Category Archives: Conventions and Concerts

December 3, 2022

Anime NYC 2022: Wrap

By omo

It feels weird blogging about Anime NYC while attending its sister con, Anime Frontier in Fort Worth. On the other hand, AF is basically the same setup as ANYC, just much smaller…and has Gundam Aerial HG in stock.

Anime NYC comes back from its Omicron-shaded 2021 edition and is a victim of its timing, yet again. This time it’s still not its fault. Japan opened its doors in mid-October which made booking guests feasible. Record high inflation and strong US demand for entertainment in 2022 means every international act is trying to play here, resulting in a slog of perfomer visa applications. This is partly why fhana and Flow dropped out of A-Kon earlier this year, but this is also why ANYC, despite various tries and attempts (as heard from the grapevine) couldn’t really come through with much. With help from CR, the Mogra DJs made it to the US, including the once-denied-by-visa DJ Wildparty who was supposed to show up at Porter Robinson’s show earlier in October. Rock band [alexandros] was literally announced on Friday of the con with a concert on Sunday, curtesy of Bandai Namco and their huge Gundam push. There’s a video out there of them talking about their visa limbo. It is a very 2022 eventer feel for Americans.

Anime NYC 2022 is a big Gundam con. I would say a good fifth of the programs are related to it including guests, screening, and the Alexandros concert. Bannam brought two huge Gundam displays and a large Gundam Base shop, along with other Bannam stuff. It was so big that it took me a while to find where the Tensura and music stuff were sold. Mixbox had a booth as collaborated with MAL, so I guess that technically is also Bannam? Bannam brought over the producer and director to Hathaway’s Flash. I finally got to tell Murase how I feel about Witch Hunter Robin! Maybe it’s blessing in disguise it wasn’t Reina Ueda at the con. Anyways they had a big presence.

Sort of overshadowed by them are Aniplex, and Toei. It’s hard to overshadow the huge One Piece displays they had at the hall, though. Literally a giant Luffy balloon towered over everything there, with regular cosplay gatherings riding on the hot Film Red stuff that’s going on.

Aniplex did their usual best, and I thoroughly enjoyed their panels, or at least the ones I could go to. Kagura panel was a ton of fun, and you can watch it streamed still. The big Mahoyo displays though…it is a vibe, as they say. I guess I need to dust off my Switch for the holidays.

Being mostly an industry thing, ANYC let the big companies bring their stuff, and it worked out because Bannam, Aniplex and Toei are real deals and I am impressed with what they did. Gundam Base did brisk business all weekend. If you spent $500 there you could get front row Alexandros concert. I’m not sure people realizes the value of this.

Alexandros are bros through and through. Two of them are fluent in English so it helped. It’s my first time seeing them in person but these guys are chart topper rockers (and I guess played in NYC in 2018). Still wild that they came with basically 2 days of notice. We were able to coax an encore out of them so that was good.

For reasons, I actually missed out on most of the Mogra stuff. I hated it, but it can’t be helped. The show was combined with the JP DJ with this LA DJ (she’s Taiwanese?) who played basically half the time. LIO from NIOLION was there with Teddy also, who I was able to see on Sunday.

The last thread from ANYC in terms of programming was the Tensura stuff. The movie just came out in Japan and was right after ANYC. Mindaryn and RON from Stereo Dive Foundation came over to do some music from the movie. In fact, Mindaryn had to fly back on Saturday because she has a movie event literally the day after. The mini-concert at the Tensura panel was fun. RON also did a solo show the Wednesday after ANYC (literally day before Thanksgiving) which was basically the same set plus a bunch of his older stuff. RON has written a lot of anime and game music so his solo work from SDF is kind of just scratching the surface of his catalog but do check it out.

What else is there to say? The con is huge–49K plus unique warm bodies, and it’s only because they weren’t booking the entire Javitz. The lines were a non-issue this year due to the lottery system. That said the lottery system is a bit of a mess, so I hope they clean that up for 2023.

On that note, Flow said at their panel at Anime Frontier that they want to go play in NY, because they only played in NJ and toured NY during their off day (sup Anime Next). Maybe this is a sign.

