OTAKON 2004 Presents: L'Arc~en~Ciel, Live in USA

By: Lauren Goodnight and Karyn Waller
Date: Saturday, August 07, 2004

OTAKON 2004 Presents

L'Arc~en~Ciel

Live in USA

When: July 31, 2004 (Saturday) show 5PM

Where: 1st Mariner Arena, 201 W. Baltimore Street, Baltimore, MD 21201



By Lauren Goodnight and Karyn Waller






After many months of rumors and speculation it was with great fanfare that OTAKON 2004 announced the Japanese rock band L'Arc~en~Ciel would be headlining a performance at the convention. For Otakon get this band is nothing short of a feat because without a doubt L'Arc~en~Ciel are one of the most famous rock groups to ever come out of Japan. Since their debut in 1991, they have sold over 35 million units and after a 2 year hiatus to pursue solo projects, they returned in 2004 with the album SMILE and the small break did nothing to diminish their fame. L'Arc~en~Ciel has provided several anime theme songs to some of the most popular anime programs such as "Great Teacher Onizuka (G.T.O)", "Rurouni Kenshin (Samurai X)", "D.N.A^2", and the new hit anime series "FULLMETAL ALCHEMIST". The band consists of hyde on vocals, ken on guitar, tetsu on bass and yukihiro on drums. It is thanks to the combined efforts of both Tofu Records (http://www.tofurecords.com) and the staff of Otakon (http://www.otakon.com) that they were able to perform.



Setlist



01Kiss-Kuchizuke

02Lover Boy

03HEAVEN?S DRIVE

04Spirit dreams inside

05Jiyuu eno Shoutai

06Forever-Eien

07KASOU

08Living In Your Eyes-Hitomi No Jyunin

09Driver?s High

10Feeling Fine

11STAY AWAY

12REVELATION

13READY STEADY GO

14HONEY

15Blurry Eyes

16Pieces







LG: Prior to the concert, the audience was treated to a showing of the first episode of FullMetal Alchemist. The audience reaction to the opening theme (showed at the end of the episode) was riotous... they were ready to rock!



"KISS - Kuchizuke" was the opening number and the little Japanese girls who rushed the stage almost lost their bangs and eyebrows to the pyrotechnics. Speaking of the pyrotechnics, the American live was just as complex as the Japanese lives. We were treated to the full sound and light show, as well as all of the Japanese pyro.



KW: "Kiss - Kuchizuke" was an excellent opening. Just as the song kicks in, flames flared up, the lights got brighter, and we just went wild. Usually in concerts you want a spirited opening, something that takes the audience's breath away. "Kiss - Kuchizuke" accomplished that. The next song was "Lover Boy," which was an excellent follow-up. The drums for this particular song are quite hard hitting, while ken and tetsu have some excellent interplay with the guitar and bass lines.



"HEAVEN'S DRIVE" was the next song which really got the audience going. It seemed as most people knew this song, so there was a lot of singing going on. Afterwards, hyde decided to speak to the audience. He greeted us, explained he was glad to be in Baltimore and then posed a question:





hyde: Do you like CRAP?

Audience: *yells cause hyde is speaking but doesn't get what the hell he's saying*

hyde: *tries again* DO YOU LIKE CRAPS!

Audience: .... (some of us yelled who understood what he was saying)

hyde: DO YOU LIKE CRABS?!

Audience: YEAH!

hyde: I had two.





KW: Mind you, the day before I had munched on crab cakes and was like, "Man I hope Laruku get to have some" and I'm glad they did. Maryland crab cakes are a treat not to be missed.



LG: I had maybe three or four bowls of crab soup during my stay in Maryland. There is nothing better. Go hyde-sama! "Spirit Dreams Inside" was next song and had the crowd's attention on every level. It seemed like everyone know how to sing along to this, even though they weren't quite sure why. I was pretty thrilled at the song's inclusion on the SMILE album as it was perhaps the best thing about the film Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within. Hearing it live is exhilarating, and hyde's voice was crystal clear and controlled.



KW: So then it was "Spirit Dreams Inside" followed by "Jiyuu e no Shoutai." That is the band's newest single and I didn't think they'd play it, as it hasn't really appeared on any CD save the single. It was a nice treat. Following that was "Forever - Eien" off SMILE which was lovely. At this point, lighting on stage dimmed down a bit.



I'll be honest I'm not completely into SMILE but however, it was live. I enjoyed it... I find that if I dislike the studio recording of a particular song, I end up liking said song live.



