Kiramune Music Festival 2012
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This past weekend was KiraFes 2012 at the Makuhari Event Hall. There were two performances, one on the 17th and one on the 18th. I was hoping that since they were having the performances on different days that the set list would be different but unfortunately they were the same.
It rained all day Saturday and I stood in line for 2.5 hours in the rain for goods. Not fun. By the time I was finally able to buy the goods I wanted, doors were already open for the event. My seat for the day was in arena block 9 near the back.
When the lights went down, everyone broke out their pen lights and glow sticks. First up, surprisingly, was Kamiya! He wore a pink jacket that was very sparkly. It was funny because while waiting for the bathroom before the event began, my friend and I were wondering what Kamiya would be wearing for the event. We came to the conclusion that since he wore pink in 2009 and was sparkly in 2010, this year he would be a combination of the two–pink and sparkly. And we were right! XD
Kamiya sang Nijiiro Chouchou, Dual Wing, and For myself. Of course for For myself, everyone sang the “oh-oh oh-oh oooh oh” part. I’ve noticed that Kamiya tends to sing For myself on a bit of a higher note when singing live. It sounds good either way. He danced for For myself and it was the same choreography as when he sang the song for Harezora Party. Adorable! When Kamiya said his greeting, he said, I just said ‘good afternoon’ right now but by the time this event is over, we’ll all be saying ‘good evening.'”
There was a talk corner after all the main Kiramune members sang the first part of their set. Kamiya showed off his order-made outfit. The sparkles on the jacket were actually Swarovski crystals and when SuzuKen asked him, “What kind of jewels are these again?” Kamiya had a hard time saying “Swarovski.” It was very cute. On the back were the letters “Hiroshi K.” spelled out in the crystals and on the front were star designs. Near the bottom there was half a star on each side so when he zipped up, the star would become one. They also talked about Miyu kun’s blog entry that showed Kamiya’s gaudy rehearsal pants (also seen here in the staff blog). Apparently Kamiya received those pants from the Kiramune staff at the Harezora Party event and was told to wear the pants during rehearsal. Kamiya was all, “You want me to wear this during rehearsal? Okay, I’ll wear them during rehearsal, but don’t make me wear them outside.” XD And as always, they talked about food.
The new Kiramune members, Trignal (Eguchi Takuya, Kimura Ryouhei, Yonaga Tsubasa) and Okamoto Nobuhiko sang their sets and then had a talk with Iwata and SuzuKen of CONNECT. Next up was KAmiYU. Kamiya and Miyu kun came out from the second floor singing Taiyou no Sympathy! They were wearing checkered shirts and got pulled along between the 2nd and 3rd floor stands. They went all the way around and ended back on the main stage. Next they sang Sting of Love. The choreography was the same as the one during KAmiYU in Wonderland 2.
For the second half of Kamiya’s set, he sang STYLE, Silica Gel, and Mirror World. He changed into a stylish all-black outfit. It looked very good. He sang STYLE at the center of the main stage in front but for Silica Gel he sang from the left side. He was on a crane and lifted up high. As expected, the crowd yelled out “Hey!” during the song. It was very fun, and everyone was much more into it on Sunday. After Silica Gel was Mirror World. Kamiya started singing it from the left side but when the crane came back down, he was carted to the back of the arena where there was another stage. For Sunday’s performance I was in the last row of block 8, which is in the middle, so I had a very clear view whenever anyone stood on the back stage. I absolutely love Mirror World so I was very glad to finally be able to hear it live. I was hoping that he’d sing it during Harezora Party but he didn’t, so I figured maybe he was saving it for KiraFes. In any case, it was a great performance of a great song.
For the encore, Kamiya sang from near the middle of the arena. It was kind of funny because before it was his turn, you could see his shadow being carted to the middle near the end of the song. He wore the KiraFes 2012 t-shirt but it was purple instead of grey. Kamiya sang Happy Hour and everyone sang parts of the song, such as “Let’s join!” “Hey!” and the lyrics in parentheses. I was kind of expecting him to sing Harebare Heart but it seems they deliberately chose songs that he hadn’t sung live before. Aside from Dual Wing and For myself, all the songs had never been performed at any events.
Last was the new group song Get Together and then Ever Dream. All the guys were singing from different areas of the venue. Of course I kept my eye on Kamiya the entire time. ^^ For the final greetings, Kamiya told everyone to look at their watch and said, “See? Didn’t I tell you it’d be ‘good evening’ by the time this was over?” The event was about 4 and a half hours long (and very tiring on the feet ^^;).
As I mentioned, the performances on Saturday and Sunday were exactly the same. It was the same set list and in the same order. This was how it was in 2010 too when they had 3 performances that were exactly the same. I do kind of wish they’d shuffle things up a bit, either by having a different set list for each performance (preferable) or at least by having the guys sing in a different order, especially since the event it quite expensive. The only thing different was the talk corners, though sometimes they talked about the same things. Still, I had a great time both days and because the performances were the same, on Sunday I knew when Kamiya would be up.
Since this is a DGS fan site, I didn’t write about any of the other members, but let me say that Miyu kun is so cool. He’s such a great singer and dancer and I look forward to seeing his performance again on DVD. The KiraFes 2012 DVD will be released on August 24 and retail for 8190 yen. A bonus CD with Get Together will be included in the first edition and the DVD will only be available at Animate and .ANIME.