As for the rest of the con, I actually spent most of the time there, despite working Friday. It was crowded, and the exhibit floor was pretty much buzzing most of the time. Since panels were lottery for a good number of them, I didn’t really try to go. I didn’t even get to see Kawasumi… and the aforementioned miss on Mogra DJ left a bad taste in my mouth because I wanted to see them (and even paid VIP..)…well it’s partly my fault, but everything was announced kind of last minute, including the schedule of when the DJs will play. I think those issues aside, ANYC was actually a good time that renergized me (even if it was at the tail end of a eventing spree). Good time with friends were spent, especially making this ANYC special as covid’s grasp on events continue to weaken.

I gave away a bunch of these Minami Saki photo books. They come with a DVD. Not sure how many people even know her at this con... Why do I have these? Someone gave them to me lol.

PS. Eats… if we take the full time from Friday to Wednesday after SDF’s concert… Went to 3 izakayas and they were all pretty good. The Henn na Hotel in Midtown has a proper izakaya inside of it, just really expensive. We went to 2 other places around Grammercy, one being a staple and another more traditional. We ended up getting “hot pot” which is just meat foudue Japanese style. It’s weird. Other spot has become a bit of my regular place with tebasaki and boozy milkshake made from nigori sake. We had late night dimsum on Wednesday after ramen for pre-show pregame. I mean what else is open at 11:30pm the day before Thanksgiving, am I right?

Leave a comment | posted in Conventions and Concerts, Gundam

November 3, 2022

Anime Weekend Atlanta 2022: Wrap

By omo

It’s been about 5 years since my last AWA. Some things didn’t change, others did. For starters I started to just call it “awacon” in chats this year because it’s a bit less ambiguous and it’s what the website and twitter handles read like. Second, the cell connection was terrible at the con. I’m not sure why, but it’s really bad, and worst than I’ve ever had it at any other con, including AWA 2017. I have had better luck at AX and Anime NYC than at AWA, and those cons have maybe 10k more people or more on site on any given day and moment. I also run a full-blown TMO (via Fi) connection as well as a work Verizon LTE sim. Between the two (and downshifting to 4G for the TMO one) sometimes I can get connection. On Saturday this was basically not really possible even.

If I was doing a gripe panel with AWA this has to be my first complaint. Full stop.

Without internet there are a bunch of things I would like to do but didn’t. One is to see who I know is at the con. Another is to look up and research people at their panels so I can be better at asking questions, if any were to be asked. I was able to go to one and a half panels. I spent about half an hour at the Renaissance lobby on the “boarding pass” PC talking to United rep to change my flight. There’s also the issue with my Passkey hotel reservation. Long story short there were a lot of internet/tech issues at this con that may or may not be a big deal that affected me.

So, what did I have to do–call Hyatt because somehow when the reservation went from Passkey (the con block hotel management side) to the individual hotels, my dates were off by 1. After calling reservation for Hyatt, they confirmed that the dates were off by one, and they cannot change it without additional cost. I did end up calling the hotel who told me my dates were actually correctly transferred. Then I changed my hotel reservation anyways–because originally I was only going from Thursday night to Saturday night, and then I changed my mind to stay for Friday to Sunday.

I also had to do the aforementioned United thing. Same-day changing my flight from Thursday night to Friday was easy and free, but it was impossible to not pay to switch from Saturday to Sunday for some reason, via the app and web. I decided to just do it and not worry–maybe leave a terrible review or something.

Because I have no internet, I didn’t really ask much during the BPM15Q panel. I also wasn’t connecting with some local Ps until late Saturday when I was just chilling at the Maggiano’s across the highway. No, I don’t really want to trek back to the gazebo area from there, sorry. Not to mention I didn’t notice the tweet until hours later. This does mean I missed out on some uma cosplayers, sigh.

Anyways, back to AWA this year. I was only interested to see the Japanese guests, and the con did not had a lot of other special content this year. Still I was able to check out Diana Garnet again, and this Voia guy. Seems legit. Both of them served as opening acts for other JP acts like ASCA and BPM15Q. Burnout Syndromes was put up after PIXY.

