I actually had half this post typed up in yet another internet cafe (with any luck, the last one I’ll spend the night in for the rest of my life… -_-”) Saturday night after the event, but yea, in the end I had to stop to sleep (though I mostly caught up with it on my 10 hour train ride back home the next day ORZ).

(Edit: And I intended to finish it yesterday, but yea, classes started + homework + catching up on anime + campus internet cut off at 10= usual bunch of excuses.)

Anyways, seiyuu3 has coverage for both days of Animelo Summer Live 2008 (again, I can’t thank these guys enough or I wouldn’t have gotten the chance to watch it live since I so totally failed at purchasing tickets of my own… *pinches self again to make sure it wasn”t just the best dream ever*), so you should head over there for better details since this post is really my n00b’s-eye view of Saturday’s show. (Sorry folks, even if I had a ticket for Sunday’s show, it would mean skipping the first day of classes if I had gone to watch it. Sunday’s show seems to be full of niconico memes and whatnot that I wouldn’t have got anyways…)

And in case you doubt how n00b-ish this post is going to be, consider the fact that not only was this my first time at an Animelo live show - it was probably my first time at a live concert show at all. (It’s not that I don’t get out much, I just haven’t had the urge to fork out cash to be sandwiched between total strangers for hours on end just to watch someone sing before… till now XD)

So here go my Twitter-like tweets I was making in my head throughout the day. (And no photos, since I had to surrender my camera before entering the stadium. Perhaps later I’ll post more random shots of the crowd outside -_-” edit: Okay I realized this post became a huge wall of text so you get random pics now)

  • Arrived at Saitama Super Arena at about noon-ish. Had lunch, then met up with a certain writer for seiyuu3 (Oh god, this is embarassing, I know your name, but I don’t know which one you are ORZ) to receive the ticket they kept for me (Sorry for acting like a retarded dumbstruck ditz at the time, it was really a giddifying moment for me >.<)
  • After randomly snapping shots of the crowd and deciding not to join in the absurdly long line (more like a zoo pen) to purchase Animelo goods, joined in the equally absurdly long line to get into the stadium. Must’ve took about an hour before I got to my seat, in the meantime, was eavesdropping on all the Japanese otaku speculation about the upcoming show =P
  • Once I got to my (actual) seat (hey, i wasn’t the only one confused over the numbering…), I realized that there were a lot more 1) ojisans middle aged guys 2) parents (moms) accompanying their teenaged children (seriously) attending than I expected…
  • A good portion of the female crowd must’ve been in some form of gothic lolita outfit… No prize for guessing who they came for…
  • Guy sitting next to me whips out his lighted Chihara Minori fan… I start to think I should’ve gotten a glowstick at least…
  • After some delays and Niconico/ Penguin Musume Heart DVD/whatnot commercials being played to us almost 3 times… The lights go down…

Gazing across from the station to see the crowd already amassed in front of the arena… *thinks: uh-oh…*

(spoilers start here if you rather not know anything about the performances)

(apologies if I end up ranting things out of order - fixed)

  • ANIMELO SUMMER LIVE 2008: We get a montage of all the performer lineup for the day. Was to caught up being giddified by the big names I did know to actually figure out on my own who on earth Ishida Youko, AAA, bless4 and GRANRODEO were (A big apology to these artists for being the n00b that I am ORZ)
  • And the show kicks of with…
  • FATE AND NANOHA Mizuki Nana (!!!) and Tamura Yukari prancing about stage in school uniforms (To the utter delight of many XD) I had no idea what they were singing though… Not the Fate & Nanoha duet I was hoping for… Not that I cared, in my head I was like “!!!!!!!!! YES, I’M NOT DREAMING, THAT LITTLE DOT ON STAGE IS MIZUKI NANA!!!!” (My seat was probably as far from stage as you could get, though it was a straight on view of it. Thankfully the large screen made up for it)
  • After two cutesy songs, Nana-chan and Yukarin leave stage… Only Yukarin returns moments later in a frilly pink dress (wow, she changed fast) and the cutesy-ness continues… On her last song, she ‘apologetically’ whips up a matching pink magic wand with which to kill her fanboys with moe overload get everyone to the wave whenever she pointed to the crowd… (Oh well, when in Rome… *waves* XD)

