where, when you listen to a song in a different context, it helps you see it in a different way, it’s been growing on me, particularly because existentialism is my bread and butter and the lyrics for this song touch on that quite a bit.

Anyways, this is where the concert ends formally, so for the encore, she sings “My Entertainer”, which 3D Tamu sang on her daytime setlist (this mirrors that the daytime encore was Anamnesis, which was in real Tamu’s nighttime setlist). The dancers come back for this one, and Tamu is still keeping up like my gosh what does this girl eat???

By the way, speaking of the setlist, I’m particularly sad to have missed the last three songs of the daytime one. She sang an alternate version of “Junjou Sacrifice”, which she did release and i honestly love it more than the original, i feel like the instrumentation encapsulates the vibe of the lyrics much better. Then “Miniascape”, which is one of my favourites of hers just out of the sheer atmosphere it evokes, and she ended with “Son Macabre”, which i honestly didn’t like at first, but it seriously grew on me a whole lot, she mentioned it on the watchalong, but it really gives off that “bad end” vibe really well, from the perspective of the villain, particularly, and i reeeeeeeally wanted to hear that in the context of this concert’s story.

Now that the story is over, Tamu can finally break character and do an MC. Yep, the only MC is in the encore. She goes at it for like i think 15 minutes or so, mainly showcasing merch and talking about how this whole live came to be, and like, she’s talking at like a hundred miles an hour, mind you she’s doing this for the second time on the day, and this one is even more hyped up than the daytime one, and there’s not a sliver of tiredness at all in her voice, like if i speak uninterrupted for just 10 minutes my throat feels sore for the rest of the day girl what are you?

The biggest announcement is that she’s going on tour!!! And with a live band!!! Like, the momentum that she and the other LaPri girls have been on is insane, they’ve done so much these past two years that whenever something new is announced, i get kinda fearful that like, it’s gonna be their peak and things will start to slow down, just because y’know, they’re pretty much as close to indie as you can get (nayuta in particular actually being one), but no, they just keep shooting higher and higher, and that really warms my heart.

Also, with how intense Tamu’s songs in particular are, my excitement is through the roof to hear how a live band brings them to life.

Actually, now that i think about it, it might’ve been for the best that i picked the nighttime performance, I’m writing this a couple days after my first watch, so i had a little time to marinate my thoughts on it, and most importantly the immediate post-event-hype wore off, so I’m more inclined to think “dang it, i really wanted to see that”. And like yeah, i am a lil pouty that i didn’t get to watch everything, but on second thought i feel like i really needed the uninterrupted burst of energy that this live was.

I like to make playlists of concerts after i watch them, not only cuz it helps me remember but often because i like to think about the intention that went into arranging the songs in that particular order. I’ve noticed that I’ve been listening to Tamu’s quite a bit ever since, and i feel that i gained another level of appreciation for her stuff now, particularly because i was in the position that i was when i watched her concert, which is fun, but also cruel to think about how these sorts of pieces move. (Future Zero note: guys help me i don’t know what the frick i meant by this???)

I don't know how to end this, uhh... i guess the lesson here is beware of time warping, body-snatching, cute singing anime girls. Yeah.

4. Aitsuki Nakuru – Qulalim Stella

After all these years, i finally know how to write クラリムステラin romaji! It’s still nonsense but it sounds cool

Oh and by the way this is the best concert I’ve ever watched. Ever.

I’ll get into detail about it in a bit but I’m finishing writing this up over a week after i first watched it, and i still cannot get this concert out of my head (which for me is saying something), like it was just so good in all the best little ways a concert can be, but I’m getting ahead of myself.

Before we get into the songs, i wanna talk about the visuals. First and foremost, the venue was massive, like, look at this!

I looked it up, and the capacity is for roughly 1.7 thousand people seated, and it was absolutely packed! And also, the stage was fully decorated, which i could be wrong but i don’t think I’ve seen that before in utaite concerts (usually it’s just the empty stage, or just the screen behind them), which really helped bring the performances to life, considering how large the stage was.

But what i freaked out the most about was this:

They actually made her the Nardack/Indigrotto/jellyfish outfit!!!

She had announced what the stage outfit would be like (this one, from the 2nd keyvis and designed by her friend Youichi), and with how complex Nardack’s design is, i wasn’t expecting at all that she’d actually have it made too. The pics really don’t do it justice, it looked amazing on stage, the skirt is a lot puffier than it looks, and the translucent parts looked especially great with the stage lights shining through them.

The first three songs were very fitting for a 1st concert, in a “this is who i am vibe”, she started with “Azura Lano”, which she later called her “self introduction song”, then “Cosmodiver”, one of her latest songs, which she actually explained that it was made especially for this concert (and written by Tamu, no less!). And “Kotonoha”, a very old song for the older fans, which I’ve never heard before because I’m an overseas fan and Nacollection 1 doesn't exist for us.

