AP BANK FES 05 Report

[andy]

Hi there,
I'm a Mr.children fan from San Francisco (USA). I'm new to this board and just wanted to share my wonderful experience at AP bank fes last month.
I went there for all 3 days and had a great time. The first day, I was in B5 block. No seats, just standing room. I was very close to the stage and had a good view of everything. The second day, I was in C6 block. Not as good as the first day but was good enough to see the stage and the screens. The last day, I had A5 block ticket. I was determined to be in the front raw and nothing was going to stop me. But when I arrived early to the concert area, there were many people already lined up. But I waited and waited. The line finally moved after 2 hours of waiting in the hot and humid weather. I pushed my way and fought all the screaming and running girls and made it to the front raw but it was already blocked. finally, I squeezed between 2 people and claimed my spot. A dream came true. Sakurai was in front of me most of the time and the best thing is that when I gave him a PEACE SIGN, he gave me back a peace sign. Also, since it was really hot the last day. Sakurai brought a water gun and started to spray the fans with it. I got splashed too. Also, HITOTO did the same thing and I got splashed a bit. That was the highlight of the concert for me. It was so much fun even though it was so hot and crowded. Below are some details about the concert.

Daily, the concert starts with BANK BAND for 2 hours (sakurai , Kobayashi, and other support members ) singing couple of cover songs then invite other guest artists to sing with sakurai as backup singer. Then Mr.children performs for another hour or so. Then all the artists from each day gather on the stage and sing [To U].

The guest artists were

Everyday:
Bank Band (Great performance and good choice of songs. They sang HERO the last day and Sakurai cried a bit. All the girls around me were crying too. I might had a tear in my eye as well.)
HITOTO Yo (I think that she was one of the best performers and her duet with sakurai singing [Morainaki] was magnificent everyday. She stayed as a backup singer for couple of songs each day)
SALYU (Great voice and perky girl. She performed as a backup singer on couple of songs each day as well)
GAKU-MC (Sakurai's friend and soccer teammate. Everyday he performed his song with Sakurai, sort of Japanese rap-hip-hop song. So much energy in their performance.)

Day1:
Every little thing (was not a good performance. Sakurai even mispronounced their names couple of times)
Ulfuls (only lead singer showed up but really rocked. I think that he had the best performance of all the guest singers. Everyone was dancing and having fun)
Inoue Yousui (Awesome classic Rock, only older fans knew him. Sakurai admires this guy a lot)

Day2:
Pornograffitit (wonderful performance, even Sakurai said Kakuii about them. They were the fans favorite band)
Mika Nakashima (beautiful face, people talked about her rainbow braided hair more than her performance. Good but not great performance)
Suga Shikao (brilliant. Great voice and music. Him and Sakurai are good buddies and they sang well together)
Sano Motoharu (Special guest. Sakurai was surprised to hear that he made it. Was not on the official guest list. Performed one song with sakurai and was a good classic rock song)

Day3:
Sukima Switch (the younger crowd loved them and their performance was fun)
Chara (awesome voice and good selection of songs. She looked like Diana Ross with her big hair and red dress.)
Hamada Shougo (another classic rock performance and he is great. Sakurai admires his a lot.)

Mr.Children:
They are just simply magnificent. All seems to have good time and they performed at high level. Even the quiet members like Tahara and Nakagawa were more animated and laughing a lot.
It was amazing that Sakurai still had energy left to perform for another hour. He sang, ran, jumped, and played the guitar. He is amazing. Couple of times, he forgot few lines while singing.

They performed the following songs:
優しい歌
名もなき詩
未来
Over
雨のち晴れ
ランニングハイ
I’ll be
いつでも微笑を
～Everything is made from a dream
and I love you
overture～蘇生
CENTER OF UNIVERSE
It’s a wonderful world


Sorry that my review in in English but I just wanted to share.

Andy