FOLLOW ME UP LIVE TOUR 2015 - 2016

Latest news, upcoming events, general Maaya talk.
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Yyrkoon70
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Re: FOLLOW ME UP LIVE TOUR 2015 - 2016

Post by Yyrkoon70 »

Very fun!

As usual, she destroyed a few songs, this time it was Arco (off pitch during the whole song T_T), Waiting for the Rain and Life is Good. Overall the backing vocalists were also off pitch from time to time, that's so unprofessional but this is common in Japan. Finally the mixing was not great: Maaya's voice was too strong, and the master level was also too high. Also, for me, they used too much pre-recorded music parts (strings and effects mainly) where I think they should come up with some more acoustic or pseudo-acoustic arrangements.

But there were a lot of very good moments and the lightning/visual effects were absolutely great.

I will describe every song performance:
The special intro for Follow Me was very good, but when she appeared wearing this ugly black red check two pieces, I was a little bit less excited since I also don't like the song.
Then she sang Gift, it was great!
I'm not a big fan of Be Mine but her live performance are great, it was quite fun to watch!
Then, like all the high tempo songs this night, she nailed Sanagi and it's actually a very good song when performed live.
Then came the horrible performances of Arco (exact same arrangement as the album version by the way, with almost everything pre-recorded -_-') and less horrible but still not so good performance of Waiting for the Rain (same kind of live arrangement, characterized by the actual absence of an live arrangement)...
But the following songs were great. First Chibikko Folk was awesome, it was an acoustic arrangement with 2 guitars and the backing vocalists.
Then she did Kimi ga Suina Hito, in a piano-vocals version. Nice but I think the song is dull so let's move to what's next.
She did That is to Say, in a nice jazzy performance with the bassist playing a double bass.
Then, the beautiful DIVE was nailed vocally, but the arrangement was the same as the original song, and I preferred the acoustic arrangement from the IDS live she did this year in Itsukushima Shrine. But that was still awesome.
After an instrumental part of Secrear she came back with a beautiful black dress and kept it until the Encore and performed T-Shirt, her performance was great!
Then was performed Mada Ugoku, great performance for a boring song ;)
After great performances of Replica and Shikisai similar in every way to those from Super Arena, she performed Shiawase in a version a little bit more acoustic than the one from Super Arena. This song turns out to be great live, and this time she was less nervous than when she opened Super Arena with it.
Then she did a very good Platinum (seems she can really sing it well now :P).
The countdown was disappointing because it was exactly the same song as 3 years ago: Magic Number. She was more yelling the song than singing it, but it was fun. She ran to both ends of the stage with her dress which wasn't clearly design to run but she was so fun. I really would have preferred another high tempo song instead...
Just after that, she was of course exhausted from all the running, and because of that she couldn't sing Life is Good properly and even just yelled some of the lyrics without singing them, but it was the excitation of the new year thing so I don't mind actually, I had fun. I think we can say that was a fun song destruction! ^^
Then came the most boring ending setlist that can (hopefully) ever be: Happy New Year (like in 2012), nice song but since it's a cover, I don't think it's related to Maaya and it's so slow and boring, and then a few forgettable songs from Follow Me Up (Kazukana Melody and Iris, the failed attempt to write some musical song), and the usual SSW.
She then came back with a beautiful white dress and performed Korekara and Pocket.
Performing those final songs was even more boring cause it was 1am and everyone was tired among the spectators, some up-beat song would have been great.

This was the 3rd major live event she did this year. In my personal ranking I would put Follow Me first cause of the big thing, a lot of great oldies and Yoko Kanno of course, then the Itsukushima Shrine live since it was 100% acoustic with mainly old minor songs, and then this one.

Oh and one last thing: here's my bootleg!
https://mega.nz/#!odJRGKpK!wDtHwRIgdsVo ... 5O0kzjdtSs (won't stay there for long)
Scoop
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Re: FOLLOW ME UP LIVE TOUR 2015 - 2016

Post by Scoop »

Kimi no suki na hito was my favorite song in the concert. Really can't say much else because the volume was way too loud to the point the sound was cracking as if the speakers couldn't handle it anymore. I don't really understand how no one else seemed to notice it. I hoped they'd fix it mid live but nothing was done. Nevertheless I enjoyed every bit of it. Now I'll just wait for the release in some form of this tour to actually listen to the songs :P Just like Saitama, the live experience was pretty bad but the bluray is amazing, her best concert to date. This was actually worse than Saitama, I didn't think it would be possible :D

Yyrkoon70 didn't like Maaya's first outfit but I thought she looked good in it :) But the black dress we agreed on, she looked great being a bit flirty with her leg :P It was also a dress she only wore for the countdown live! The white dress was ok.

Nice to know JM that you enjoyed some songs you didn't like before :)

Despite my apparently personal issues with the audio I enjoyed it to the fullest smiling throughout when not swallowing my tears during kimi no suki na hito. For some reason that song hit me hard even though I don't like the studio version that much. She sang it beautifully.

I'll continue to attend her concerts whenever possible obviously! :D
naddie
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Re: FOLLOW ME UP LIVE TOUR 2015 - 2016

Post by naddie »

I really enjoyed the live :D It was my first time attending a countdown so it was something different.

I was looking forward to listening to Sanagi, Waiting for the rain, and Arco from her recent album. From the 3 songs Sanagi was my favourite performance of hers.

My favourite part was getting to listen to Chibikko Folk live <3 It's one of my favs from Shounen Alice (along with Yoru).

