The Last Three Days

So, a lot actually happened over the last few days.

Tuesday Tasia came to visit for the day. She is doing Light Fellowship in China, but changed her travel arrangements slightly due to her love of Japan (and Japanese food). We did a grand tour of the city hitting up all of her favorite spots from when she was here last summer. We also took in some new sights. One of which being the Tokyo Tower pictured above, but the magical thing pictured below.

Yes. It's a freaking Gundam. A LIFESIZE GUNDAM! I used to make models of these things that were 1/144th the size of an "actual" Gundam. Also, yes, it was entirely necessary to do the epic Gundam title pose.

Besides being in absolute disbelief that anything so awesome actually exists, we went to Akihabara, Odaiba, and Harajuku. Tasia introduced me to the Harajuku Crepes. My mind has continually thought about them from that moment on. I will become large.

Wednesday was me getting back on the ライーブ scene. I attended a show north of Shinjuku Station at a club called Motion. When I got there the crowd was small and the first band was the youngest I had seen since I came to Tokyo. They were called ひらくドア (He Luck Door) and were a sort of poppy soft rock group. The had a pretty kooky tambourine player who would do some funky dances while mouthing along to the lyrics.
http://www.myspace.com/takayukikato

Second was 東京 Freestyle CLUB. They were fairly straight forward j-pop/j-rock. The bassist would go for a run from time to time, the drummer was pretty tight, and the singer had the j-rock voice down. Unfortunately, I wasn't extremely interested in it.
http://www.myspace.com/tokyofreestyleclub

Up next was VIRIDIAN. A drummer in a sparkling pink shirt and two women in matching themed outfits with the same accessories, stood on stage. Based on the other acts of the night, I was not prepared for what happened next. The bass come booming in with heavy drive and I was wowed by a dance punk number featuring perfectly shrieking vocal harmonies that I think only two Japanese girls can pull off: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dl7AqLYIPeg&feature=related
Following that song I would say the rest of the set was a little more straight rock, but those crazy harmonies stuck around for the show. They even had a blues song and a song with a ska guitar riff.
http://www.myspace.com/viridianviridianviridian

The following band was called Knock Note Alien. This was one of the weirdest bands I have even seen live. For the record I have seen some crazy stuff. The set began with them playing a recording and wandering out into the audience with a lamp, mouthing the speech they had recorded to go with this introduction song. The band had crazy rainbow colored instruments and transitioned into their first song right out of the recording. I don't even know what they were. "Absurd experimental funky something" is the phrase I wrote down that evening. The singer was a ball of energy who's pep NEVER diminished. She would run around, point out at the audience, count things, jump up onto her tippy toes, lean over the railing, and hop on the set play four hand drums. All of this for pretty much every song. They were wild and really good musicians.
http://www.myspace.com/knocknotealien (I wasn't able to find media to show how weird they were)

The Headliner was called Metro-Ongen. They were a very polished, professional sounding J-pop band. The singer was great, and the band was really together. They had a projector behind them displaying all kinds of crazy images of space. On their last song they added a some nice guitar effects (reverse delay with lots of swells) and it gave them a big finish. I can't really say too much more, just give it a listen:
http://www.myspace.com/metroongen

As for today, I went to Asakusa and visited the Senso-ji. Alert: TOURIST TRAP! Too many westerners with souvenirs. The temple was amazing though, even though there was scaffolding on the outside of it. On my way back I discovered that right near Akihabara is the instrument district of Tokyo. It was literally a street of guitar shops. I arrived a little late so most of the shops were closing, but I will definitely be going back soon. Also, as I walked back to my apartment, I discovered that I am walking distance from Tokyo Dome City, which has a crazy amusement park.