A couple of things to note, first of all, my compliments to the PA team, the whole concert was mixed to perfection, with the venue being as large as it was, the acoustics were really intense, but not too overbearing on the ears. Also, and I’ve noticed this on her 3D stuff, but it’s amazing how Nakucha’s voice has so much projection while still remaining as airy and breathy as she usually is. She’s a human flute if I’ve ever seen one.

Also also, for this being her first ever solo concert, she’s an absolute natural at it, like, she said she’s just winging it, but she’s extremely charismatic and lively, her interactions and banter with the audience during the MCs had me smiling all the way. Of course, this isn’t her first concert per se, she’s had the past two years or so with LaPri and stuff, but i do think there’s a difference between having the other two to bounce off of and doing it on her own, and she pulled it off incredibly well.

Anyways, she sang her version of “Tsuisou no Ragnarok” (which in my humble opinion is the best one), and i haven’t been able to shake the thought that they’re gearing up for a NakuTamu two-man live, they’ve got another single coming up soon, and it really seems like Hifumi and Gree are pushing hard to make this pair a thing.

Now, for the first highlight of the night, “Oxydlate”.

Holy crap.

This was pretty much what everyone was talking about, reading up on tweets and live reports, and justifiably so, because oh my god what a performance. The song has some of the highest falsettos she can do, which was already impressive enough, but i think what really made this so incredible was actually getting to see her expressiveness during it, like, being able to see through her body language, the inflections and tiny imperfections on her voice denoting how demanding this song is, and how much work she is putting to pull it off so perfectly.

That, combined with just how enthralling the song itself is, is what i think made this so memorable, it gets you as into a performance as i think is humanly possible, like, i distinctively remember being in like a sort of a trance that i had to shake myself out of by the time the song ended, I didn’t mention this before, but i was home alone the day i watched this live, so i got to set up my computer to my actually pretty nice TV, and i really feel like that increased my experience of it like tenfold.

Oh, and i can’t not mention That One Part™ where she falls to her knees, which pretty much everyone was like “holy sh*t what a moment”, she actually mentioned on her post concert stream that she was only half-acting on that part, she really needed to get her bearings in that moment and figured she should do it with style. I personally feel like that part really cemented this as one of my favourite live performances of all time, like it’s that good.

Then it was Endorfin time! sky_delta came as a guest, playing the keyboard, i really liked how the stage really lit up during this part, with the strobe lights going crazy in the back, and the crowd really got to cheer hard during this part too, Endorfin’s songs usually being more upbeat, and that played off of the hype from “Oxydlate” perfectly in my opinion. A special highlight to “Suisei no Parasol” because sky_delta got to play a sick solo in it.

I wish sky_delta had stayed longer, not only because live instruments are better as we all know, but honestly he himself was a joy to watch. He’s a little more awkward on stage than Nakucha, but they bounce off each other really well, and he really seemed super happy to be there. She mentioned how he approached her 10 years ago, when she wasn’t doing singing as much, and was like like “hey let’s do this thing”, and now she got him to perform their songs in front of almost two thousand people, that really warmed my heart.

Entering the second half of the concert, a prerecorded performance of 3D Nakucha sings “Indigrotto” while real Nakucha goes to change outfits, it looked sort of like this (there's a timestamp here i hope it works):

She comes back wearing the dark outfit from the 2nd keyvis and sings “Evil Bubble” joined by two dancers, and i must say that I’ve not seen a harder display of bad b*tchery as this. She spends most of the performance sat on this ornate sofa, doing a badass pose, while the two other girls dance wildly around her, and only at the end she gets escorted out of it, hand in hand with the dancers, mirroring the puppet imagery from the song. I gotta give props to the camera work here for really going crazy with the shakes and angles while still managing to capture everything, it made the recording really come alive

She then really goes off and joins in on the choreography in “Lilith”, and like, she absolutely s l a y e d, she kept up with the dancers amazingly, and the choreo itself was incredibly captivating (this is my polite way to say that she had me swooning lol it’s a sexy song and I’m gay what do you expect?).

The next three songs were pretty much each one a highlight, being all fan favourites, but i feel like the last one in particular even more so. She started with “Gyakusaka”, with the dancers doing this amazing performance with traditional umbrellas. Then “Killer Neuron”, which is already hype enough of a song just from the sheer energy of it, but was even more intense to watch, with the dancers going all out, and the incredible camerawork being the cherry on top.

She then went into an MC and i gotta say that i love how she’ll sing like the hardest, filthiest, most stank-face inducing songs known to man, and then be all like “hey guuyyyss ☺️☺️☺️ that was Killer Neuron!!!! ☺️☺️☺️☺️ how'd you like it???? ☺️☺️☺️☺️☺️”.

Halfway through the MC, the lights go out, and when they come back up, Nakucha starts speaking in this overbearingly cutesy and bubbly way, and i adore that i immediately knew what was going on. Like, she could’ve just gone straight into the song, even more so since everyone knew she was going to sing it in this concert (it was chosen by the fans through a poll), but it’s super cool that she took the time to make up a whole routine to build up to it, even though I’m pretty sure she was cringing on the inside.

