-After the show at Saitama Super Arena, did you have at least a little time to rest?
Aoi [After the live immediately…well, we had to clear up our equipment, had to put it back in the shelves and into the storage room. There was quite a bit to do.]
Ruki [(laughs)We quickly cleaned up the backstage room, didn’t we?]
Reita [(Also we had to clean up) all the glitter tape (which had been shot out during the show) (laughs)]
Ruki [Everyone cleared the bentou, too…]
Reita [Actually it wasn’t bentou, was it. (laughs) At Saitama Arena it had been the catering.]
- From the very start of this interview you are all telling lies with such straight faces…(laughs). All in all, when catching on to that, it’s amazing how the members of Gazette are doing such things all by themselves, too, aren’t it!
Aoi [Of course we do! Since this has been our stage, moreover we work hard with our own hands until it’s all finished…]
Ruki [Eventually we saw the event manager of, as we had finished the live.]
Kai [And we left the venue as the last people.(laughs)]
Uruha [We turned off the lights and locked the doors. (laughs) ]
- You had the keys to Saitama Super Arena, isn’t that amazing?! (laughs)
Ruki [Yes, we had it, the magic key! (laughs)]
- And with that magic key you are able to open the doors to all the locations in Japan… well, well, well. (laughs) Ok, that was a joke for the moment, so, how was it when you started the tour? There had been a lot of songs from [DIM], which you had to present for the very first time. I imagine that the tension was pretty high then.
Aoi [Rather than tension…This was more like we were heading for our dream stage.]
Reita [There are still resources to lies. (laughs)]
Ruki [Shouldn’t we slowly take a more serious turn? (laughs)]
Aoi [(laughs) The day before, we had been rehearsing at the venue. There we checked, what it would be like… However, really there was not much time to (build up) any tension. We’ve been busy the whole time.]
Ruki [Haaaa… It’s really been like that. During the rehearsal we were kinda asking ourselves, why we were actually doing it like that. We felt like the rehearsal wasn’t really ever ending. (laughs)]
Aoi [Exactly. Once we went into rehearsal, Mr. Stoic – Uruha- certainly just wouldn’t let us go home. He was like [Next I would like to play that song.] and he kept going on and on like that.]
Kai [And then he was like [Let’s all go to the studio!]]
- (laughs) I never knew that Uruha-san was called Mr. Stoic.
Uruha [Well well well. (laughs) Basically we are all like that, though. However, it wasn’t quite right. I felt like it wasn’t enough, still.]
Reita [However, how long had you wanted to continue that? For like 11 days or so?]
Ruki [Yeah. Like a whole series…]
Uruha [Well, in such sequences it would have been pretty hard.]
Ruki [On the first day I was thinking [Eh? (Is he serious?)] (laughs)]
Reita [Well in the end, we did it for only one day. There had been band members who needed to work.]
Aoi [Besides there was the radio and such.]
- Because there were probably a lot more things that needed to be done apart from producing and preparing the live, weren’t there? Still, it also included the most recent material. Since it would be the first time to play the album’s songs, one might want to do it thoroughly, too, wouldn’t you?
Reita [Yes, with the new songs certainly.]
Aoi [Since we never really got past being in the studio, we couldn’t actually recapture that sensation…We basically started from there. At the beginning, the feeling (of rehearsing for a live) didn’t really come up. Suddenly there was just this really loud sound, which would make my ears hurt... ]
Ruki [Your ears would be like [wooooaaaah…]]
Aoi [Yeah. As the rehearsal continued, bit by bit we would get used to that sensation.]
Ruki [Also…for this tour there had been a (certain) image. For that reason, we needed to see what it is all about and really had to practice to the highest amount possible. Until the day prior we had basically been standing on stage to confirm all of this. Well, anyway… Arranging the songs from what was there of this image, a lot of things had been quite exhausting.]
Uruha [And if we consider all of this, it was really necessary to have that much of rehearsal.Because at first we had been doing the rehearsal without that certain image, we couldn’t actually realize how to do this on stage, which was in most parts exhausting as well.]
