Description:

2002 Live Concert

Track List:

1. Teki wa Dokoda
2. Kusou Kagaku Shonen
3. Ageha Chou
4. Music Hour
5. Report 21
6. n.t.
7. Heart
8. Aokage
9. Guitar Inst (didgedilli)
10. Last Of Hero
11. Saudade
12. Bitter Sweet
13. Shiawase ni Tsuite Honkidashite Kangaetemita
14. Mugen
15. Ookami
16. Jazz up
17. Bitter Sweet
18. Live on Live

 

Review:

The following review contains spoilers!

This could be counted as Porno Graffitti’s first ‘proper’ concert DVD.
It comes in a proper DVD case, has nice animated menus and more options.
The design of the case is cool and grungy and has lots of images of the band, there is a lyric booklet inside and the middle pages feature a the band in black and white photographs.
Also the run time has shot up to nearly 2 hours!

This concert is in a much bigger venue than Tour 08452, but it retains the insane energy of that concert. Akihito is still very bouncy and does lots of fun dancing, but unlike Tour 08452 this concert also has the balance of having slower songs and calmer moment.
All the band including the back up members get screen time in this concert, and Tama and Haruichi get a lot more screen time rather than the focus being on Akihito all the time.

There are many wonderful, exciting, energetic and beautiful performances on this DVD, I’ll let you experience them for yourselves, but there are a few that deserve special mention because they bring the concert up a level from just being a run-of-the-mill concert.

The first of these was Aokage, in this concert it’s arranged in an acoustic version, Haruichi plays some stunning acoustic guitar, Tama plays haunting trumpet and piano and finally crisp, clear violin from Naoto adds a stunning beauty to the performance.
The acoustic sound also allows Akihito’s voice to stand out, the performance is slow and peaceful, calming and beautiful, it’s a real gem of a performance, and the best performance on the DVD!

Also deserving special mention is the brilliant guitar instrumental (didgedilli), Haruichi fans will love this!
Haruichi gets lots of time to show off his superb guitar skills and the other band members get a little bit of the spotlight too.
It’s fun to see Haruichi getting the audience to cheer too!

Last of Hero is a pretty interesting performance, it opens dramatically with Akihito being carried on wearing a cape, on the shoulders of two beefy looking guys in wrestling masks!
There’s some most elegant and crazy dancing from Akihito, both Haruichi and Tama get a solo and then to top it all off they have a bit of a guitar face off which is fun, and it ends with a great drum solo too!

This DVD has 2 encores! The first is neat as they have the back up of a complete brass section which stays for all 3 songs of the encore.
The second encore they play Bitter Sweet… as you’d expect them too play in a concert with that in its title!

The end credits get a mention in this review because rather than the usual text on a black screen the credits run over snapshots of the band and other shots taken behind the scenes of the tour.
But it’s not over yet, after the credits there is a special bonus track with some great clips of behind the scenes throughout the tour. There’s lots of goofy, fun and cool moments here and it’s all set to a great song!

So overall, this is an extremely enjoyable concert, it still retains the high energy of their ealier DVD but also it has evolved to something more with the inclusion of a bigger variety of song, and special arrangements of those songs.

Reviewed by shiro

"BITTER SWEET MUSIC BIZ" LIVE IN BUDOKAN 2002 -2003/03/26