Anyways, yeah, the next song is “Fake Idol”, the Aitsuki Nakuru song of the 2020s (so far). And y’know, as hype as this song was with the whole buildup and everything, by this point the rhythm of the second half has already settled in, so there isn’t much i can say about this performance that i haven’t about the others already. But as it turns out, she has a trick up her sleeve, because following this one, she sings two of her “actual idol-ish” songs, which i thought was genius.

Like, if these two songs were anywhere else on the setlist, it would’ve been fine, cutesy upbeat songs are fun to cheer to, but i wouldn’t think much of it. But because she started the set with “Fake Idol”, you get that lingering feeling that something isn’t right. The two songs, “Continue!” and “Watashi ga Watashi ni Itatta...” are perfectly innocent, cute songs, and she just sang them normally, but she manages to spin them around as songs that put you off simply by their placement.

Which is another reason why i believe why this is my favourite concert ever: the setlist was absolutely perfect, every song choice was perfect, their positioning on the setlist was perfect, and the flow from one section to the other was completely immaculate.

The last song was “Kore Kurai de”, another one i actually hadn’t heard before either. As it turns out, it’s a song she sang for a really old eroge, and actually i wanna take the chance to ask what is it with eroges having some of the hardest ending songs ever? Like, i do appreciate the effort and that they take themselves so seriously, but like, the amount of times I’ve heard a banger only to look it up and see that it came from an eroge is insane (looking at you, I’ve sound, Mosaic.wav). Kudos to japanese devs for that.

She explains that the reason she chose this song in particular was because not only she imagined that it’d be nostalgic for a lot of people, but because the lyrics summarized perfectly what she had to say and how she wanted to end this live with. Halfway through the song, though, she started to cry, and i don’t mean like her voice was shaking or she teared up a bit or anything like that. No, i mean she cried hard, like to the point that she couldn’t even finish the verses anymore. She managed to power through but as soon as the song ended she just mumbled a “thank you” and literally ran away from the stage.

It hit me really hard that, like, the girl who was lighting the whole stage on fire only 5 minutes ago and pulled off every song on the setlist flawlessly was the same one crying so hard that she could barely get the words out. Mainly because she isn’t the most open about herself, not that she doesn’t share (i mean look at her sub-twitter), but she’s sort of like the type of person that you can only infer so much about what they’re like from what they show you, so you can’t say that you really “know them” for certain.

(Also overall, she just isn’t around all that much)

So because of that, i really didn’t know how to feel about what had happened, it was simultaneously extremely endearing, given that the song is about not being able to properly express one’s gratitude for how cherished they are. But at the same time, i felt guilty somewhat, it takes a lot of fortitude to be vulnerable in front of someone, let alone over a thousand people, and i got the impression that she wasn’t particularly ready to be put in that position. I sincerely hope that I’m wrong and that she did felt at least comfortable enough to be seen like that, i imagine everyone knows how much it sucks to crumble somewhere you don’t feel safe doing so.

She came back for the encore, and the first thing she said was “this is so cringe”, which... yeah, i can imagine, if it was me i would’ve just went home then and there and not do an encore at all, professionalism be damned. Again, I hope it’s not something that’ll haunt her in her sleep or anything. It was usual encore business, she showed off her merch, did her announcements, she called the dancers and sky_delta to the stage to say a couple words, which was particularly nice. But most importantly to me i think was the little talk about herself she had at the end.

In her words, she’s always been nothing more than an “empty void”, someone who never had any big dreams or passions in her life, being overall a complete pessimist. But that changed once “Aitsuki Nakuru” came to be, because that was a part of her that people began to look up to. Since then, she dreamed that she could keep on being “Aitsuki Nakuru”, to be able to live up to who that is.

She said that if “Aitsuki Nakuru” were to fade away, she’s afraid that she might end up back on her old ways, “a monster of pessimism”, as she put it. So, as long as the veil of “Aitsuki Nakuru” exists, she wants everyone to keep watching over her through it, and keep her dream alive. And in return, she’ll keep on singing through it, to push everyone towards their own dreams. While she doesn’t want to be put in a pedestal or anything, all she asks is that everyone keeps the memory of “Aitsuki Nakuru”, even if just a small piece of it, on the back of their heads, until the day we die.

I mentioned that this was my favourite concert I’ve ever watched, and like initially i thought it was just the euphoria of blasting it on a big screen, which i never got to do before, but even after that wore down i was still thinking about it a whole lot, particularly these last 20 or so minutes of it. Plus, I watched some insanely incredible stuff, like, a core memory of mine, and the very reason I’m so into watching live concerts, was Kalafina’s very last concert on the Nippon Budoukan, that was an experience i cannot even begin to describe, and that I’m forever thankful that i never forgot about.

But what made this one so special to me, even in the face of much more objectively amazing stuff I’ve watched prior, is that it felt very human, “normal”, in a sense. I know that my gushing so far may not convey that very well, but for whatever reason, throughout the duration of this concert, i never once felt like i was looking “up” at her, that the girl on stage was someone above me, that i couldn’t see eye to eye with. This is something that I’ve been working to unlearn about people i admire ever since i left my teens, but that i don’t think I had faced it to this degree yet.