- During this time’s tour a lot of that image seems to have been taken from the first song [The Invisible Wall]. We had been writing a live report as well, and when it comes to songs that would leave an impression with their atmosphere concerning the stage production, it would have been [Nakigahara] or [DIM SCENE] as well. This is including light effects and stage setting.
Ruki [Yes, it’s like that. The LED, too. We had been using those for the first time at Mukahari Messe Hall. It was then, that I said, that I wanted to use them. I wanted to create a stage set, where the images in the back would form the silhouettes of the band members in that shape.]
Uruha [We wanted to do it the whole time. Still, it is pretty difficult in different circumstances.]
Ruki [The thing with the set was pretty exhausting. Depending on the stage, there had been different restrictions. During this tour from the very beginning I had this image of piling up a lot of TV monitors on stage. However, with LEDs set in fixed rows, I was told that it is not possible to arrange them in diagonals. Therefore we changed the plan to creating just one large LED frame in the back… Then suddenly it was like “Wait a second!” Maybe it would have been ok to do this just the normal, more common way. However, I had gotten pretty tired of this thing, which you had seen and taken in as normal on so many different stages already. Therefore I wanted to create something more individual, discussed that and in the end we got what it turned out to be.]
- If it is Gazette, then not being able to show such a stage seems pretty meaningless. This time, speaking of the tour… I was surprised to see that Reita-kun had been injured. Was your finger OK then?
Aoi [That had actually been part of the performance.]
Ruki [Efficient, wasn’t it?]
Uruha [His nose had been injured as well. (laughs)]
Reita [(laughs) My nose had been injured, too…Like it would have been OK if I broke another 3 to 4 fingers.]
Kai [In the end, we would have just glued you pic to the thumb. (laughs)]
Reita [(laughs) Well, but it was OK. However, it had been hurting from the very first day in Toda… I went to the hospital in Tochigi, I think (The performance was on August 2nd in Tochigi-prefecture Sougou Bunka Center Main Hall)]
Ruki [Sometime he had to turn to the back and have his bandage fixed in the shadow of the amp. For me, seeing that had been a total shock…It was not very nice to look at and I felt a bit miserable…]
Reita [Well, it couldn’t be helped. The first day, when I had that finger bandaged, it would get all messed up. (laughs)]
Uruha [Don’t you wanna tell, why it actually hurt?]
Reita [Aaah…no I won’t tell.]
Aoi [(In a powerful voice) Why wouldn’t you tell us, why it actually hurts???]
Reita [I. Won’t. Tell.]
Kai [(laughs) Not even if you are asked that nicely?]
Ruki [Maybe because he was the one who caused it himself?]
Reita [(laughs) Well…I had been throwing my bass, I missed it, it fell and hit my hand…]
- Uuuwaaah! That must have hurt!
Aoi [Actually, the pure action of throwing an instrument…]
Reita [I felt sorry… (laughs) Really, for a long time already, I had been told by almost everyone that it was pretty dangerous and that I should rather stop doing it. But I only said, that if I did it, it would be always successful. The contract when using a guitar said that, too. (laughs)]
Aoi [There is no contract about throwing guitars!]
Reita [I’m really sorry…]
- Please be careful. Honestly… Even if we need to stick to the rules of that contract. (laughs) Alright, so we want to hear about the live a little later on, now I would like to hear a bit more about what had been going on backstage. Something that people not really get to see about you, and I think the fans would be also interested in that.
Ruki [There is… Nothing to be shown!]
- (laughs) There has to be something. Before the live, when there was a little free time, what did you all do? Did you get something from other people, did you go anywhere, any kind of sightseeing, or I’ve heard that you had gone to the onsen (Hot spring) (laughs).
Ruki [Aaah…How to say…Pretty much, we didn’t really do anything. (laughs)]
Aoi [We are pretty stoic as that, when it comes to going sightseeing and such…]
Reita [Mr. Stoic (laughs)]
Ruki [However, really actually…wasn’t there really anything? Did we have any days off?]