So yeah, this is kind of a stacked lineup, if you know what these acts are. ASCA was a big reason what anisong kids wanted from AWA. I didn’t particularly leaned either way about ASCA honestly, but I wanted to see her again and hear those best hits. I wanted to see live HOWLING. It does feel she got more into it at AWA versus Boston during the concert, even if the vibe isn’t as chill and cool compared to the ASCA artist image. Which is fine because, well, what she really is in some ways.

Burnout Syndromes to me, before AWA, was a forgettable anisong band with tie-ins for shows I didn’t really care about. The one song that I kind of did, Good Morning World, is a Jump title and I generally have little affinity for acts following Jump anime even when they all bring their A game to big anime nowadays. That said I didn’t have a bad opinion of them or anything, their music had something to offer as far as typical big-label bands go. Thanks to certain someone’s pushing I went to see them and got to learn a lot more about this band, and it really made things interesting to me.

For one, Burnout Syndromes is pretty diverse musically. It’s hard to suss this out partly because their sounds do change a bit between different anisong tie-ins so I don’t always connect them. They’ve been around for a while as well, so it’s hard to get a good sample of what they really sound like “today.” Being diverse musically also didn’t help with communicating their vibe.

What did communicate Burnout’s vibe was seeing them play and speak in person. That vibe is a, uh, dorky group headed by one music mastermind, the frontman, composer, and leader Kazuumi Kumagai. Apparently the 3 current members of the group started in middle school and are still together after all these years. It’s both very simple and yet very artistically clear what and who is doing all the figurative talking. Their music makes sense once you get to see the people behind it. Well obviously it’s the guy who is doing the singing too, but musically there’s this “literary” slant however super-flattened it could be in some ways. Like the hat he wears half of the time. The one rap song he did was a good example. Do people rap with that kind of head gear typically? It’s safe to say this group, even if it’s not up my alley, at least has something worthwhile to see. It’s like a humanities-nerd kind of a vibe.

At the end of the show they were repping their stream that’s later this year that will also have a foreigner-friendly option for watching. I’m not sure if it’s a bridge too far for me, but if you dig Haikyuu songs maybe it’s worth it.

I’m not going to go too deep into ASCA, because I sorta already did, other than to say she’s cool and check her out. Then again ASCA has the kind of anime tie-ins that I watch and it’s always a treat to see her do Hibari in person. And this is someone who didn’t watch too many of the alt Fate stuff. I missed her panel on Friday because I got in late, but she was collaborating with some local streamer type person. She also popped out at the end of ASCA’s show on Saturday? Anyways, I don’t know what is going on with Sacra Music marketing, as usual.

If we go back to two weeks before the con when AWA announced BPM15Q was attending and performing their first US show, I was largely met with surprise and indifference. I vaguely know about CY8ER but I didn’t know much about the Ichigo Rinahamu personality, and all the music and projects Rinahamu started and is still a part of, and this seems like something actually worth flying to alone if everything about BPM15Q is as they say. Turns out, it is as they say. This is the core or basis in which one of the most interesting idol groups in the last 10 years.

Thinking back, this whole idol circus stuff is something now I am somewhat familiar with. You do the photo sessions, you do the watashikai and signkai, you talk to them, to do the wota moves and calls, and you enjoy yourself. As with typical East Coast cons, the number of people who indulges and knows the ropes are probably in the handfuls, at any given event. Having probably the worst slot at the con (last show on Sunday afternoon), BPM15Q still made the con for me. Imagine people finding out about them at the show–the reception of BPM15Q at the con would have been a lot better.

I can see why Rinahamu is who they say she is, because she’s definitely left a mark in my mind. In another way, nicamoq also left her mark, but she’s playing it more straight and my comm skills are probably not strong enough to really enjoy this…funny/charming idol. I don’t know what to say, just that Rinahamu slayed it at the concert, and it was what one could call an “unforgettable experience.” I’m not so sure it’s actually unforgettable, but it’s like being branded by cattle iron sort of thing. It left a very deep impression. It’s something about Rinahamu’s face, her expressions, the way she pumps up the crowd, the way she ad-libbed the stage positions and dances, and it’s really a full package deal.

The show itself is basically just the two of the members dancing to Teddyloid’s backing. It’s basically nearly non-stop dance mixes. There was a cover portion where we got Go, Butterfly, 君の知らない物語, and Renai Circulation. Musically this is the kind of denpa-inspired idol music, but updated for the 2020s. I had a nice place by the railing on the Hamu side of the catwalk, and I went as ham as I could at times. I had a blast.