This could be just me assuming things, but from what little i know about her, Nakuru seems to be the type who doesn’t think too highly of herself, not in a self-deprecating way (although she goes that way sometimes), but as in like “i’m just a person doing person things like everyone else”. A thing to note, and that she mentioned a couple of times before, is that she didn’t particularly want to do a live concert at all. She doesn’t like singing in front of people, and even though she does do live events every so often, she gets a little unhappy about it because she feels that she isn’t cut out for it.

In contrast to that, this concert was put together to an unbelievable degree of perfection, as i made sure to let you know. You could see in every detail of it, the stage, the decorations, the outfits, the choreographies, the sound quality, the cinematography, the venue itself, that an insurmountable amount of effort went into producing this concert and making it happen as smoothly as it did. And people showed up for it, i know i keep on hammering this point but like holy ship the venue was massive, keeping in mind this is the very first live concert, of a doujin artist, i cannot stress enough how absolutely incredible that is.

Of course, i have to be real here, Hifumi is a very capable agency, and Nakuru is one of the more well known utaites out there, so it’s not like this is a total Cinderella type thing or anything. But even still it felt very personal, like, the high production value in this didn’t feel like some celebrity’s grand endeavor, it felt like an everyday person, the type you’d see on the train or your coworker, being granted the opportunity to show the world that they can do something special.

And y’know, i think, and i at least hope, that this was a revelation to her as well, that she’s capable of a lot more than she gives herself credit for, and that there’s much more to reap from what she sowed for the past 10 years or so. “Aitsuki Nakuru” isn’t some ethereal existence that she needs to keep clinging onto to be able to have some sense of worth, “Aitsuki Nakuru” is something she made with her own hands, the result of work and dedication. It may not be who she is, but is what she achieved, and i sincerely hope she is as proud of that as everyone else around her clearly is.

“Kore Kurai de” was a song about gratitude, being shown happiness that one doesn’t know they could have, but not being able to express themselves about it. With the context of what she spoke about herself and what “Aitsuki Nakuru” means to her, i would like to think that her tears came from realizing that it’s her that we’re looking at. She is Aitsuki Nakuru, the happiness and gratitude she wanted so much to convey through that song was the result of what she worked to achieve. Not some external concept bound to a song or illustration or 3D model, her, the actual person in this world that made it happen.

In short, this is my favourite concert of all time, not just because it was some million dollar production that was completely and utterly impressive every step of the way (which it was, mind you), but because it was the work of a very flawed individual, not unlike all of us, that shows that we’re not any less capable of achieving incredible things because of it, even if we might not personally believe it so.

Anyways i didn’t even mention the encore track, it was the title track of the concert, “Qulalim Stella”, which by the way i actually took the time to translate, if you scroll down on the music video you’ll see me down there lol. I particularly like the second chorus, in the context of this concert:

“The yesterdays that i put behind me, and the hazy tomorrows yet to come

I hope that i can eventually embrace them both.

Because you showed me a side of myself i never knew of, I can now shine so brightly. And so

I shake away my doubts, so the path i walk may continue.”

Like I’ve said before, the song choices and placement for the setlist was absolutely immaculate, following up on the themes of “Kore Kurai de”, but with much more conviction and firm grasp and understanding of oneself. I’m not sure if that’s something she actually thought about, but i hope that, as the song suggests, she can hold her head up high moving forward and be more proud of herself.

(Future Zero note: her current Twitter banner is a shot of the live concert visuals from Fake Idol, kinda ominous but i hope this means she sees live concerts more favourably now lol)

Oh, yeah, and the announcement! To no one’s surprise, really, she’s gonna do another live, and looking at the venue holy shoot the place is even more massive than the first! I don’t think i need to say how excited i am for this one!

Nakucha world Domination!!!

6. La Prière – Splash the Tone

(Go follow Narumi-sensei he actually has a tumblr!)

It’s summer!!!

Well, not in Japan, and especially not here, but it might as well be, I’m pretty sure it rained like at least once a week for the entire last year, but lately it’s been scolding hot every single day, I’m pretty sure my skin is sublimating, and i even got a pretty bad nosebleed the other day.

This concert really was like an Avengers moment, since not only it follows only a little while after Tamu and Nakucha’s solo lives, but also, as the very last stop of their tour, it’s the last project backed by the crowdfunding from two years ago (which i still can’t wrap my head around how insane that was). And it absolutely shows here, not only this is their biggest venue yet, but it was also incredibly produced. Like, from the stage outfits, to the adorable set decor, to some of the most professional and dynamic camerawork I’ve ever seen, it’s actually hard to believe that this wasn’t a company-backed concert, i cannot stress enough how well put together this live was.

