9th live - Countdown live review
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Noon show
Me and Hatix arrived there pretty early and were probably pretty much in front during the line for the goods, when I reached at the goods booth I quickly told Hatix to get me an FC T-shirt because the non FC T-shirt is just too plain. Not only its plain, its no longer colour coded. Oh well, due to that I almost could not make it back home cause I basically spend every last cent I had during that time... (thanks hatix for everything!) We waited for a pretty long time, but when all the foreign fans got together you could definitely see the glares darting in and out all around you
. In the noon show, Hatix and I were sitting next to each other and the 15th row is not a bad row at all. I'm pretty short, and the people in front of me weren't that tall so that saves me a lot.
The track list for the noon lives is pretty much for the older members of the group, I'm guessing they want to reserve their stamina for the countdown live. It started off with Eve and continue to a set of medleys thereafter, since I don't really remember the order of the songs I'll just go ahead with my comments. Then we had Beta na Shitsuren ~ Shibuya ni Furu Yuki, being an obviously biased Umeko fan this song was definitely awesome for me and Yazawa's singing sounded much better this time around too
Then we had Caramel Latte Nomi Ikou~ performed live for the very first time. Though everyone had no idea how to wotagei around at this song since its the first, it was an awesome song. Nothing really fancy with the choreography or anything like that. The kansai team sang Makehende and compared to the NGK live, Manami and Ruka sounded much better this time around. Stargirl Starboy had an adorable choreography! Maybe its just me not watching the shinahachi episodes, but I was pretty much wowed by it.
there was a dance by Ruka, Asahi and Ookawa in the noon session. It was fricking awesome, can't take your eyes off Ruka whenever this kind of thing is available.
MC-ing around this time is pretty weak compared to other idoling!!! lives but the noon show MC-ing is definitely better than 8th live's. At the very least we have the "say your apologies!" again~! The noon show had the younger team to saying out their apologies but I'm sorry I can't recall what was said.. Then we have Yurika and Ookawa MC-ing, it isn't really better MC-ing than Tono/Ruri MC-ing but at least screaming Ookawa's trademark "Yareru! Dekiru! Dekiru Yareru!" felt much better than the normal wave + Yokoyama Jump. Morimoto appeared once to MC and she was talking about the ranking of volume of tears shed this year. 1st place was Asahi 2nd place was Ookawa and apparently 3rd place was Umeko. I was a bit baffled by the Umeko in the list and then I just realized they were referring to the curry episode, so yeah that's definitely a chart holder too.
before the encore we had a session where they play a VTR of this year's happenings and stuff.
The encore was normal for the noon session. Like a shooting star > Snow Celebration > Sayonara Mata Ne. Nothing really funky or weird happened, no dead bodies rolling on the stage. You just gotta love it when Amimi holds the mic though.
Evening show
waiting for this show is a freezing hell for me, I'm not used to winter at all and it was frigging cold outside! Even Hatix, whom had snow and stuff before coming to Japan was shivering, only God knows just how cold it was for me. But thankfully there was this really nice Japanese Idolinger!!! whom I was talking to kept me from thinking about the cold so much.
I got row 4 seat 0 for this show. Pretty much way in front and near the railings at the stage. Awesome seat with the huge speaker right besides you too. Couldn't really hear my self chanting or anything at all. Song list is pretty much the same except for the difference that I wrote in the few post before this. What really turned me on was the 1st moteki no uta by the younger team. First time listening to Moteki no Uta live and it was a blast, especially with the stereo system right besides you.
MC-ing wise, well since it is a live broadcast they just gotta have Amimi and Yazawa and they delivers. After that we had YokoRuri pair again doing the same thing they did in the 8th live. After Makehende, apparently Morimoto came to the stage saying that Pony Canyon is considering to release Makehende as a singles on its own but only if they made it into radio request top 50. If they could make it into top 30, PC promised to throw in a PV too (please make this happen!! I love this song a lot!). The adult team's apologies are a bit... weirder
Endou confessing to kissing Morimoto when she drunk and stuff like that.
The encore, is a whole lot better this time. Like a shooting star > Snow celebration > Sayonara Mata Ne, that's how it is supposed to be but they Amimi begged in for a Moteki no Uta Season 2. I thought it was a totally staged thing but apparently according to Silverbolt, due to that song they went over their broadcast time limit. The moteki no uta encore is as usual your chaotic Idoling!!! encore. Watching it live was awesome and I was so close to getting Serina's bracelet too, oh well...
Countdown live
As you can see, the musical was awesome. We have stay with me, shokugyou idol and Mujouken koufuku this time around. The accoustic Meniwa was amazing, and Maipuru short solo flute was awesome as well during the song. Umeko was camwhoring with her winks, sakacchi apologizing to everyone for stealing the 1st Tonooka hug only to be countered by Maipuru's super tight hug with Yurika. This might be shorter but it has a lot more unusual stuff, making this a whole lot more entertaining.
Overall
Jumping into winter, injuring my feet, almost had no money left at all, for these 3 lives were definitely worth it. Especially for the countdown live, watching the musical live is awesome. It kinda shows just how well diverse are everyone in the team. On the way out from the evening show though, I saw Kikuchi AP or should I say Ex-AP. And of course Sawada AD and Sakuma D during the evening show, since I was pretty much at the front. I'd love to come again next year if they are doing another CDL..