Up next was the song "Kasou," which was a surprise for a number of reasons. One, it doesn't appear on SMILE or Clicked Best 13. The set list of the concert took songs exclusively from those two records (excluding "Kasou" and the aforementioned "Jiyuu e no Shoutai"). Two, it is my (admittedly limited, please feel free to correct me if I'm wrong here, fellow Laruku fans!) understanding that they don't really play "Kasou" much anymore. Needless to say it was lovely; the lighting here was really superb!



LG: Anyone who knows how much I enjoyed the SMILE album knows how much I loved the next song in particular. "Living in Your Eyes" is the English title, and I had declared it the "Otakon 2004 Make-out Anthem" or something like that. It was beautiful, and the band's energy and emotion during it reminded me of X-Japan at their very peak. We all had emotional moments during the song, as the song wove a spell around us and dragged us to full attention. If you ever get a chance to see the video that goes with this single, claw your way to it, because that is an experience in and of itself. Very intense.





KW: What can I say about "Hitomi no Jyunin"? Easily the most beautiful song off SMILE (personally, I think its one of their best, but your opinions may vary as always). I can't really put into words just how much hearing this song meant to me. It was like that: an experience. I believe it was after this song that hyde decided once again to venture into the brave world of speaking English.



hyde: I am Evangelion

Audience: all the Eva fanboys whooped, the hyde fangirls whooped and the rest of us burst into laughter.

hyde: Going berserk you know!

Audience: *whoops*

hyde: GOING BERSERK!!!

Audience: *roars*



LG: I almost died. Almost. I was in Evangelion, and here hyde is, stalking around on stage as a Evangelion "going berserk"! It was so much fun... and he's such a petite guy that it was even funnier.



KW: Following hyde's free talk, the band kicked into "Driver's High," which was a lot of fun. Some of you may recognize the song as one of the openings to Great Teacher Onizuka (G.T.O). Then it was "Feeling Fine," which was... feeling fine. By this time the crowd was ridiculously into the band and what was going on.



LG: "Feeling Fine" was a heck of a lot of fun. The only problem was that hyde kept wanting the audience to sing the hook, "Are you feeling fine?" and facilitated this by holding the mic out over the audience. The raving fangirl in me was screaming the lyrics to the whole song at the top of my lungs ("VA career? What's that?") and being very upset because the whole room should have been full of the audience's appropriately placed "Are you feeling fine?"s.



KW: Then it was "Revelation" or as Lauren calls it, "the Marilyn Manson song." "Revelation" live is amazing. The lighting was all red and dark and hyde was growling and sort of humping the speakers so it was all good. That boy has a bootie.



LG: I absolutely slammed the song "Revelation" in my review for animeondvd.com, and I was standing in the arena, jaw on the floor, at how good this song could be. I was beet-red and flustered. How could something that bad in a top-notch studio sound so good in a mid-sized arena with awful acoustics? L'Arc~en~Ciel worked a miracle.



KW: Then once again it was hyde's special brand of English.



hyde: Are you ready?

audience: YEAH (we so knew what was coming up)

hyde: ARE YOU FCKING READY?! (Perfect)

audience: *ROARS*

hyde: READY STEADY GO!



KW: And then they launched into "Ready Steady Go." All the Fullmetal Alchemist (FMA) fanboys got up and cheered and it was just a lot of fun. Tons of jumping around and screaming of which this reviewer took part. Then the band left the stage.



LG: The reaction to "Ready Steady Go" was predictably insane. After priming the audience with it in the FMA episode, I was expecting no less. The huge projection screens beside the stage were used for this song only, and various action scenes from FMA were shown. Needless to say, no one was paying attention to the projection screens.





KW: Now we come to the portion of our review when your narrator once again tries to explain the concept of encores. When a band "finishes" and the house lights do not come on... you don't leave. They are coming back. If the house lights come on, then (and only then) do you get out of Dodge. Not beforehand. Of course this went in one ear and out the other, since I'd say roughly 25% of the people left the venue. I'm hoping some of them had other plans and didn't leave because they disliked the band. Maybe all those [Smashing] Pumpkin concerts have ingrained into my consciousness that you don't leave... who knows.



LG: No, this is pretty common practice with most major recording stars. If the lights don't come up, you don't get up. Then again, from what I kept hearing both before and after the event, this was many attendees' first concert.