The first three songs were probably the most in line with the summer theme, “Seishun Summer Dive”, which I’m actually a bit sad that they couldn’t find a way to sing the harmony parts live, but on the other hand, really highlighted just how perfect the live mixing was on this. The drums pop out so much that you’d actually think there was a live drummer in the venue. And yet, their voices were crystal clear, which particularly impressed me since not only were they wearing masks, but this song has the harmony parts and pretty dense horns as well, which could’ve very easily drowned out everything else.

Next was “Susume Lovely Idol...”, probably their silliest song, i really liked how not only they came up with a little choreography for it, but also fully acted out the little dialogue parts. While this isn’t a song that i usually go out of my way to listen to, it was very cute to watch it performed on stage.

They did a little intro MC (shout out to the couple people who were actually from overseas, i soooo envy you) and then went into the title track, “Splash the Tone”, and like, something that really surprised me, especially since the previous two songs were so high energy, was how incredibly soft nayuta sounded in this one, like, not only the texture of her voice, but even her pronunciation of each word was unbelievably clear, my heart actually skipped a beat every time she had a solo verse.

(not biased at all guys promise)

Then “Instant Love”, which actually had a pretty involved choreo that they absolutely slayed. Something i really love about this song is that it’s a perfect example of how their combined vocals are greater than the sum of their parts. Like, you have the verses sung solo, then the pre-chorus has one vocal line front and centre, but with the other two harmonizing the backing vocals (which i particularly like how since they each have a turn, it showcases the different combinations of their voices and how they harmonize together) and finally the chorus, which puts it all together with their unison parts.

Next, they sang “Evo”, which i actually didn’t expect to become one of my favourites, it’s one of those that never leaves your head after your second or third listen (damn you Chinozo and your catchy hooks), it was a particularly “ooh!” moment for me when it came up because they sang a different summer themed version of it, with a different MV in the back and everything, although sadly it's apparently not gonna be released.

Oh yeah, as if this live couldn’t get any better, they even brought guests! Nakurage (CV: Natsume Itsuki) and Poyuta (CV: Natsume Itsuki), who were both incredibly honoured to be there and absolutely came out of their own volition and not at all because they were coerced into it by a certain lady in blue or anything.

Something i really like about these smaller concerts is that, at least from what I’ve seen, the MCs are much more laid back and freeform, particularly with this one where there’s three people on stage, there isn’t much of a worry about keeping the audience “in the moment” and they can just goof around a lot more. Tamu and Nakucha in particular are such a dynamic duo, their back and forth is always so amusing i love it.

Ending the “upbeat” part of the live, they sang “Tenshin Ranman...” and “RisingSun” because they’re required by law to sing these two together. They and the audience had these little wooden fans during these two tracks, and the visual of the crowd waving them around was really compelling for me, i don’t know why, like, it made the venue feel very “alive” in a way.

Also, for the first highlight of the night, “RisingSun” holy shoot, it’s already my favorite of the two, but the live performance was jawdropping. The song has a lot of long tones, and nayuta absolutely knocked it out of the park on her parts, her voice was soo bewitching like i can’t put into words how well she was singing here. Like i mentioned before i don’t know if it’s just me but her voice just feels even more clearer and softer than ever in this live, i couldn’t get enough of it.

Also also, i didn’t mention, but in this first “idol-y” part, pretty much every song had a little choreo for them, a couple were very simple, and a couple were genuinely impressive. Like i mentioned, the one in “Instant Love”, but also the one for “Tenshin Ranman...” were probably my favourites.

There was an intermission while they went to change outfits, and the song that they played was... something, i could barely follow along because it was so trippy, like think “Susume Lovely Idol...” but double the BPM and add some very weird beat drops and breakdowns and a bunch of nonsense lyrics. It’s not something they released i think but i couldn’t not mention it because it was so weird.

The second half of the concert (which was more like 2/3 of it) is where in my opinion it really pops off. First and foremost look at their outfits:

Not only were they absolutely rocking these on the stage, but they sang 5 absolute bangers back to back, “richromatic prayer”, their latest song, really reminds me of their earlier, super intense material, like, it’d be a perfect fit for “Galaxy Triangle” had it come out back then. Next, “Eikyuu no Gemini”, which i can’t really explain why but it has that particular sort of epic feel that gets you pumped up in a “i want to flamboyantly swordfight to this” sort of way. And “Koi no Illusionista”, which is one of my favourite songs of theirs ever, not only because it’s extremely catchy, but also it has a super crazy and addicting rhythm section, which was absolutely incredible to hear through a live mix. (also I’m pretty sure their outfits were based on the ones from the MV), they also had a choreo for this one, so even more extra points.

They kept going with “Sweet Dreams”, which looking back, was probably the only low energy moment from the entire setlist, i mean “Instant Love” wasn’t super high energy, but it had the most complex choreo so far to make up for it. Also i wanna praise the camerawork again, since the girls were sitting down for this one, they went crazy with the effects and angles to still make it visually engaging. And finally closing up the set, “Muhou Chiten”, another personal favourite, it’s a very quintessential JRock song, but done so well that it just never leaves your head.

