Nostalgia spins out of J-Pop concert

Featuring:

THE BEATMOTORS

     Masashi Akiba, vocals/guitar

     Tetsuro Kimura, guitar

     Johnny Yanagawa, bass

     Takahiro Shikano, dums

Joe Inoue

Diana Garnet

Surrounded by hundreds of giddy millennials inside Whitespace Manila, I asked myself a handful of times if I was lost or if I found myself in one of those baffling dreams. Alas, there was no denying that I signed up for Spinning Manila: J-Pop Live!, a concert featuring THE BEATMOTORS, Joe Inoue, and Diana Garnet. I believe that my anime/manga loving days have long since reached its peak around a decade ago but my support for the Japan Foundation, Manila urged me to relive my otaku days and let loose on a lazy Sunday for one night of J-Pop music.

Things quickly warmed up inside the cold, air conditioned interior of the venue when THE BEATMOTORS took to the stage. The infectious energy of vocalist/guitarist Masashi Akiba, guitarist Tetsuro Kimura, bassist Johnny Yanagawa, and drummer Takahiro Shikano, all donning identical Jollibee t-shirts, got the crowd going. I found it remarkable that despite the language barrier (none of the members could speak English) and the unfamiliar set list, the audience response was very enthusiastic. Towards the middle of their set, the band performed a cover of The Carpenters’ Top of the World, in an arrangement similar to that of Shonen Knife that was released a little over 20 years ago. I found it very amusing that there was a throwback from my time as a teenager at a concert that I initially thought I would not be able to connect to.

The next act, Joe Inoue, had no problem communicating at all since he was born and raised in America. Visiting the Philippines for the fifth time already, he was very comfortable with the crowd. I think he got too comfortable since he even went a bit naughty with some of his spiels which made the crowd go wild. Even his occasional sips of water drew cheers from the crowd which greatly amused Joe. Unlike the previous act, the audience sang along with him, especially during Closer, a track he recorded that was used as the opening song for the anime Naruto. His take on the popular Dragon Ball Z opening song Cha-La Head-Cha-La was a surprise for me and definitely took me back to the 90’s when the series was regularly shown in here.

I thought that the crowd would’ve been exhausted already (I was) after the energy draining performances of THE BEATMOTORS and Joe Inoue. But the last act, Diana Garnet, managed to get a second wind out of everyone. Sounding like a character straight out of an anime, she endeared herself to the crowd especially when she professed her love to mango juice. Wildly cheered was her performance of Spinning World, an ending theme for Naruto: Shippuden which made her the first female solo act to sing a theme song for an anime. She also evoked nostalgia when she sang A Cruel Angel's Thesis from Neon Genesis Evangelion along with her personal favorite, Yuzurenai Negai from Magic Knight Rayearth. Diana was joined by Jhona in a couple of duets and I think that the two were splendid, harmonizing really well in Secret Base from Anohana: The Flower We Saw That Day, a bittersweet anime series that brought me to tears a few years back.

What really caught my attention was when she sang in an operatic/classical style during the performance of Nankai! Mystery, the theme song from the anime of the same name that she has recorded. Later on, I was able to have a word with her at their holding area and found out that she did have a background with that type of singing. When I asked how she managed to shift from the anime type of singing to that of western classical, she responded that it takes a lot of practice.

I really thought that I would be unable to connect to the artists, the crowd, and the songs at Spinning World: J-Pop Live! but the sprinkling of nostalgia through the anime songs from the decades past, made me look back with fondness the series that I’ve loved. I may not be crazy about the current popular anime/manga right now like One-Punch Man, Attack on Titan, Fairy Tail, etc., but the concert made me want to unearth and revisit Akira, Grave of the Fireflies, Slam Dunk, Great Teacher Onizuka, Beck and Nodame Cantabile, to name a few.

What astonished me with this event was having two Americans, Joe and Diana, who’d gone to Japan to establish a career in the world of J-Pop, now performing outside Japan as J-Pop artists. Just like what Diana’s song title says, it’s truly a Spinning J-Pop World out there.