As mentioned last week, Amu Plaza had their Age-paku (fried foods) event from the 14th to the 22nd. They had live music Saturday to Monday the first weekend, and then Friday to Sunday the second weekend. The music on Friday coincided with my classes at the English school, and I had to work most of Saturday (when I wasn't working, I was in Tenmonkan and Central Park watching Ogionsa). There really wasn't much going on the second Sunday - just 1 Believe FNC at 1 and 4 PM, then Yoko at 5 and 6 PM.
I got out of the apartment at 11:30 AM Sunday to watch Ogionsa, but things did kind of slow down at 12:45, so I walked up to Amu Plaza. I've heard the name "1 Believe FNC" a few times in the past, and I've seen their offices over in the neighborhood near Terukuni shrine, but I've never seen them on stage before. I'd been led to think that they were an idol group similar to Seven Colors and Southern Cross. But, all they did was take turns break dancing to a hip hop CD. It's copyrighted music, and I didn't feel like recording any of the dancing. They were ok, but long on posturing and short on group skills.
It didn't take long to get a feel for what they do. After a few minutes, I returned to Tenmonkan to record more of Ogionsa.
After Ogionsa ended, I went back to the apartment to process the videos I'd shot. I kind of got the times confused for Yoko, and ended up missing her first set. I think I've seen her before at past music events, but I wasn't sure. Plus, I wanted a few photos for the blog, so I got to Amu Plaza again at 6 PM. The crowd of people there to eat and listen to the music was fairly heavy then, easily 100 people. Yoko tried to get them to clap and dance during her first few songs, and only one woman in the audience responded. Everyone applauded at the end of the songs, though.
Yoko is a good singer, but again, she's just doing karaoke to a CD playing behind her.
I took a few photos, then tried to go back home. However, one of the British guys I know (an English teacher who also makes his own music and had played at live clubs) saw me and wanted to talk. He thanked me for loaning him my Kaossillator synth, and we talked about music for a while as he killed time before going to a restaurant for dinner with some friends at 6:30.
As we were talking at the front of Amu, two young Japanese women sat down nearby and started taking selfies with their smartphones. One of them was shooting video of the people walking by along the sidewalk, and I noticed that she kept aiming the phone at me. I'd like to hope that she was shooting more selfies, but I'm pretty sure that she was recording me for some reason. I'm hoping I'm wrong, or that at least she has no plans of using the video for anything, because I wasn't doing anything worth filming. Sigh.
When the Brit left for dinner, I returned home and continued processing photos and video from the weekend. It was HOT Sunday, making up for all the rain on Saturday, maybe. I'm happy to stay indoors now, until the burning on my arms and back of my neck subsides. In the meantime, I'm planning on wearing long-sleeve shirts for a while.
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