Wednesday, 19 July 2017

X Japan Acoustic Special Live Report

X JAPAN WORLD TOUR 2017 WE ARE X Acoustic Special Miracle～奇跡の夜～6DAYS! 
July 16th, Yokohama Arena
When Yoshiki announced that he had to have surgery for his neck, I was sure he would postpone the 6 tour dates he had announced for Japan. It made no sense, after all, to have an X Japan concert without him, but also, he would need a long time to recuperate.
Instead, in true Yoshiki fashion, he threw caution to the wind and announced that while he cannot drum, he can still play the piano so the “regular” concerts were turned into “acoustic specials”.


Before the concert, they showed a short version of X Japan’s documentary We Are X. This was a great way to pass the time between the doors opening and the actual start of the show. It also got everyone nice and sad so that when the curtains were raised and the band started playing Forever Love, everyone could cry freely and easily after all, while the song was a success all on its own, it has become synonymous with hide’s funeral. To make things more grandiose, there was a string orchestra behind Yoshiki’s famous clear piano.
After the song ended, Toshi (stylized as ToshI, which frankly is too confusing for me so please forgive me as I just write it normally) and Yoshiki greeted the emotional crowd and went on to play Tears.
Toshi’s voice was quite a mess, he could barely reach any note, but it wasn’t too much of a problem because Toshi’s strained vocals are part of what make X’s song so heart wrenching and also because whenever the song reached a point he couldn’t handle, he just got the fans to take over, and the fans were all too pleased to take over.
One thing that was very notable from the beginning was that this was not going to be an X Japan concert, this was the Yoshiki and Toshi show. Pata, Heath and Sugizo went on and off the stage but were mostly off. During the M.C portions, it was only Yoshiki and Toshi.
After a short talk and another song, HEATH got on stage to amazing cheers from the crowd. He gave an amazing bass solo and showed off his rockstar charisma. After HEATH’s solo, it was PATA’s turn. The man looks like he was born old and tired, rocked the stage with his cool air and guitar playing.
After PATA’S solo, Sugizo came on stage with his violin. He played a beautiful rendition of hide’s Pink Spider and people were moved.
The band sans Yoshiki came back on stage and played a beautiful acoustic version of Silent Jealousy after which they cleared the stage and Yoshiki came back. Putting the grand piano on the top of the stairs seemed like a very bad idea. Yoshiki looked in pain, but then he sat down and played his solo that consisted of Swan Lake and an opera piece featuring a young American opera singer named Ashley Knight. Once that was finished, Yoshiki introduced Knight, who was very sweet and had lots of Japanese written on her arm. When Yoshiki asked if she had anything else to say, she proudly said “これはペンです。YOSHIKIは変です！” (which means “this is a pen. Yoshiki is weird.”) she then rushed off the stage to the sound of the crowd laughing.

After another long talk between Yoshiki and Toshi, they performed Miracle and then announced it was time for the Request Corner. The crowd the pretty unanimously raised their glowing drumsticks to the shape of an X to indicate that that was the song they wanted. This was problematic as X is one of the louder songs that is meant to make the crowd jump and cheer, so playing it with only a piano and vocals seemed impossible. Have I mentioned that Yoshiki doesn’t back out of a challenge? Because nothing can stop that man, so he double checked he knew how to play it on the piano and on we went! It was very amusing to see 17,000 people jump and scream “X!” to the sound of the piano. If they ever release a DVD for the concerts, I hope this makes it in as it was truly ridiculous and adorable.
After this amusing segment, Yoshiki and Toshi went on to perform a few more songs with Sugizo occasionally popping in and out with his violin.
Yoshiki then dedicated the song Without You to hide and Taiji and clips of the deceased members were shown while they performed the song. It was an eery moment as many fans chanted the names of the two dead members every time their faces were shown, as if they were really there.
After that slightly morbid moment, the band came back to play Kurenai and then Yoshiki closed the set with a mini version of Art of Life.
The crowd started chanting “WE ARE X” over and over again until the band came back.
Once again, only Yoshiki and Toshi were on stage to perform Rose of Pain and then PATA came on and performed White Wind From Mr. Martin. Toshi and PATA were then joined by HEATH and Sugizo and they performed Rusty Nail. Yoshiki came back on stage and whispered something to each member which they then repeated to the fans and followed it by screaming “WE ARE~” several times and receiving lively “X” in return every time.
After that, Toshi got all the fans to sing “in the rain” “find the way” as he performed a soft version of I.V. It was beautiful and haunting and better than the original. They then performed Longing ～跡切れたmelody～ and closed the whole concert with Endess Rain.
The 3.5 hour concert was beautiful. The fans were 100% into it and the band really gave their all. Personally, I wish we could have seen more from HEATH, PATA and Sugizo as this would have made the concert feel more like an X Japan concert, rather than a Yoshiki solo featuring X Japan members, but I wouldn’t dare say the concert was bad. It was emotional and the setlist was astounding. Seeing Yoshiki live really emphasises what he says in the movie We Are X which is that he’s willing to die on stage. Despite very clearly being in excruciating pain, he gave his all to the point of it being uncomfortable to watch.
Seeing a legendary band like that live is something I wish for everyone.
I wish it for myself again too. With drums next time.

Setlist
01 Forever Love
02 Tears
03 Kiss the Sky
04 HEATH Solo
05 PATA Solo
06 DRAIN
07 Sugizo Solo
08 Silent Jealousy
09 Yoshiki Piano Solo
10 Miracle
11 X
12 Scarlet Love Song
13 LA VENUS
14 HERO
15 Without You
16 Kurenai
17 Art of Life
Encore
18 Rose of Pain
19 White Wind from Mr. Martin ~Pata’s Nap~
20 Rusty Nail
21 World Anthem
22 I.V
23 Longing ～跡切れたmelody～

24 Endless Rain

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2 comments:

  1. Mija20 July 2017 at 06:23

    Thank you for the report!!! I was so curious how the lives were going to be after his surgery!

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