My next favourite part was the countdown lol. It was fun with everyone counting down together and I felt like the previous hours passed by quite fast.

But yeah the songs after the countdown were a bit slow for my taste. (Pretty sure JM went into a coma after Mada Ugoku but he won't admit to it.) Perhaps she was tired after all the running around so it's understandable. To be fair though I quite liked listening to the slower songs live compared to the studio version where I would usually just skip them (I really liked Kasukana Melody live). And I really liked Mada Ugoku :D The live sounded great.

Overall was very happy that I went to the countdown, and I'm looking forward to her next big live!
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Conrado
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Re: FOLLOW ME UP LIVE TOUR 2015 - 2016

Post by Conrado »

Thanks everyone for the impressions! Sounds like it was fun :)

Thanks Yyrkoon for the bootleg. Chibbikko Folk was indeed awesome!

I also recorded a bootleg from Nov 21. The quality isn't great though.
https://mega.nz/#!RxpDBaZR!QWvzAsRDoVzI ... 7D6Mlsuju8
Popcorn
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Re: FOLLOW ME UP LIVE TOUR 2015 - 2016

Post by Popcorn »

I went to the concert on the 30th, misread the ticket, and arrived 40 minutes late. Aughhh.

I only know Maaya's old stuff with Yoko Kanno, so it looks like the only thing from that era I missed is Gift, right?

By the way, has Maaya ever performed Active Heart live, other than as part of that piano medley with Yoko? It was always my favourite.
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Jérôme.
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Re: FOLLOW ME UP LIVE TOUR 2015 - 2016

Post by Jérôme. »

Here you can find all songs and their live performance:
http://100331.blog31.fc2.com/

Active Heart were played only 4 times since 2001...
Scoop
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Re: FOLLOW ME UP LIVE TOUR 2015 - 2016

Post by Scoop »

Too bad they didn't play Road Movie, an acoustic version of it would've been nice. It was the only new song that wasn't played.
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Yyrkoon70
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Re: FOLLOW ME UP LIVE TOUR 2015 - 2016

Post by Yyrkoon70 »

Scoop wrote:Too bad they didn't play Road Movie, an acoustic version of it would've been nice. It was the only new song that wasn't played.
Agreed!
maayalove66
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Re: FOLLOW ME UP LIVE TOUR 2015 - 2016

Post by maayalove66 »

I was at both the 30 and 31 concerts. Setlists were mostly identical and were pretty boring.
I was seated almost all the way back on the balcony and I thought the sound was pretty damn good for a arena type venue.
Not sure what you mean Yyrkoon70 with off pitch for Arco, did you listen to it again? Sounds pretty on pitch to me. I have experienced similar stuff before though where you think it sounds totally off during the show, but if you listen to it afterwards it actually never was. Thank you for uploading btw.

Thing that bothered me on the 31st show were the stupid morons (basically whole audience)who decided to stand the whole concert even though it was a seated venue. I had a bad back so I was forced to watch Maaya with binoculars through someones armpit the whole show. I also saw some elders in the audience who I can't possibly imagine could stand for 3 hours. This is just plain disrespectful to me. If you are gonna stand please stand between songs FFS.
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Jérôme.
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Re: FOLLOW ME UP LIVE TOUR 2015 - 2016

Post by Jérôme. »

I've listened to your recording of Life is Good, it doesn't feel that bad, even if she shouts some times... The other live version I have listened is from the MIT live back in 2001, and yours feels better, she has improve her (live) singing skills a lot since then :)
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Yyrkoon70
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Re: FOLLOW ME UP LIVE TOUR 2015 - 2016

Post by Yyrkoon70 »

Jérôme. wrote:I've listened to your recording of Life is Good, it doesn't feel that bad, even if she shouts some times... The other live version I have listened is from the MIT live back in 2001, and yours feels better, she has improve her (live) singing skills a lot since then :)
Yeah it's still okay, especially considering she just yelled a lot on the previous song for the countdown. This is still nothing compared to the Arco disaster (which my damned recorder fixes a little bit ^^)
Scoop
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Re: FOLLOW ME UP LIVE TOUR 2015 - 2016

Post by Scoop »

JM do you remember what Maaya said at the concert about the fortune cookies? Did she just thank the people who bought them or was there something else?
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Yyrkoon70
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Re: FOLLOW ME UP LIVE TOUR 2015 - 2016

Post by Yyrkoon70 »

Scoop wrote:JM do you remember what Maaya said at the concert about the fortune cookies? Did she just thank the people who bought them or was there something else?
I don't remember but if you can tell me after which song she spoke about it I will tell you!
Scoop
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Re: FOLLOW ME UP LIVE TOUR 2015 - 2016

Post by Scoop »

Yyrkoon70 wrote:
Scoop wrote:JM do you remember what Maaya said at the concert about the fortune cookies? Did she just thank the people who bought them or was there something else?
I don't remember but if you can tell me after which song she spoke about it I will tell you!
Then we should forget about it :D
zakito
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Re: FOLLOW ME UP LIVE TOUR 2015 - 2016

Post by zakito »

Hi everyone! ! Im from Chile -Southamerica, Ive been fan of Maaya since highschool, and now I have a trip to Japan and I was looking for chance to going Maayas concert in Nakano Sun Plaza, Tokyo.

I asked some people in Japan and they told me that tickets are sold out. Tickets were released for sale on january 23th, but I searched on webpages that official LINE account posted, but I couldnt understand how to buy or pre order.

I would really appreciate your help to explain me how to buy or if is that true that tickets are already sold out.

Thank you very much in advance.
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