Fake Star brought all these talents to AWA, including BPM15Q (but except ASCA), who is direct from Sony/Sacra). There were VIPs for PIXY and Burnout. There were photo sessions for BPM15Q all 3 days and sign sessions all 3 days. People went to Burnout’s sessions after their Friday night show, but most didn’t know about BPM15Q and their show was at the end of the con. This means literally a dozen or two people were at all their sessions. It’s too bad, but at least I didn’t have to compete for anything.

It’s not with much expectations I went with AWA, but I left with some deep memories that I hope doesn’t blossom or fester into something else lol. The lack of cell signal does sting because I couldn’t hang out with anyone easily other than the folks I already made plans with before the con.

I wish I can see BPM15Q’s show again, that is the foremost thing this con left me with. I got to shoot the chitchat with some folks. I had fun escaping reality into fuwa-fuwa denpa dream idol land. I enjoyed some music culture. I said hi and seen some faces that I have not for ages. It’s all good.

Leave a comment | posted in Conventions and Concerts, Modern Visual Culture

October 17, 2022

So, You Want to Go See Masters Of Idol World 2023?

By omo

Back around 2013/2014 we knew IDOLM@STER series will do a splashy show for the 10th anniversary year. We sort of got together to get something organized, and for the most part it went as well as things could have gone. With MOIW 2023 now in the horizon, maybe it’s time to review a few things.

For starters, the ticketing situation in Japan has gotten much harder than just “walk in and apply.” There are a bunch of factors to understand. For one, after COVID, many anisong shows have a big drop in attendance. Most concerts in Japan are still on their way to recovery in terms of attendance in 2022, but to put it into perspective, the summer big show, Anisama 2022, only really had packed seats on Saturday. Day tickets could have been had at the door on all three days, and those days don’t even have 100% seating utilization. The stands were at 50% on Sunday and both stands and arena were 50% on Friday.

Anyways, this is the biggest factor because fundamentally, some things have changed. Thankfully, it’s not that much.

Because of COVID, ticketing has largely moved to digital. There are still physical tickets for many shows, but some companies have completely moved to digital. For our purposes Bandai Namco has, anyways. Specifically, between eplus and OnlineTicket/Smart Ticket, it means ticket holders needs to map to account holders, for the most part.

No thanks to scalping laws pre-COVID, many ticket sites require verified JP phone numbers to even open an account now. This is probably the biggest barrier for oversea Producers trying to get tickets. The upside about this restriction is that you can get a sim card or perhaps even a rental phone, even as a tourist, in Japan, that can be used for this purpose. The downside is that there are few ways to obtain a permanent number that works oversea for this purposes, and no real way at all for most people outside of the country (or at least non-Japan residents).

The second barrier to going to see MOIW is the actual obtaining the ticket part. Besides having tickets within your ownership, you will need the same account if you want to apply to buy tickets, which means having a JP phone number at some point and having to register it with the account. In other words, to apply for the lottery, you need to rely on people who are already in Japan, or people who have already figured this out from overseas (due to being grandfathered in or something). Thankfully, the MOIW 2023 Asobi Store round ticket lottery allows each account to apply up to 4 tickets, both days (or up to 4 per day and there are also “through” tickets that include both days). Well, all the aforementioned barriers plus the smaller problem of that currently, there are no easy way to pay for it using oversea credit cards.

Enterprising Ps should be able to find someone who has an eplus account and have that person apply and get tickets for your fam for now, during the lottery rounds. Then worry about sending out the extra tickets to each person once you land in Japan.

These ticketing barriers are not exactly new, as some of these things were already pretty hard in 2018-2019 trying to get tickets via eplus. Either you had to figure out a payment system (like what used to work such as Mixi M), or had help from someone local. What is definitely harder is trying to get a phone number, as Japan really locked down the prepaid sim process and requiring residency proof.

So first thing everyone should do is flag themselves as interested for those who want and can go next Feb. Then people can organize lottery pools to at least get the right number of tickets.