The zoo pen area where the goods were being sold

  • Ishida Youko… I still don’t know who you are ORZ (sang the Strike Witches OP - not that I knew- and a song called “Towa no Hana” which wasn’t the Towa no Hana I know… Okay, I think it’s about time I watched Ai Yori Aoshi…)
  • ~SAKURA SAKU MIRAI KOI YUME~ The first “Finally! A song I actually know!” moment was with yozuca* singing the OP from the Da Capo anime.
  • After yozuca* came Coorie (And at that moment I learnt that her name is pronounced “koo-ri-eh” as opposed to how I’ve been saying it all along - think of ‘Cookie” with an ‘r’ -_-”).
  • Dumb note: Coorie was wearing a green dress, singing on a green stage with a green background (at that moment). Guess what she sang? show
  • As a follow up to yozuca*’s Da Capo song, Coorie next chose to sing Sonzai (2nd ED to the first not-so-crappy anime), which is a song I like since it’s sung in a low whisper, which must be tough to pull off on stage. In the end, poor Coorie just sounded and looked very anguished singing it (but hey, it fits the mood of the song! And I still found her quite cute in her own way =P).
  • Best armpits Most physically active on stage: The guy from m.o.v.e.(har har). Hey, he got me off my seat XD (up to that point I was slightly lethargic from my lack of sleep throughout the trip)
  • I had no idea who AAA was before they started playing the World Destruction montage during their performance (they sang the OP for the anime). Also ALI Project was on stage with them, I think? (If she was, she basically just blended in with the sea of red that was AAA’s costumes)

The zoo pen area where people had to line up for god knows how long to get into the zoo pen area to buy goods.

  • Most LOL…i : The Karen Girls singing the Zettai Karen Children OP. I couldn’t stop laughing because it kept reminding me of those music videos featuring such young girls singing Chinese New Year songs back in Malaysia… XD
  • Random unexpected song I didn’t see coming: “Nowhere” from Madlax - which I instantly recognized when it started, but then I had trouble recalling whose song it is (Fiction Junction YUUKA)… And just as I realized it wasn’t anyone on the days’ performers list, it turns out to be Minorin, yozuca* and savage genius… (No, they did not all wear white cocktail dresses of doom…) There was a joke at the end as to why the 3 of them sang the song, but I failed to catch it…
  • After travelling all the way from Osaka to Saitama, it somehow felt good to hear savage genius talking in Kansai-ben XD She also sang her yet to be released single which is to be the OP of an upcoming Fall 2008 anime (title eludes me because I’ve not been reading any previews Yozakura Quartet)
  • AKINO from bless4 (a group of her siblings) take the stage with a vaguely familiar song… (Sousei no Aquarion. According to someone I know who san it in karaoke once, most Japanese will know this one since it was used in a commercial some time ago… Well I obviously wasn’t in Japan then)
  • AKINO’s only 18??? And was it just Sousei no Aquarion or does she have a penchant for saying “A-I-SHI-TE-RU!“

  • GRANRODEO ’s job was to inject testosterone into rock up the stadium. But I guess I have to say I’m more of a Okui Masami person in the end. =P
  • Kuribayashi Minami sang the OP to Kurenai, and started pimping out the next season of Kimi ga Nozomu Eien… I was thinking, wait, why do we need a second season of that show again? (A lot of the audience seem pretty thrilled about it anyways). Her outfit reminded me of a dead bird (why is it that you hear this description so often lately..)
  • Best vocal performance of the night -god, I sound like an Idol judge- goes to Suara, imho. Her song Seiza, which was my first time hearing it, was done really beautifully - carried mostly by her vocals as opposed to instruments and stage effects. (Plus it was probably the only performance where I could clearly hear every word the singer was singing -_-”)
  • The next performer quickly confirms whose fans I was sitting amongst that night… (If you happen to hear the chants of “MINORIN SAIKOU!!!” from the audience in the DVD’s, chances are, they came from my side of the audience -_-”)

Umm yea, just for the sake of breaking up the wall of text.

