Even later to the party for this one than when I posted about the Miku 39's day concert, I think. But seeing the Come With Me BD get listed prompted me to go ahead and watch the Let's Go! concert... and it was completely amazing. There were so, so many spectacular moments.
One thing I love is how well the seiyuu fit the characters. Sure, to an extent they're expected to act out the part but it's not like the MC sections were necessarily
about that, instead it came off really natural. Well, except Sanada Asami totally acting out the part, but her Sawa-chan was totally one of the highlights of the whole show so I am most certainly not complaining. I'm convinced Toyosaki hardly had to act at all to be Yui... it's such a perfect match. Hikasa was the emotional, crying one, just like Mio and it worked great. Satou is
totally the hyper energetic Ricchan, Kotobuki has Mugi's composed, refined looks and attitude (blows my mind that she was only 18 at the time) and Taketatsu is completely perfect for Azunyan, being a bit short and nervous compared to the rest.
Speaking of Kotobuki, I've always known she's attractive but god, she's like a supermodel on stage there. Really stunning. Definitely the prettiest of the girls, but they're all cute. And Taketatsu's zettai ryouiki? Wow. Just... wow. I also find it a bit amusing that little Taketatsu seems to have the biggest chest in HTT.
Aki is tall... really tall. For a young Japanese woman at the very least. It was a little surreal seeing "Yui" tower over "Sawa-chan".
I rather liked the character song bits, with Hikasa's, Kotobuki's and Toyosaki's being as good as you'd expect. Singing was rather more clearly not Taketatsu's or Satou's forte, but Satou's energy on stage was seriously infectious, and I always thought that character song of Azusa's was really catchy. Yonezawa did Lovely Sister Love very nicely and her "ba baba bada ba ba ba~" made me melt. But what was really impressive was how fantastically Fujitou Chika (Nodoka) sang. I almost wondered if she was lip synching, it sounded do good. I don't see that anyone else was though so I doubt they did it just for her. It bothers me that her connection with K-ON! hasn't seemed to do her any good in landing other anime roles, if she's even still looking to be in the business.
Oh and Toyosaki is an incredible MC. Seriously. If you didn't know any better when watching, you'd think she were a long, long-term industry veteran, not an inexperienced 23 year-old. She did a wonderful job keeping things fun and moving along.
The really huge "OH SHIT" moment came before the MCing that led into Yonezawa and Fujitou... and Sanada Asami completely fucking blew the roof off the place. Just utterly epic heavy metal rocking out nuttiness. She even came out in the mask and outfit from the flashback! She got easily the loudest applause too. Kinda easy to see why... "playing" the guitar with her teeth? Brilliant.
I did get a little sad when Toyosaki aid "Everyone from school is here now!", and there was no Jun. ;_; I knew she wasn't in this one though, and I do see her on the cover for Come With Me - she has character singles now after all - so I'm excited for that. "Call and response" was fun, including people bringing castanets to the concert, but above all for Sanada Asami stealing the show again. The "Day in the Keionbu" bit was cute too. Kotobuki is so hot when she talks in the Mugi voice...
Back to music with Curry and Fude Pen, but the real treat came when they played their own instruments for Stapler and Fuwafuwa. Man that got so emotional. You can't fake that kind of nervousness, tension, concentration, relief, and overwhelming emotion. I'd heard Satou banging on those drums here and there all along, even before now, but man when it was really down to them to play the whole thing live in front of 15k people, you could see how nervous they were. A lot less smiling during the song, less movement, and a lot of intense focus on their instruments. I thought they'd burn holes in them with their eyes. And it was, like, the most charming, endearing thing
EVER. Seeing them try so hard - and do rather well, all things considered! - made me fall in love with them all much more.
I mean, seriously, that degree of going the extra mile (Hikasa was playing left-handed to be like Mio, even though she's right-handed!) was such an awesome gift to the crowd. And when they pulled it off, you could just see how relieved they were. And then to carry on into Fuwafuwa time, Toyosaki's voice starting to break up near the end (you can pinpoint the exact moment she got overwhelmed, the next to last "Fuwafuwa time", which then proceeded to affect everyone else), Hikasa in tears throughout (good thing they didn't pick a Mio song here, I don't think she could have done it), Satou banging away looking like she was on the brink, goddamn, Taketatsu looking super nervous and focusing intensely... it was so so moving.
Totally caught me off guard wen Kotobuki pulled out the exact same thing Mugi did in episode 12, starting the song back up solo on her keyboard, tears just streaming down her face the whole time. Amazing, totally amazing.
I thought it would be awkward to come out for the encore and go back to fake-playing, but Don't Say Lazy is definitely the kind of awesome rock song where it didn't matter. They kicked ass. They didn't have long to fully compose themselves, but somehow Hikasa got through it very nicely. And then the "surprise" second season announcement... even knowing it (hell, having seen the season!), it was great.
With the encore over they come out once more, to say thanks and sing Let's Go. But man, waterworks all over the place, and it got me too. I was moved by all of it, but two things really stood out: One was Satou talking about how the rehearsal didn't as well as she'd hoped, so se came back to the hotel and continued practicing singing in the bath. The idea of Satou being really nervous and singing in the bath - since she knows singing isn't her strength - just so she can do the best job possible, gah, makes me love her and all of them so much. The other one was Fujitou starting off very calm and Nodoka-like, but losing it after she says that K-ON! was her first anime audition, first seiyuu gig, first live concert...
And really, that's why this is so special. Maybe I'm deluding myself somewhat because it's what I want to believe, but I just
can not believe that these young women could be so passionate about things they didn't truly love. Particularly when it was the first big break for almost all of them. They hadn't done a hundred of these events before, they hadn't plowed through dozens of character roles before this. I'd really like to believe that it was as special for them as it was for me.
The backstage footage extra was really cool too.
This franchise is beautiful. It just never, ever stops giving me wonderful, wonderful memories every time I engage it.
Importing this BD ASAP. Bring on Come With Me, and of course, Jun!!