Now for another big highlight, the start of the next set was “Necrogamy”, which is like, an outstanding piece of music, like easily top 5 best LaPri songs, objectively speaking. I could just spend the rest of this report talking about all the things i like about this song, like, to me, it’s a distillation of everything that makes each of them, and LaPri as a whole, great, the lyrics are very engaging (massive props to Tamu, she wrote them!), and the melodies and instrumentation are so beautiful and captivating.

And of course, their vocals are so mesmerizing all the way, there’s solo parts showcasing their softer singing, then the first chorus in unison, displaying their synchronicity, but then, as the song shifts from major to minor they shift into harmonizing, which is probably my single favourite thing about this group: they each have such distinct voices, each very clear but in very different ways, yet they combine so perfectly when they harmonize, nayuta’s is focused yet clear, Nakucha’s is breathy and ethereal, and Tamu’s is strong and piercing.

Then there’s the c part, which suddenly brings the energy of the song up, and just condenses everything i just talked about, there’s unison parts, which devolves into disjointed solo verses, continuously building up in intensity until they all come in sync again to resolve the section. Finally, the song ends with a repeat of the a section, but it ends with them harmonizing a minor chord instead, reinforcing the overall theme of the song.

I really like this one...

The next one was “GHOST”, which while significantly less intense than the last one, it makes up for it by having very expressive verses, the rhythm is a very tight groove and the verses are more spoken and rap-esque, but the way they put a lot of emotion in their voices make it flow very naturally, while still being musically engaging. (Also i particularly love the drums in this one and again, the in house engineers killed it with the live mix). Then, “Sore wa Sekai...”, their first song ever as La Prière, and to this day one of their best ones, being incredibly well composed and masterfully making use of their vocals both individually and together. It was particularly interesting to hear it live, since it made for a good show of how much their singing has matured since then, Tamu in particular, since she sounds a lot more aggressive when she sings live, i feel like her parts were really the highlight of this track, particularly in the last chorus, where there was this little back and forth between Tamu alone and Nakucha and nayuta in unison, she cut straight though their softer vocals with how potent her voice is.

The final set of the concert though was just cruel.

“Habataku Kimi e” is another personal favourite, maybe not top 5 but extremely close, much like “Necrogamy” it’s all about how their vocals mesh together in all sorts of different ways, but while “Necrogamy” reels you in first before hitting you hard, this one is just a big explosion all the way through, like it’s all of the things i talked about before but condensed into a short but powerful burst of music, even more so on a live mix, where everything sounds so massive, and you can pick apart their voices even more clearly, like i got goosebumps so strong it actually hurt a little lol.

“Triptych Symphony” then follows in the vein of “Sore wa Sekai...”, in that it’s very much about each of them individually, showing off their own strengths and ultimately how they come together to make something even more beautiful as a trio than it’d be possible on their own, not only in the arrangement (which i can’t not appreciate that it was by nayuta, the talent on this girl), how it’s mostly solo parts, but certain parts will be highlighted by one or two of them doing backing vocals to support the lead for the part, and only converging in a unison part at the very end. But also in the lyrics, which actually i wanna come back to in a minute.

Then, finally, for maximum emotional damage, the final song of the concert was “Three Piece!”, which like... i didn’t think that i was gonna cry watching this live, but like, how do you not? That wasn’t fair at all. I wanna say that it was i think 10pm at the time but i actually sang along to this one, and yeah my sisters got mad at me for it but y’know what i had tears in my eyes and the biggest dumbest smile in my face and i regret absolutely nothing.

Thankfully they didn’t cut straight to the encore because the whiplash would’ve killed me, the first song was “Animatte Utopia”, which i had been wondering why it wasn’t together with “Evo”, since they both have the same energy. Again, since they didn’t cut straight to it like it usually is the case with these lives, and they even played a little intro for it, i had a little time to get my mood in order.

Anyways, i feel like I’ve been very cordial and respectful throughout this report, but i genuinely don’t think there’s any other way to express this.

nayuta.

Was too.

F***ing

CUTEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!

I FREAKING LOVE THIS WOMAN SHE IS SO DAMN ADORABLE OH MY F***ING GOD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So they had changed into casual clothes, as per the usual with encore sections, but for this song they each had put on a set of animal ears and tail, corresponding to the MV. Not only that, but this one also had a super cute choreo too, and it’s probably just because I’m biased since she’s my favorite but like i feel like out of the three of them nayuta was the absolute cutest, just completely and utterly the most adorable little thingie I’ve ever seen, like i wanted to squeeze her till my arms give out, especially considering she’s the shorter one of of the three of them, so she just looked even more cute jumping around and doing the animal poses next to the other two. Like i swear to god i wanted to scream into my pillow because of how cute she was...

...ahem...

So, uh, yeah. Also, the choreo for this song was a really intense one, and the song itself is very fast paced, so it was actually really impressive that they pulled it off so flawlessly, especially considering they were using handheld mics, which are way too easy to lose volume if you pull them away even just a little bit. But then again i shouldn’t be too surprised since they were absolutely slaying from early on in this live.

