Wow guys...Anime Expo this year was great. If you haven't talked to me about it you should. XD I'm gonna try and do this in order...but first I wan to explain what S.K.I.N. is:
The band, S.K.I.N., consists of 5 members: Gackt from Malice Mizer, Yoshiki from X Japan, Sugizo from Luna Sea, Miyavi from Due la quartz, and Ju-ken from Gackt's band. United, they want to make a new revolution in music. With Gackt on vocals, Yoshiki on drums, Sugizo and Miyavi on electric guitar, and Ju-ken as bassist, they can change the outlook on foreign music...
Okey dokey, despite geting only 6 hour sleep over a period of 2 days because of stress and excitement, I still managed to get up at 3:30 a.m. on June 29 to get ready for the expo. This was the day that I would see Gackt, my favorite japanese singer, LIVE. Gackt, Yoshiki, Sugizo, Miyavi, and surprisingly Ju-ken are in a newly formed band called S.K.I.N., and were having their debut at Anime Expo 2007 this year. I'm really excited because I have been a hard fan of Gackt for about 4 years now, and it has been a huge dream of mine to finally see him live one day. XD It almost makes me cry just tryping this because this was one of the greatest days of my entire life...
I get picked up by my friend Josh and we're on our way there. We made it to AX after about an hour and a half on the road. We get in the line, which was pretty long, and we're waiting for it to move cause they SHOULD HAVE opened up the ticket booth thingy at 8. So, we're waiting there, and I'm looking around for hot/awesome-looking cosplayers cause I wanted to take pictures. We see a lot of Naruto characters, some Kingdom Hearts, and a few Fullmetal Alchemist. But...I'm looking around, and I see this amazing, sexy, super hot Kakashi Sensei just come walking near the line. I'm like OMG OMG OMG Josh friggin' look at the Kakashi Sensei!!!! I'm like hitting him on the arm and telling him to look and he said the guy looked really awesome. All I'm doing is standing there and almost drooling cause he was so sexy and Kakashi Sensei is my favorite character in Naruto. He even had the Romance Novel and everything!!!! XDXD Josh noticed that I was staring at him so friggin much he was telling me to ask to take a picture with him and all I could do was stand there and marvel at his greatness...*shiver* man he was hot...Anyways, I did see a really awesome Dark Sora from Kingdom Hearts 2 and I couldn't even take a picture of that cause I was too lost in the greatness of the cosplaying...>.< (Ok, just to let you guys know, out of this whole experience, I was not able to take even ONE picture...not even ONE, cause I was just too stunned in this whole thing...) The time we had to wait in line was unbelievable, due to the lack of preparation of Anime Expo.
I'm gonna skip right to the concert part, cause nothing TOO exciting happened. I had bough a premier ticket online assuring me that I would be close enough to the stage to actually enjoy myself in a 6,000 seated arena. I'm in there and I'm 22 rows back. That wasn't too bad, I knew at least I would be able to see their faces clearly, and they had HUGE screens set up cause of all the cameras. I was happy just to be inside cause I had been wearing boots to the Expo and my feet were KILLING me. I had some really nice people around me and we had talked about Gackt and all the people in the band. One thing we were talking about is when Yoshiki plays piano, cause he's so beautiful when he plays it. Then we were talking about when Gackt plays piano, and how aweosme he is at it. Then we were making jokes about "What if they do a duet together!?" I had a lot of fun talking to those people. Everything was starting to heat up cause people wanted it to get started. We had been waiting outside for an extra two and a half hours cause of AX, and people were starting to get tired of waiting.
When their opening video FINALLY came on, people were screaming and yelling and jumping up and down. I was sreaming as well of course. After that, there was a sheet that fell down off of the stage and then: there they were. I almost started crying becuase I couldn't believe that Gackt was right here, in front of my eyes, about to sing songs with his beautiful and sexy voice. Of course I was excited about the other band members as well, cause Yoshiki, Sugizo, and friggin Miyavi were there!! So I was screaming for them as well. But OMG when everyone was screaming for a little bit, Gackt puts the mic up to his lips and yells, "WHAT'S UP!?!?!" And everybody was screaming their heads off. I never though I would ever witness Gackt speaking in english live. It was so amazing, I was jumping up and down and screaming his name and holding back the tears of the moment. Then he says, "Are you ready to ROCK!?!?" And there was more sceaming. Then they start the first song.
Wow, the screens and the background and the music were awesome! XD This is when I also niticed that Ju-ken was on the stage with them, playing the bass. I know about him cause he was in Gackt's band when he wasn't in Malice Mizer. Ju-ken was amazing. XD Man, it was so wonderful watching some of the most famous japanese musicians playing all together on one stage. During the song Gackt was yelling, "SHOUT! SHOUT! SHOUT! SHOUT!" and then we woul repeat it. After the first song they did kind of a slow one, and Gackt was saying some stuff in english before he started singing. I couldn't hear too much cause of how loud everyone was, but I did pick out, "You know...being in love...is sometimes a hard thing..." And everyone was screaming. OMG I was still amazed that I was hearing Gackt speak in english!!! The backgounds were going and I was enjoying the song and trying to scream and yell for Gackt and Sugizo. The song was so beautiful and just hearing Gackt sing made me want to cry.
