B'z Live-Gym 2003
"BANZAI IN NORTH AMERICA"
The Showbox, Seattle, October 21, 2003

Report by OroOroKen

I decided to not skip class on the 21st to get in line for the show, because I honestly didn't think there would be any need to. And it turns out that there wasn't; the Showbox was handing out "line passes" before the show; the first 130 people who showed their ticket at the ticket booth before the show recieved one of these, meaning they were allowed to be in some sort of reserved line. My "line pass" said that I was number 82, but it turned out this number didn't matter at all.

I waited quite a while, waiting for anybody I might know to show up, and I ended up finding the b'z net party-goers first (no surprise here). A good majority of the time before the show, I was busy trying to sell the surplus of tickets that I had (a consequence of friends backing out of the concert), and made a fool out of myself traversing up and down the line, asking in both English and Japanese, whether or not anybody was interested in purchasing them. Eventually, I found my sister, and she decided to take over the role of ticket seller (and she was far better than I was at it; I guess because she's cuter.) Thus I was finally able to relax in line and talk to Dave, Boyd, and Touko about all the great things the universe has to offer. We even talked about some B'z stuff. There were a lot of non-Japanese people at this concert, and though they were still the minority, they weren't very rare at all.

Okay, I'm sure most of you guys haven't heard of the Showbox, but it is an AMAZINGLY convoluted and unjust operation. First, they decided to have these "line passes," something that they have never done before. Secondly, those who didn't have "line passes" had to wait in a back alley adjacent to heaping piles of trash. Third, those who were let into this bar called the Green Room were let into the concert first, so in order to be let in first, you had to be over 21 years old (and they probably made people purchase drinks too). Dave and Touko, I still feel bad you guys didn't go into the bar because you didn't want to leave Boyd and I behind; I still don't think that you two were being very fair to yourselves. You guys would've had WAAAAAAAAY better spots at the concert. You guys are too noble...

One cool thing that happened in line is that my sister and I got interviewed. My sister had already been interviewed at the LA Cali Roll concert last year, so the lady who was interviewing said, "do you remember me?" My sister of course did, and so the lady asked something along the lines of, "now that B'z is in Seattle, what do you think?" I got to say something too; something really simple like "B'z, Seattle ni kite kurete hontou ni ureshii desu. Hontou ni arigatougozaimasu." (I'm very happy that B'z came to Seattle. Thank you very much). Yah, I could've said something a lot cooler, but oh well. The worst that can happen is that we won't be on a dvd or tv special. But in case we are, look for Boyd and Dave standing right behind us.

After hours of waiting, they finally let us in, and once in the crowd, I was at about the sixth row of people. But as people kept coming in, I somehow magically found myself in about the 2nd/3rd row, with a bunch of shorter people behind me (and infront of me as well). Feeling bad for one girl who must've been about 4'11", a let her switch spots with me, but somehow during the concert, she found herself directly behind me again.

The concert began, B'z kicked off with Arakure, and the rest is history. The sheer number of Tak fans in the crowd was amazing! I was thinking that there would be more Inaba fans, but from our side of the floor, the Tak cheers were definitely louder, something very different from when I was at Cali Roll. Maybe the Tak fans were just more audible.

The crowd was insanely wild, with someone having to be fished out of the crowd just after a few songs. I also think I saw people in the crowd who had basically lost consciousness, but due to how crowded everyone was, they were being supported but their fellow fans. I must've elbowed about ten people in the head; but it's not like I could've helped it, if I wanted to do any arm waving at all, it inevitably had to happen because everyone was so packed. For about the first half of the concert, I was singing most of the lyrics, but during the second half, I started to lose it. I was doing just fine during songs like "blowin" and "konya~", but after time passed, I lost a lot of energy for when "Ultra Soul" or "It's Showtime" rolled around.

For me, and undoubtedly for many other as well, the highlight of the show was Taiyou no Komachi Angel. It's not my favorite song, but the crowd was craziest during this song, and it got tons of audience participation (so did Easy Come, Easy Go, but it wasn't nearly as wild). Koshi and Tak even did the Komachi Angel guitar-voice harmonization thing they did in Buzz! I only wish that I could've heard it more clearly; I was really hoping they'd do that, but the whole place was just so loud. Basically most of the songs got the crowd going though; you wouldn't think a song like Love Me, I Love You could get the crowd rocking as hard as any hard rock song could, but it did.

A couple of times during the concert, Tak threw picks in my direction, and I was able to get my hand to touch them, but I couldn't actually catch any; they kept getting knocked around... and each time this happened, I was sad.

Not that you guys would necessarily care, but I got spit on by Koshi twice! A couple times Koshi reached into the crowd and touch some people's hands, but mine were about 1/2 foot out of reach... too bad.

After they played It's Showtime, they left the stage for their pre-encore break, and I looked around the ground for picks, but my efforts were fruitless. That's about when I discovered that Boyd was right behind me, and we exchanged a few thoughts on how awesome the show was. It didn't take very long for them to get back on stage though, and they finished the show with energetic performances of Hakanai Diamond and Giri Giri Chop. One guy in the crowd decided that since Giri Giri Chop was the last song, he should start crowd surfing, and as expected, he was promptly kicked out. After the last song, Koshi went into teacher-mode and instructed us in how to perform "Banzai" correctly. And to get the crowd to be in unison for the Banzais, Koshi also taught the crowd what "seno" meant; he described it as meaning something like "three, four" (you know, they way bands begin their songs so that they begin them in unison). This translation got the crowd laughing, and Shane gave Koshi a high-five for it. So after a practice Banzai, Koshi shouted, "SeeeeeNO!" the crowd screamed "BANZAI!!!" three times, and the show was complete.

All in all the concert was just TOO GOOD. I now have new found appreciation for songs like Zero and Love me, I Love You, the same way it took Cali Roll for me to truly appreciate Go! Fight! Win! Koshi said that they'd be back 'soon,' so I'm keeping my fingers crossed for another performance next year.

I looked for Dave, Boyd, and Touko afterwards, but couldn't manage to find them, so I just went home with some of my other friends (some of which were interviewed themselves). I was so damn thirsty, and I had completely sweated through my sweatshirt; my clothes must've been holding half a gallon of sweat (not joking)!

Okay, now for the STRANGEST part of my day (possibly my life). Once home, I decided that I REALLY needed to get out of my horribly sweat-soaked clothes and take a shower. By this time, I was feeling kinda sad. You know, the kinda sadness you feel when something great has come to an end. So here I was in my room, stripping off my B'z-stained clothes one-by-one, when I happened to notice something when I was about to pull off my underwear. Next to my pile of nasty clothing was something small, something white... something that looked like... A TAK MATSUMOTO GUITAR PICK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

You guys could not possibly imagine how happy and how shocked I was to find that on the floor of my room. I did not know I had one. Honestly. You guys are just going to have to believe me here. Dave, I wasn't on drugs, was I? I got close to getting a few of them, but I destinctly remember not ever being able to get ahold of one. You just don't forget something like getting ahold of a Matsumoto pick. I don't know how it got into my room; it wasn't in my pockets, because I had searched through those once earlier. The only ways tak's guitar pick could've followed me home is if it had somehow got inside the hoodie of my sweatshirt, or it had stuck to some other part of my clothing due to my sweatiness. Amazing. Thank you sweatiness.

So yah, my sadness that the show was over quickly dissipated and I was a happy person again. Now I just got to get over the aches and cramps of a B'z show hangover. And besides, there's always that Vancouver concert tomorrow. Oh boy.