Reita [No, there were none. (laughs)]
Ruki [Well, yeah since we didn’t take any days off…]
Aoi [Even the days we would be returning (to Tokyo), there had always been work. No matter how often we actually did return.]
Ruki [There had been the recording and such…]
- Ah, I see. So you did the recording of the new song during that time.
Uruha [Yes and we also recorded the PV for it during that time. Whenever it was a day of returning to Tokyo, in the end there was work, and I didn’t really wanted to return. (laughs)]
Kai [Only when it was a day where we would only be moving from one place to the next, there was a little free time. The first time we did that was from Kanazawa to Hiroshima, wasn’t it?]
Ruki [However, when we were going from one place to the next, we would arrive at a time, when it was already dark, so we couldn’t really do anything anyway. (laughs) During the tour, we did the recording, the mixing… Even the final arrangements for the mixing, we actually did that at the venue. That was about it. It was passing by rather [DIM] days. (laughs)]
- Dim (laughs). Rather deep kind of days…So, it was probably a mistake to ask about things like sightseeing and such.
Aoi [No, no, it’s ok. (laughs) Well, if you ask what had been going on backstage, it was basically hair, make-up and sexual harassment. (laughs) That’s been more on Reita-kun’s turn though.]
Ruki [He’s really a living beast, isn’t he!]
Reita [That story is not all about me!... (laughs) But honestly, what else have we done?]
Uruha [Our leader had gotten really violent!]
Uruha [Our leader had gotten really violent!]
Kai [What? Me?]
Uruha [(laughs) Our leader was, well…Concerning the destinations of the tour, our event manager was asked to prepared various tasty things at each point for us. When he didn’t care much about that, though, he got into trouble.]
Kai [That was not the reason…]
Uruha [So you didn’t throw that plate?]
- Please let’s not come up with false accusations! (laughs) But anyway, speaking of the different regions, I am sure you were able to enjoy the meals in the various locations.
Kai [We often ate at the venue, though. During this tour, there had been quite a bit of preparation at the venue. More often, actually, than we had been eating out.]
Aoi [Oh, where was it, that we ate Yakisoba?]
Uruha [Aah! You mean those mixed by hand?]
- Yakisoba mixed with the hands? What’s that?
Uruha [(laughs) Where was it? They do exist and they are famous. Fuji-something…]
Reita [Ah, I know. Wasn’t that in Yamanashi?]
- Ah, you mean Fujimiya Yakisoba? That’s pretty much Shizuoka, but Yamanashi is close.
Uruha [I don’t know where it really was…It was basically Yakisoba put into something like a small plastic bag, you would put in the sauce and then knead it thoroughly and then eat it like that. (laughs)]
Ruki [That scene really left an impact…]
Uruha [I thought it was extremely delicious. (laughs)]
Kai [However, somehow…whenever there was a live that day, I couldn’t bring myself to eat. I really didn’t know why, though. Before the live I hardly ate anything, but as soon as the show was over, the appetite was kicking in.]
- It was probably the tension, as we discussed before. That came probably from the situation before the live, as you weren’t putting much interest in eating.
Ruki [I don’t think the tension was strong to that extend…The real tension was just coming in right before the show, probably…Until the playing of the SE (intro for the show), it was still in the normal proportion and then, when the curtain would fall it was like [Bang!] It’s that moment of switching to [Yay, let’s go!]]
Uruha [However…when we form a circle, it is already rather tiring in itself…]
Reita [Aah…you mean that half-rising position…]
Uruha [My hips would start hurting. (laughs)]
- The fans certainly can’t imagine that in spite of doing such hard and exhausting lives, these scenes would unfold. (laughs)
Reita [It’s because we’re old men…(laughs)]
- If we continue this, we would probably crush a lot of dreams, so let’s change the subject. (laughs) During this tour there had been a lot of new songs, which had been presented (to the audience), but what song would leave the strongest impression on you in particular?