  • Minorin’s first three 2 songs flew past my head, because I’ve not exactly been following her singing career outside of anime >.<
  • But of all the performers and all the possible songs for the evening, I never did expect that the one to make my day thus far was to be Minorin with Yuki, Muon, Madobe ni Nite (Nagato Yuki’s character song, hell YEA). And just as I was thinking “If only she sang something I knew” too! Yuki fanboys probably got a kick from her last line of the song ;P
  • Minorin continues on her roll with what was the Best Duet of the day: Rinbu Revolution together with the oh-so-awesome Okui Masami!!! Yup, 2nd year in a row - but I won’t try to compare the performance to last year’s epic duet with Mizuki Nana of the song since I have a Nana bias this was Minorin’s cover version (Still, Rinbu Revolution just happens to be my favourite OP song of all time… And to have the original singer Okui Masami singing even half of a cover version on stage… *dies*)
  • Okui Masami continues with her awesome (there was no way I could tell she was actually sick on that day) by singing the OP to a Muvluv game (I heard it as Maburabuho or something, and I was busy thinking: huh, Maburaho? Mahoraba?)
  • ALI Project sang Shigofumi’s OP and the new Code Geass ED For anyone who doesn’t think that all ALI Project songs sound the same. Possibly the only distinct female cry from the audience I actually picked up during the night was for “ARIKA-SAMA!!!” (ALI Project’s lead singer)
  • And finally… after a break to setup the stage…

Have a random shot from Akihabara to illustrate Minorin’s fondness of ‘gazing up in the heavens’ which she did countlessly over the course of her performances.

  • Most awesome as expected: Mizuki Nana (!!!!) They had to keep me waiting by putting her last, but best for last it certainly was!
  • Oh crap, I don’t recognize the first song… ORZ (failure as a so-called Nana fan…)
  • Next, Dancing Under the Velvet Moon (the expected ‘recent’ song - though I was hoping for Black Diamond instead). Too bad it’s the one Nana song I have that I can never sing along to…
  • Well, in answer to my ‘prayer’ (*groans*), Nana introduces her backup band the Cherry Boys together which she performs Pray (YES! I knew it was too much to ask for Secret Ambition).
  • Nana addresses the audience *waves wildly like an uncivilized buffoon* and the sheer force of her popularity is undeniable =P She had to mention that it’s a pity this year’s Animelo had to be held at the bloody end of August which meant students only have classes to look forward to afterward… *sighs* And finally…
  • Could’ve been Best Duet: Mizuki Nana and ALI Project (’Akira-sama’), this year with Nana’s Eternal Blaze (last year they sang ALI Project’s Seishoujo Ryouiki together and apparently at the end of it ALI Project insisted that the ‘favour be repayed’). As much as Eternal freakin Blaze is an awesome Nana song, ‘Akira-sama’ looked pretty much lost the entire performanc, but was fairly apologetic about it at the end.
  • Finale: This year’s Animelo SUmmer theme song Yells ~ It’s a beautiful life~ with all of the night’s performers (minus the Karen Girls… Past bedtime I suppose? ) (Have I mentioned how awesome Okui Masami is? :D). And then it’s time to say goodbye… not.
  • “AN-KO-RU! AN-KO-RU! AN-KO-RU! …” (”Encore!” X infinity)
  • Last year’s Animelo Summer theme Generation-A as well as Yells again.
  • End of the best evening of my entire fail trip T.T

*looks enviously at those who will be attending day 2*

I think it goes without saying that as n00bish as I felt surrounded by all the ’seasoned fans’ (*thinks of the group of middle aged guys I saw who were on their feet from start till end), Animelo Summer Live 2008 (Day 1) was a ton of kick-ass fun *string of crazed happy smily emoticons go here* Sure I originally thought I’d go ‘just’ to fulfil my wish of watching Mizuki Nana live while I’m here (god knows where ‘ll end up next year), just about every other performance where I knew the song was worth it in itself :P Though the lack of a glow stick just made me feel even more n00bish, but once I got into the ‘groove’ of things, I just ended up thrusting my fist randomly in the air whenever I felt like it (I looked incredibly stupid next to the guy who was doing the same thing, only in a more ‘co-ordinated’ fashion -_-”)

*Sigh* The only bad thing is that it’s over and that classes have restarted, reality seems so much more bleak for now… *grumbles back into a life of homework and upcoming exam revision*