If that falls through for you, the next step is to plan the next (and future) rounds of lottery. There will likely be direct ticket sales for this, as there were for MOIW 2015. And if things are as “bad” as they are, odds are good there will be even at-door ticket sales. It should not be too hard to get tickets to this show, much like how it wasn’t hard to get tickets for MOIW 2015.

I realize a Japan trip is hard to plan on these vague chances, but that’s the reality today. I hope at least the fan groups can get together and communicate and at least lower that uncertainty a bit. It could be a good thing or it could be just getting the bad news sooner so you have a chance to do something about it.

Leave a comment | posted in Conventions and Concerts, Idolmaster

July 27, 2022

A-Kon 31: Wrap

By omo

Let’s do this foodie pics first, because it accurately depicts the order of importance to me of what happens at this con. To recap, A-Kon 31 announced fhana and BACK-ON and subsequently un-announced them about a week before the show. In their place we got Shihori and Diana Garnet. We also got surprise-SG5.

CattleAck BBQ is one of Texas’s best BBQ joints, and a perennial top-3 in Dallas-Fort Worth region. So I went with some folks. This tweet sums it up well.

The con itself deserves some mention, as it’s my first time attending A-kon. For one, it’s one of America’s oldest cons, and it has its share of highs and lows. Without getting into it too much, 2022 featured a completely new venue as they move into DFW area proper, literally 2 stops away from the airport on the local train, between DFW and Love Field. It’s a nice location as it used to be just wilderness and the new development is, well, new. The con center is next to the Westin, and around the area are other nice hotels, foods, and venues. There’s an open space with free rave music on the weekend even.

The weather in early June was actually pretty cooperative for Dallas. Nothing I can complain about really.

Toyota Music Factory is a pretty new venue that was built there and it felt a tinge of LA Live, dare I say? But the venue was new and pretty good. Shihori and Garnet made short work of a small crowd, but I had fun just trying to feel that concert mojo again.

What was really impressive was the fan idol/odorite showcase at A-Kon. The IM@S, Aikatsu and Love Live groups made the thing felt like a fan-made Bannam Fes (which I watched not that long ago as of attending A-kon). For a fan production it is pretty high level, but it’s also clearly still on the crest of cringe. If you enjoy idols like I do I think this is all very precious though, so it’s fun seeing some of these acts trying their best given what they got. There was a full on Million group that wore 3rd cosplay outfits and that got to me pretty goddamn hard.

The fun part about this is also SG5. Turns out they were socializing with all the other fan dance groups the night before at a party which is amazing, lol. SG5 closed out the fan idol showcase with some serious firepower and yeah, clearly professionals at work. After the show there was a post-show autograph area where you can go and buy stuff, so I got an autograph there and a 2shot. I also talked to some of the other fan performers and it was fun to see them just do their thing.

I was able to go to SG5’s panel on Sunday and get more 2shots. Real Idols in America hurrah. During the panel, I learned more about the situation behind their prior works. These LDH-branded entertainers have real chops and maybe this is all very produced? But who’s idea is this? It’s amusing.

Besides that, I guess I did do a lot of chilling in Texas, talking to folks who I haven’t seen in quite a while is always good, to catch up in person versus over social media. It was a nice retreat from the daily grind. I took a quick walk around the con, but didn’t explore every corner. It’s a fairly large crowd for a relatively small space between a couple hotels and the con center, I think. There is a lot of outdoor areas though.

As a con, I don’t have a whole lot to say, as a result. I can talk about the con experience as I had it, which is that A-kon 31 was a bit of a mess, and the least organized one I went to among Acen and AB, but that doesn’t mean a lot in this day and age. It’s a new venue after all, so I had came into it with that expectation. I also heard it was run by some newer folks. There were also some interesting things they did…like a foam rave, or showing films at the Alamo inside the shopping/entertainment complex the con is part of. I think the overall experience was okay, as long as they fix some line and crowd control issues. It’s also unfortunate they dropped the ball on guests! Still, I guess I didn’t mind the lemonade much from the lemons A-Kon gave me. It help cut the grease from all that BBQ.