Uruha [Something with a deep impact… This tour was certainly made to let people see and listen to all of the songs, therefore in my case each song on its own has left an impression on me. We’d go on with songs that have these elements; they wouldn’t grow flat like that. Therefore, even those songs, which were easy to relate to, left a deep impression…For me [DIM SCENE] hat this kind of open feeling in that sense. When arranging the melody of the song, it is sort of pulling along as the image is changing. As we put this together in the very end, the full extend of the song could eventually be seen.]
- on the very first live, that song had been in the middle of the setlist, but for the rest of the tour it was always set at the end.
Uruha [Yes, as it came into that position, the vastness of it could eventually be felt. To have this song facing the end at last, I think, that it is showing the magnificence of Gazette really well.]
Kai [For me [DIM SCENE] has this kind of feeling for me, too…We played [Guren] during this tour as well, and I came to think again, that it is a really great song. Even though we had played it even before we added the instrumental song [Shikyuu] to it, there is a lot of feeling to it. It had been a finished track as itself, when released as a single, but during this tour with the arrangement like that, it was yet again a different and new form to let it be heard, it seems.]
Reita [For me it would be [Headache Man]. The first time we played it was at Shibuya AX on March 25th. At that time, we had it done for the first time with the feeling of celebrating the release of the new single. Now, when having done this for the tour all over again… Well, it was definitely exhausting! It is an aggressive song from the very beginning, there is very little time to catch your breath, during the bridge and the chorus. (laughs) And then going straight back from that to being so aggressive is really tiring.. However, I really like that. It’s like cracking a whip. (laughs)]
- The excitement boiling up during that song is really nothing ordinary. The shaking of the audience seats is incredible.
Reita [At the beginning of the song I am also spinning my head, therefore I can’t really see, what the fans are doing themselves. However, during the bridge of the chorus I am facing forward and can see it pretty well…Certainly, that is a brilliant deed (laughs), absolutely cool!]
Ruki [For me it is [13 Stairs [-1]], because I think until now, we didn’t have a song quite like that, which is good. For me to have a song like that to play during lives has always been a wish of mine. It’s not pushing straight forward right away, it is rather calm, yet heavy, which I think is good. Not all of it is completely aggressive as it is, with that rhythm. It is something with a very strong image, especially, when we did this at the very first live in Toda, it was just like that. With the LEDs we used it became even more stylish, yet, it still has this smell of mud to it on the contrary, which is nonetheless a cool feeling.]
Aoi [I think it is really good how even the new songs are so familiar, and they really are. All the songs everyone has named are included (in that sense) Still, although the old songs are old, I feel it is not like they are actually losing their color… [Cockroach] is really a song from so many years ago with that certain mood to it, yet it is still working hard for us. (laughs) Somehow, it is…like unnoticed it has installed itself permanently, and it is still growing with us, isn’t it?]
- With the new [rookie]-songs and the (older) [veteran]-songs, it is like weaving up to a good feeling. As you are still giving your best with the older songs, I think it is making the fans, which are with you for longer, very happy, too…The most memorable thing for those fans was probably the MC directed at them where you [could call each other idiots]. (laughs) I think it’s great that you actually use the word [idiot] to praise each other.
Ruki [(laughs) You think so?]
- Yes. (laughs) It’s also those words [The good things between us and you all is that we trust each other.] One could really feel the depth of the trusting relationship in that. It is a good situation.
Uruha [For me…it’s a strong feeling like friendship, somehow.]
- Like friends where is doesn’t matter what you say.
Reita [But sometimes I really think one should be a little bit more careful with what is said! (laughs)]
Aoi [Really so! After all we are still older than most and they should pay us a little respect as such!]
-(laughs) But actually, I think only like that, lives with that high a level of enthusiasm are actually possible. Only when people trust each other and are willing to bare themselves like that, there can be lives to the proverbial idiotic extent - in a good way of course.
