Iro kui Live Report

On November 24th, 2008 Iro kui held a one man live celebrating the last stop on their tour. The band started off with their most recent single, Sumi Kuroi Shiro from Utau Kuchibiru to thunderous roars. The vocalist Yuri came out in his standard pink hair, short shorts with leg warmers and a polka dot scarf. The other band members were wearing rocker clothing with styled hair. Ritu played a very feminine role with extreme feminine mannerisms.

The third song was Jikojuu Alice, a song with a heavy sound that initiated all the ladies to start head banging everywhere. The song featured lots of reverb and was accompanied by hand gestures from the vocalist. The forth song, M.H.C. was certainly a highlight of the show. Yuri growled into the mic with “guru guru guru guru (spin)” followed by band members spinning around. During the song the cord fell out from the guitar jack creating some static but it was quickly fixed. After this Yuri thanked the audience for coming saying he had “many things to say tonight” with a girlish glee. That he certainly did. Yuri plays the role of the entertainer during most shows and this was no different. He can talk for hours and hours and every bit of it is always very interesting. He then exclaimed that he would teach the audience new hand dances tonight and if the fans tried and succeeded they would get a free DVD, “Itazura DVD” that will be handed out after the concert. It turns out one of the guitarist’s fathers was there watching the show at the back. The band said hi to him and he grudgingly waved back. It turns out the father was a well known jazz guitarist back in the day. Then as promised Yuri taught a new dance that involved rabbits and barfing! Fun! After the audience had a grasp for the dance that involved rabbits and barfing the band movied in to Alice Terrier. The audience had perfected the dance while the band members had their own synchronized motions that complemented this funny dance. Most audience members at visual kei concerts have their own hand gestures that they perform during a bands show that are decided by the audience. One of the unique aspects of Iro kui is that they feed off of this and encourage it by teaching new gestures all the time and the vocalist often incorporates hand gestures into his own performances. The eighth song featured acoustic guitars as the band performed a heart-warming acoustic version of their new song, Tsuki no Uta. With the audience stopping their head banging to wave their hands back and forth, it was truly a beautiful moment. After the song finished the stage went dark followed by a lengthy talking segment from Yuri. He announced a new limited edition photo set that went on sale at the conclusion of the concert. Yuri then interacted with the audience by asking where everyone was from. He really wanted someone to say Akita (his hometown) but no one raised their hand. Then Haduki asked who was from Saitama and a bunch of people raised their hands. When it was Shuuta’s turn, no one raised their hands because no one was from Yamanashi. Yuri really ripped into him for this and couldn’t stop laughing. The drummer was from Gunma and a few people in the audience raised their hands. For Ritu, the bassist 2 people ended up being from Yamagata. Yuri decided to ask again who was from Akita as before everyone was too shy to reply. A few people raised their hand and he squealed with glee. He then went through all the prefecture names in Japan asking where everyone was from. Of course Tokyo had the most as the event was at Liquidroom in Ebisu, Tokyo. The vocalist said it didn’t matter where anyone comes from.

For the continuation of the live show, Yuri asked everyone to take out their cell phones and illuminate the dark hall with them. While playing Tetsu no Usagi, Koutetsu no Yume the guitarist made heart signs with his hands to the audience. After the song he talked about his perm which Yuri was making fun of. Yuri made fun of a lot of people in jest including the band members, audience, etc. The vocalist then taught another hand gesture routine to the audience. He really is an entertainer and makes sure the audience participates in every single concert. The last song of their main performance was the 16th song that they played and was Metorotiku Birthday from Utau Kuchibiru. The danced on stage like there was no tomorrow. The members would spin in circles until they fell down. Yuri particularly had a rough fall. The song was beautifully played with dead-on bass slapping. The bassist played phenomenally all night and is without a doubt a top notch bass player who doesn’t use a pic to play. At the end of the song they announced a new DVD which will go on sale on April 18.

For the encore, Iro kui came out in a new outfit. They all wore a black and white t-shirt which went on sale that day. For their first encore song they played Juliet Meka Usagi. The song was very soothing and the guitar solos were amazing. After the song was played Yuri took out his cell phone and faced the back of the stage and had someone take a picture of the band with the audience in the background. When he takes out his pink phone, he sees that he got many text messages. They all turned out to be for stores announcing new sales. He commented that he rarely gets mail from actual people. The band played 3 more songs followed by a third encore.

Iro kui’s performance was really great. Their style was very different from many other visual acts through Yuri’s spoken entertainment and crowd interaction. Out of all the visual kei concerts that HearJapan has seen up to date, Iro kui revved up the crowd the most. It is very clear that this unique band is growing in popularity as they had completely sold out the concert at the rather large liquidroom. The concert hall was completely packed even though there was pouring rain outside. Definitely a band to keep a watch out for in 2009!