While they were doing the usual encore stuff, showing off the merch and all, Tamu brought along a cake, and they sang Nakucha happy birthday (the live itself happened at the end of February, her birthday being March 1st.). Apparently it was the backstage crew’s suggestion, which I thought was very sweet of them, Nakucha mentioned that she doesn’t really like to celebrate her birthdays (same), but that she was genuinely glad that they went out of their way to do that for her, she stole a bite of of the cake and they took the ending pics with it, i hope that made it one to remember for her.

Now, for this encore’s Reflection Time™, which i actually wanna get into quite a bit. Nakucha asked the other two to “summarize what La Prière means to them in one sentence”. It’s a very interesting question to pose, seeing that this is not only the end of their Tour, but of the whole CF campaign and the two years of projects and content that it spawned, it’s the end of an era, pretty much. Not to mention that Nakucha was the one to bring it up, considering that this is only a few weeks after her own solo live and i told you what went on back then.

Tamu said that for her, it was a “turning point in her life”, mentioning how back then, it was a big push for her to quit the day job she had at the time, in order to make more time for LaPri’s projects. Of course, she had her solo career at the time, but that it was LaPri that pushed her to make that life-changing decision, and that she probably wouldn’t be here as we know her if it weren’t for it.

Coming off of that, nayuta said that it’s something that “added colour to her life”, how it allowed her to do things that she wouldn’t be able to by herself, this concert and tour being one of them. And that because she has the two of them with her, supporting her and stepping in where she falls short, she was able to broaden her horizons and achieve much more than she thought she could on her own.

(Also she mentions how the whole idea for a live CF project came from a long conversation about life that they had on the Tokyo Sky Tree at sunset, and like that’s the most idol anime thing ever are you kidding me???)

Finally, Nakucha says that for her, LaPri is “courage”, that back when she was doing her solo live, she had been so painfully nervous about doing it on her own, but now that she has the two of them with her this time around, she feels much more at ease. She talks about how she only got the courage to do a solo live because of having already done the LaPri concerts prior, because of the two of them pulling her out of her comfort zone and showing her what standing on stage has to offer, and that at the end of the day, she can do it on her own.

The overall sentiment here was very much that “i’ve made it somewhere i never thought i would”, which i think in the face of this concert in particular, is pretty much the single most suitable way to describe LaPri and the past two years. While y’know, in Nakucha’s solo live, the sentiment i got out of it was “someone not yet realizing how far they’ve come and how much farther they can go”, with this it was much more in the vein of them seizing an opportunity and taking it as far as they possibly can.

Nayuta mentioned how much of a wonder it was that the three of them, as doujin artists, were able to make it all the way to Tokyo Zepp (twice, even!), which thinking about it, yeah, that’s actually pretty crazy to think about. Sure, i think everyone who’s into japanese music knows one or two cinderella stories like that, but at the very least in the independent utaite sphere (as far as i know, Hifumi doesn’t have anything to do with LaPri in particular, though i wouldn’t be surprised), it’s not at all the most common thing to see projects of this scope.

I mean, yeah, they are sort of a supergroup, i think each of them has over 10 years of work under their belts, and are pretty much some of the most high profile people in the doujin music scene. But then again, it’s not the biggest scene out there to begin with, and even for some of the most accomplished veterans, a single live concert is an incredibly arduous task to pull off on their own, part of the reason why you’ll most often only see them live in festivals or as part of larger projects.

And yet here they are, with a two part concert and a 3 stop tour in only two years, finishing it off on Tokyo Zepp, and with such a widespread reach that not only were they able to stream it overseas, but they even got a sizeable handful of attendees from outside of Japan to come watch them in person. Putting it into perspective, it’s an absolutely bonkers thing to think about.

I mentioned the last three songs being such a hard hit, and i wanna elaborate on that a little more. “Habataku Kimi e” is a song about closure, it evokes the idea that things end and we gotta move on from it, but that there is much more to be seen beyond what we have now. That’s something that could be said about the live, the tour, the CF campaign or La Prière as a whole, especially if we take into account that it’s the theme song and very last track of their latest album.

They’ve just entered their 5th year as a group, and yeah, they’ve come so far, and achieved so much, but that’s gotta end at some point, and LaPri themselves are going to end at some point. And in that sense, and in the context of what they talked about afterwards, i feel like it’s as much of a song for themselves as it is a song for the listener, in the vein of “this won’t last forever, but that’s okay, we were able to be part of something special, and we can now look to the future precisely because we had it”.

I particularly love this last chorus:

“To you, spreading your wings, now i say

That this goodbye only hurts this much, because we’re now so full of light.

To you, spreading your wings, never stop moving forward

towards a new tomorrow, because even after we part

The paths we walk will continue on, forever”

The timing for this couldn’t have been more impeccable to me in particular...

If “Habataku Kimi e” is about “why” you should remember, then I’d say “Triptych Symphony” is much more about the “what” to remember them by, like i said, it’s very much about each of them and what makes their union special, i mean, a Triptych is a work of art in which three pieces (wink wink) make up a whole, which is reflected on the song’s overall theme of many voices, melodies, sounds, and destinies joining together to deliver a message, be it of “lament”, of “finality”, of “love”, and finally, in the last portion of the song, simply of “music”.