KW: Needless to say, about 15 minutes went by and who should walk out but the band. Well no... hyde, testu and yukihiro came out. Then came out ken. In a dolphin mask. With a kazoo.





ken: Do you know who I am?

Audience: KEN!

ken: NO! Do you know who I am?

Audience: *blinks* Ken?

ken: No! I am a dolphin.

Audience: O_O

ken: I come from the Baltimore aquarium!

Audience: *dying of laughter*



LG: It took everyone a while to figure out exactly what was going on, but when they did, it was laughter and games as usual. Ken kept trying to get the audience to participate and hush up or get loud with his kazoo antics before explaining that he was a dolphin and not ken. This worked only marginally well, but it got everyone's attention and primed us for their encore set, which included many tracks from their past recording career (while the tracks do not appear on SMILE, they are available domestically on Tofu's new pressing of Clicked Singles Best 13, out now at http://www.tofurecords.com)





KW: Up next was "Honey," a personal favorite of mine. Probably one of their most "poppy" songs ever, it was made for bouncing along. I think this was when hyde climbed on top of the speakers and sang to us but I'm not sure. He did this quite a bit actually. L'Arc~en~Ciel are one of the very few bands I've seen that are all about audience participation. It's a beautiful thing.



"Blurry Eyes" was the next song and the opening chords were met with a scream. Arguably their most popular song that anime people would know (well up until "Ready Steady Go" anyway) the place went wild. Everyone sang along and dancing and then the music just stops.



tetsu: Do you want my bananas?

Audience: *blinks* dead silence

testu: *whips out bananas and waves them*

Audience: GAHHHH!!!!! *grabby hands*

testu: *tosses bananas out into crowd*

first row melee occurs, rest of us cracking up.



LG: Of course we want tetsu's bananas! At this point in the concert, he was in a Velvet Underground banana t-shirt. Andy Warhol and The Velvet Underground are having a resurgence in popularity in Japan right now, so I found it extremely droll of them to bring it all back to America just as they start their own "15 minutes of fame" here. That, and the sexual innuendo of dual bananas.



KW: Then the band is just hanging out and we're all laughing and finally, I think it was either ken or hyde says, "Do you want us to continue the song?" and we screamed so they did. I was dying. One of the best instances of audience participation I've seen in my many concert travels.



The story behind why they stopped "Blurry Eyes" is this: when the band were recording the concert that is now known as Heavenly ~films~, during "Blurry Eyes," ken was walking across the stage and playing and he tripped. Hard. Since then, the band always stops there to make fun of him and/or do silly stuff like the aforementioned banana sequence (thanks to Sam for clearing this up for me!) After that hyde once again spoke to us for what would be the last time.



hyde: I had a great time tonight! We love you. Thank you America. Thank you Baltimore. We LOVE YOU! Next song... Last song... "Pieces."



KW: And then "Pieces" began and I started crying again. During this song people whipped out their cell phones, glow sticks, flashing lights and the entire arena swayed back and forth in sync. It was... I couldn't believe it. There were many more people then I would have guessed standing up.



L'Arc~en~Ciel put on one amazing show. Each of them was on cue. From hyde's beautiful voice to the hard hitting drums of yukihiro to ken's insane guitar playing to testu's wonderfully funky bass licks, the band was in excellent form. Otakon and Tofu Records did an superb job with the handling of what could have been a logistical nightmare. Please support the band and go buy their stuff from Tofu! Here's hoping that this was the first of many concerts here in the US. Cheers!





LG: I screamed and cursed at myself for not dipping into my glow stick collection. However, as Karyn said, many of us had cell phones, which we promptly whipped out and whipped on. The crowd moved like one great big being, adoring the band in front of it, worshiping music with love.



When the concert was over and everyone was filing out, it was beautiful to see cosplayers, lolitas, goths, little badly matched Japanese girls, big scary fanboys, and normal people all merged together, chattering about the band, the music and the experience. True, many of us almost got run over... a lot. But it was the spirit of the thing, and I think the spirit of L'Arc~en~Ciel caught us all by the heartstrings and showed us the passion of post-modern Japanese rock 'n roll.



A special thanks to Otakon for facilitating this appearance. Karyn and I would especially like to thank Tofu Records and Sony for allowing us to experience this from the press area where we could truly survey both the band and the audience. Tofu really shone as a bright light in how they treated their attendees as well as their invited guests. Thank you.





All Picture (c) and by Junichi Takahashi