After that, then they kinda went even more slow...BAM! We see Yoshiki on piano and everyone started sceaming and yelling. Yoshiki even waved at us cause we were all excited. I felt the tears start coming into my eyes and then BAM again a spotlight comes on and then we see Gackt on another piano across the stage. The tears just started flowing. I couldn't hold them back anymore. Gackt was playing the piano. I was crying so hard that I could barely stand up and watch. It was so unexpected but a thought went through my mind that Sugizo was gonna play his violin next and then BAM there was Sugizo with his violin. That made me cry even more and I was leaning on the chair in front of me and just trying to keep my hand up in the air. When I finally get the nerve to look up again BAM there's Miyavi playing the Shamisen (a geisha instrument). And I'm like OMG I can't believe that this is happening. The huge screen splits up and you can see all 4 musicians playing this beautiful song and I'm crying my eyes out cause this is all so amazing and unexpected. After a little while of the song Yoshiki gets so into it that he starts to just bang the piano without even really playing it right. I was still crying and all that cause it was just so much...I was so happy that I could experience this...
Well, after that, it started to get all happy again, lol. Gackt started to introduce all of the band members one by one. Starting with Miyavi. He said, "This man, is like a brother to me." And everyone was screaming. Miyavi walks over to Gackt and they're next to each other. Then Gackt says, "What's his name!? You know it!!" And everyone was screaming Miyavi and all that stuff. Miyavi was doing his own guitar solo and it sounded so friggin great! XD After he was almost done he just started slapping it and jumping around and it was so awesome! He's the only one who can slap a guitar and make it sound so friggin good!! XDXD
Then he went to introduce Ju-ken. He said, "Many of you might know this man. He used to play in my band...it's...JU-KEN!!" More screaming and OMG Ju-ken just pulled out an AWESOME bass solo. Holy crap I was amazed cause I didn't know he could play THAT well. Jeez!!! After Ju-ken's bass solo Gackt said, "You want MORE??" And everyone was screaming. Then Gackt would say, "MIYAVI!!!........JU-KEN!!!" Then Miyavi and Ju-ken would switch off playing their instrument and playing really awesome stuff.
After all that, Gackt started to walk over toward Sugizo and what made me laugh and smile so much is what Gackt said, "2 years ago, I HATED this man...but now, he's my Best Friend." He also put his arm around Sugizo and everyone was screaming. Then he said, "It's SUGIZO!!!" Oh man, Sugizo was so amazing as usual when he did his. OMG He's so friggin HOT when he plays his guitar and thats why I like him cause he also likes to put his soul into his playing. Man it was so mezmerizing. XDXDXD I was raising my arms up and doing the little sign that Sugizo does with his fingers to show some love. ^^
Oooooo...Yoshiki...XD. Gackt comes over and he's like, "Many of you should know him...from being in a certain band..." Then everyone was screaming and screaming. You can see Yoshiki smile from behind those friggin drums XD "He's from X Japan....YOSHIKI!!!!!" Oh man and then Yoshiki did his thing on those drums...It was so great. AFter he ws done Gackt was like, "You want MORE!?" More screaming. The Yoshiki did ANOTHER solo. Even more awesome. Gackt says again, "You want MORE!?!?" Screams, ANOTHER drum solo from Yoshiki! XDXD Man, that was so cool. I was so happy to see Yoshiki play those drums!
Then...last but not least... there was Gackt. He walked up to the front and said, "Now...there's one more...WHAT'S MY NAME!?!?" And I screamed GACKUTO!!! along with many other people in the arena. He asked us the same thing abut 5 more times and then most of it was just screaming after that. Then they started the last song and everyone was jumping up and down and I couldn't even feel my feet anymore. I had so much fun being there. It was so amazing. While Gackt was singing he would swing his hips side to side and then I even saw him start to friggin lift up his shirt and that made me flip out!! XDXDXD For the chorus of the song Gackt would say, "Get Back!" and then we would repeat it. I think we did that about 20 times, lol. But it was so fun! XD Then soon after that Gack ended up chanting, "We Are-" and then we say S.K.I.N!!!! We said that a lot too. Gackt also said, "This is the last song...but it's not Goodbye...We'll be back!!" and everyone would scream.
Then things started to get wild. Gackt was throwing and spitting out water and water bottles. Miyavi was hangin off of something and making faces at us and doin all this crazy stuff. Ju-ken was spinning in stage. Sugizo was rockin out. Yoshiki was doin his thing. After whole bunch of crazy stuff then Yoshiki started to just crash his drum set and smash it up. Sugizo even took his exspensive guitar and smashed it on the friggin ground about 3 times. Gackt was still spitting water on people. Miyavi and Ju-ken were being idiots, but in a good and cute way or course ;). Gackt was saying goodbye to everyone and thanks for having them and all that good stuff. Yoshiki, like, came out from the drums and threw out a whole bunch of drumsticks into the crowd and I was like OMG I want one so bad!! He threw another one by itself and it landed 2 rows in front of me and I was like holy crap I wish I was just 2 rows closer XD. Gackt threw a water bottle a little off to the side from me and I saw a mound of people fighting to go get it. That kinda scared me, lol. But the thing is, if I was that close I would do the same friggin thing to get Gackt's water bottle. HA.
Then they started to leave the stage and I was screaming and almost crying again cause I didn't want it to stop...After they were gone I didn't want to leave, I was just looking at the stage hoping they would come back on. I heard my friend calling me and I turned around. We met up and we were about to walk to the bathroom when I hear Raki-chan call me with a huge smile on her face and then she comes running towards me. Right when we hugged I burst out into tears again and I'm sobbng and saying "OMG I saw Gackt Raki-chan...I friggin saw GACKT..." I actually almost fell to the ground from crying and some people were passing by and saying "Don't worry, we cried too! You're not the only one!" I smiled and waved at them. It was so awesome...I envied Raki-chan cause she was on the second row, really close to him. I was happy for her as well. We all had fun. This was a great day.
We get outside and of course we're all talking about how great they were and all that. I still can't believe that I got to see him live. I'm never gonna forget this day.
Well, that's pretty much it. Thanks for taking the time to read this. I had so much fun. Ask me about it in person and I would be happy to tell you about it. Thanks ^^