Ruki [The response is, well…The things we do is what each of us is just doing at a certain momentum (laughs). However, honestly…there is this mood. We could actually put a much larger space between us. We could get a lot more into that [Band vs. Fan] thing, and if we got a little more of that distance, it might be a little more relaxed… But we came to live with this feeling as it is, from the very beginning, with the fans are still excited. Pretty sticky even. (laughs) It seems however, that this certain mood is actually a good thing; not to think about this kind of [distance].]
Aoi [Ruki-san is such a good person…when he talks about his thoughts like that during his MCs.]
Uruha [(laughs) He is talking for us, and if he didn’t bring across what we are thinking, we’d be in trouble.]
Aoi [Sometimes though, when it is something essential, he’s skipping between [us] and [me]…Then we feel like [But we think the same!]]
Ruki [(laughs) I’m sorry! I’m sorry about that… Well, it’s OK, though. I’m saying [us] in between, too. Also, when I’m writing [I], just read it as [Gaze] (laughs).]
- (laughs) So, that is a consensus between all the band members, certainly. With that, you have come to create this really hot and exciting tour of this time, and I would be grateful if you could sum it up once again.
Ruki [What I was thinking was… if it is only 20 live performances, this feeling of having done something great, has not yet kicked in. It seems we are still in the middle of it. Also there was this one live which had been put off due to myself…(on August 31st Ruki’s physical condition had been so bad, that the live at Fukuoka Sun Palace had to be postponed.)]
Uruha [In many ways, this tour really had something to it, it seems.]
Ruki [The peculiarity was extreme! We really just couldn’t keep hitting the lives like we usually did. That was something which I had said from before the tour already, though. We would changed many things, I said. Really those words weren’t a lie at all with this tour. To have a very heavy song as our first track in the arrangement was something within me, that I really couldn’t abandon. With [The Invisible Wall] I already had the feeling that it would be the first song (of a set). The first song really was supposed to be like a [BANG]. And because I was thinking that, I had really accomplished that with that song, I could do the live shows just like that.]
- Wasn’t it very positive that you actually took this new approach to this challenge? I mean, how things have been shown and how the margin turned out.
Ruki [I think there are pros and cons, though. I was wondering whether the mood wasn’t just only lukewarm, or was is all much heavier than I thought, was it not…the response of people had been very widespread during this tours, but that was what I had been worried about.]
Aoi [Well, still…I think you have only said that at the very beginning.]
Ruki [Probably. From that it had actually been too heavy just as always and so exhausting.]
Uruha [Yes. Really exhausting.]
Ruki [But I really, really like that about it. This was quite a nice sensation for me during this tour.]
Kai [In that sense, there is actually something this makes me think about…Eventually, in the end, it has become the live which make me realize all of this. I want to continue playing live and on the other hand, I have to play lives to continue…It is like the conversation we just had, the response to this is a very individual but playing live, we are a band. While going through a lot of trial and error phases we continue as we do, with good things, with new things and showing those…]
Reita [(Like during the Tonnoruzu-show, with the voice imitation of Mr. Ishibashi, he said: ) Shut up, IDIOT!(which has everyone burst into laughter)]
- That was way too sudden, I was surprised…Why did you do it right now?
Reita [Well…Somehow the atmosphere had gotten way too heavy, I thought. (laughs)]
Aoi [Anyway, it did not sound like that (show) at all!]
Reita [But I just felt like it……. (laughs)]
- (laughs) As the punishment for busting the atmosphere like that…Reita-kun has to sum it up nicely now. So please go ahead.
Ruki [Certainly! We cannot have this end with [Shut up, IDIOT!]]
Reita [No…(laughs) As we came along all these different places, the people who came to see us also increased, which we came to realize there. They are all like [friends]. to repeat Uruha-san’s words. From here on with the next lives we would like to continue to get along well with everyone, so we can create even better lives, I think…This year it has come a little bit more to the end, nonetheless, continuing from here, I thank you for the support!]
Zdroj:https://kiniro-ageha.livejournal.com/13835.html
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