And y’know, while this song is about the merging of their voices, it’s very interesting that most of it is sung in solo parts, with only a couple of spots where all three of them sing together, like in the first pre-chorus, “this lone melody i found among the darkness shall change my fate”, or the whole second verse, which is a flip on the much more somber message of the first one. The same goes for the verses each of them sing and how they might relate to each of them in a deeper level (Nakucha’s in particular), i hadn’t thought much of it before, but after listening to what they talked about in this concert, these choices seem much more purposeful than they appear.

And of course, “Three Piece!”, which to me felt very obviously like a celebration of everything that’s happened these past two years. It was the theme song for their first concert, the very start of the whole saga that this performance was closing up, which even now looking back at it, the fact that this entire project was even able to happen in the first place is just straight up unbelievable. I think that this one hit me as hard as it did because it marked the end of something that was lucky enough to be there every step of the way, it was something that I’m insanely happy to have been able to be a part of and to see through to its end.

I’m also extremely proud of the girls themselves, of course, for pushing forwards and upwards as far as they possibly could with this, and for how much they were able to accomplish because of it, as LaPri and individually, considering how much more each of them have been doing on their own in the past two years since the first LaPri live. At the very last drop of the song, the venue exploded with confetti and the crowd cheered super hard, and i don’t know why, but to me that moment in particular just absolutely filled me with joy, i don’t think that I’ve been as happy to have found out about them, to have donated to the CF, to have followed them throughout every step of this whole saga as I’ve been in that single moment. I just can’t put into words how immensely satisfying of an ending that was, like, they could’ve said that that was their last ever live performance and i would’ve been okay with it because it was such a high note to end things on.

Oh, yeah, and i haven’t even mentioned the second encore song yet.

“Chronologue”, the La Prière song, putting a bow on everything proper. I’ll admit that i wasn’t as emotional by the time it came around, since the first encore was so cute, and they talked for long enough after for me to pull myself together. This is a very special song in that the lyrics are by all three of them, and also I’m just now realizing that i made an oopsie because what this song is about is pretty much what I’ve discussed at length in the paragraphs above, so i kinda don’t have much else to say here...

The interesting thing about this song , though, highlighted in this performance, is how it and “Three Piece!” sort of play off of each other in their similarities, Tamu even joked how hard of a punch it was to end the concert with one and the encore with the other. “Three Piece!”, which was released later, is much more about looking ahead and wanting to do so much more moving forward, with verses like “There’s still much more to this story, and we’ll be together for it”. Meanwhile, “Chronologue”, which came before, is about looking back with pride on the path that one takes and being grateful for it, the titular verse of the song being “We’ve made it this far because you were here for us”. For this concert in particular, i feel like they were two different ways of expressing the same feeling, one in emotion, and one in the lyrics, which i think makes each of them a great ending in their own right.

And that’s that, the end of La Prière’s Splash the Tone tour, as well as the two year long crowdfunding campaign, it has been an absolutely insane ride and I’m so glad that i got to be a part of it. I hope that my painstakingly extensive rambling here encourages you to support your independent(-ish) utaites, i mean, who knows what other great projects are out there, waiting to be realized. Maybe it’ll be short lived, and maybe it won’t be the biggest most jaw-dropping thing in the world, but the fact that it was there, and that it happened, that alone makes it special, and speaking from experience, it is absolutely worth it to be there for something like that.

A little epilogue

It’s been almost a whole month and i still haven’t posted this freaking thing why am i like this.

I feel like i went through a whole character arc in those 3 months, in hindsight it’s pretty crazy how almost every one of these concerts had something in them that i needed to hear or think about, i honestly feel like i grew up a little lol.

All that aside, hopefully i can save up enough for this summer, since there’s gonna be a lot of stuff happening then too, though thankfully not as much as in these past few months (so far at least) so my bank account won’t cry as much. Sadly that means I’m gonna have to skip Albemuth’s live coming up this week, which sucks not only because I’ve been seriously into ADAM and their Christmas album, but i really wanted to see Aru off.

I’ll be paying attention to the live reports and Twitter so hopefully i can at least get a good grasp of how things went, but i just know I’m going to regret missing this opportunity, Albemuth really grew on me these past couple months and while i have accepted that there won’t be any more of them... there won’t be any more of them!!! And I’m gonna miss the very last of it!!! Can you see how that’s eating me alive!?

Also also, it’s M3 month!! So while things finally calmed down on the live side, i have new music on the horizon to look forward to in the meantime! The past 2 M3s have really been something for the artists i follow so I’m super excited to see what they’ve been cooking this time.

Anyways, uh, yeah, music good, girls who sing even more good, live concerts? Pshh, even gooder.

Cheers to all two of you reading this, i hope this year gets kinder to you and me both.

#natsume itsuki #aitsuki nakuru #hifumi inc #nayuta #la prière #utaite #zero types a lot

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