PS. Covid was definitely a guest at A-Kon because masking was poor if at all, despite con’s policy about it being mandatory. I guess this is how that part of the country rolls, unfortunately. On the bright side much of the con experience is outside, and other than inside some panel rooms or parts of the Westin, you’re either outside or in big open spaces. Even the very crowded dealer hall probably isn’t as bad because of the better ventilation of a modern convention space.

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June 27, 2022

Anime Boston 2022: Wrap

By omo

It’s a bit unusual for me to write up these cons so long since I attended them, about a month ago. But here we are.

The COVID-induced ennui does things, I guess? But at the same time, there are plenty of good reasons to not go to cons for fun, as AX discourse showed us. That’s coming right up isn’t it? Well I am not going despite that Aniplex still came through with two big seiyuu guests…

People like Aoi Koga came into prominence in and around 2018-2019 and in a way you feel about them a certain way, as their biggest impact was during COVID. It can definitely be said of ASCA, which Sacra/Sony Music brought to Anime Boston as a guest. It is my first “normal” anisong concert since February 2020, so it felt a certain way. ASCA already performed once in Hawaii for Kawaii Kon so this is her second stop. She’s also going to Germany for AnimagiC next month, but the thing I want to state from this encounter is having that anisong experience with calls is a thing she has not had as a performer until recently because Japan still bans calls at shows.

Fake Star booth at Anime Boston

Since ASCA officially debuted in 2019, she’s not really had a solo show with calls, as this COVID-era new artist said as much. It was moving to hear the handful of us doing the calls. Well, not really sure how many people caught on in the audience during Howling, but howling at ASCA at AB’s Friday night concert was a ton of fun. It was also stirring. It’s like having old synapses firing that you forgot were there. You feel in ways you have not in some time, and yet that sensation feels new.

This is the kind of rending of emotions that I welcome in a post-COVID world, much like old friends reunited since the era of quarantines and travel bans. This is why this summer, for better or worse, travelers will be bustling, COVID counts be damned.

ASCA Panel description displayed on a hall monitor

The problem in that scenario as things play out isn’t so much just the pandemic, but that these events and organizations are also now putting on a show to record crowds, many having to weather the storm and lost much in the process. Anime Boston did probably the best job out of the 3 cons I attended this year trying to mitigate things. Overall they were well-staffed and for the most part the con ran okay. Crowding was an issue during peak Saturday, but it was still manageable if chaotic.

The autograph ticket line was set up using spare panel rooms, which meant lining up to get seated, and they handed out tickets by moving people in rows of seats. That was fun. At con badge line was basically none by the time I arrive Friday afternoon.

What was hellish was that MIT and Harvard both had graduations that Saturday, which meant hotel and flight prices went through the roof (airlines and hotel industries are part of that “events and organizations” aspect I guess) for AB’s dates. It’s bad, because those 2 (large) schools postponed their 2020 and 2021 graduations to 2022, so 3 years worth of grads walked on the same weekend. Luckily they had a batch of hotel rooms in the con block open up in April which made things a bit less painful. The drive from my home to and from the con was also pretty crazy for traffic, because other schools across CT also had graduations (did you know there are a lot of colleges in Connecticut). The NBA Playoff Conference Final was also on Friday, which adds an extra layer of logistical fun, I suppose. The Prudential Center (basketball venue) is literally the venue attached to the con upstairs. Oh, it’s Memorial Day Weekend, which is a huge travel day in the USA anyway to start. Anyways, it kind of was a terrible date to have a large fan con in Boston.

I was only at Anime Boston for about 24 hours, which is unusual for a change–had family stuff to deal with that long weekend. During that time I tried to make the best of it. I walked the Dealer’s, which was mostly just to say hi to a bunch of folks. It’s a little sparse but not too bad. I should walk the AA but I didn’t get around to it. If I had stayed until Sunday could have caught a BoSox game. Ah well, maybe next time.

PS. Not much fooding. Just a pic.

Lobster roll with fries on the side

Legal Seafood is like last resort at the venue. Both because it’s a bit pricy and it’s not that good, and it’s open when everywhere else is full. I think it’s still an okay place to take first timers to, but I’ll get the fried scallops next time.

I went to Eataly on Saturday for late lunch and that was way better and costed a bit less. I should have went to grab some groceries before I headed out of Boston. Cannolis are my sins.

Leave a comment | posted in Conventions and Concerts