Fujirock!!!

[phaseblue]

I`m off to Fujirock tomorrow with the Japanese dirts! We rented a van and are driving up early. We`re taking video as well as recording audio.

Since this show will not be recorded/broadcast (at least to my knowledge) I am kicking myself for not buying a higher quality video camera! I have a consumer Sony DV camera and it does a decent job anyway. Also, I won`t have my photographer friend Scout with me this time - he`s the one who took the high quality pics in my Oblivion Ball gallery on darktrain.jp - but I still have a pro-sumer Nikkon camera that should work fine enough...I hope! As the Japanese say "shoganai"!

Anyone else going?

I`ll fill you in on all the details when I return!

Matt

[potatobroth]

enjoy the show, Phase! I'm quite jealous of you! :P

[phaseblue]

Thanks potatobroth! It`s a bit of a drive up there, but it should be amazing! I just hope that it doesn`t rain, like it does almost every other year!!!

[jose m]

watch out for the monkeys on the road !

[phaseblue]

Well, I`m back from Fuji and I must say it was really amazing. There were 9 stages/tents, the main ones being the Green (main) stage, the White stage, and The Red Marquee Stage. There were also several art installations, and tons of food and drink stalls; all of this nestled within the beautiful ski resort valley that is Naeba! They even had one of the ski lifts (Dragondola) operating so you could go up to the top of the ski slope. I was quite impressed with the facilities too - lot`s of toilets, open spaces (although it was crowded as hell), and even chairs in the main food court.

We spent the day walking around looking at the different sights and sounds. Many of the paths at the venue wind through cedar forests, which made for a very relaxing atmosphere. There is even a river that runs from one side of the place to the other and people were free to play in it!

The show itself was amazing! It was a bit short at an hour and a half, but I`m sure this had to do with the venue scheduling than anything else.

The setlist was roughly as follows:
Crocodile
Improv 1
Parc
Pearls Girl - beginning (no lyrics)
King of Snake
Moaner
Two Months Off
Synth Improve
You Do Scribble
Rez/Cowgirl
Improv 2
Born Slippy Nuxx
Jumbo

The show included a good mix of old and new favorites, as well as a few nice improves! Karl was quite energetic tonight too. Even Rick lip synced a few parts and jumped around a bit. The highlight of the show however, and quite a surprise, was during the end of Born Slippy, when about 40 to 50 1.5 meter diameter beach balls were released out into the audience. It was great fun! People were bouncing them everywhere, including back onto the stage, and Karl and Darren kept kicking them back out into the crowd!

I took just over an hour of video - good in many parts, a bit shaky in others. I also took lots of photos of the Fujirock grounds during the day, however, most of my shots of Underworld turned out blurry because of the low light / slow shutter speed. I will post these as soon as I can go through them a pick out some decent ones. As for the video, I would rather share this sooner than later! I just got home, but I will get it up so that people can download it, and perhaps someone else can compress it and re-upload it(not my specialty).

I didn`t see any monkeys on the road, but I`m sure they were there, watching us all from their concealed hideaways ;) They can be quite nasty and agqressive little creatures actually!

All in all, a fun day and a very nice show!!!

[Dirty0900]

Well, I`m back from Fuji and I must say it was really amazing. There were 9 stages/tents, the main ones being the Green (main) stage, the White stage, and The Red Marquee Stage. There were also several art installations, and tons of food and drink stalls; all of this nestled within the beautiful ski resort valley that is Naeba! They even had one of the ski lifts (Dragondola) operating so you could go up to the top of the ski slope. I was quite impressed with the facilities too - lot`s of toilets, open spaces (although it was crowded as hell), and even chairs in the main food court.

We spent the day walking around looking at the different sights and sounds. Many of the paths at the venue wind through cedar forests, which made for a very relaxing atmosphere. There is even a river that runs from one side of the place to the other and people were free to play in it!

The show itself was amazing! It was a bit short at an hour and a half, but I`m sure this had to do with the venue scheduling than anything else.

The setlist was roughly as follows:
Crocodile
Improv 1
Parc
Pearls Girl - beginning (no lyrics)
King of Snake
Moaner
Two Months Off
Synth Improve
You Do Scribble
Rez/Cowgirl
Improv 2
Born Slippy Nuxx
Jumbo

The show included a good mix of old and new favorites, as well as a few nice improves! Karl was quite energetic tonight too. Even Rick lip synced a few parts and jumped around a bit. The highlight of the show however, and quite a surprise, was during the end of Born Slippy, when about 40 to 50 1.5 meter diameter beach balls were released out into the audience. It was great fun! People were bouncing them everywhere, including back onto the stage, and Karl and Darren kept kicking them back out into the crowd!

I took just over an hour of video - good in many parts, a bit shaky in others. I also took lots of photos of the Fujirock grounds during the day, however, most of my shots of Underworld turned out blurry because of the low light / slow shutter speed. I will post these as soon as I can go through them a pick out some decent ones. As for the video, I would rather share this sooner than later! I just got home, but I will get it up so that people can download it, and perhaps someone else can compress it and re-upload it(not my specialty).

I didn`t see any monkeys on the road, but I`m sure they were there, watching us all from their concealed hideaways ;) They can be quite nasty and agqressive little creatures actually!

All in all, a fun day and a very nice show!!!

Glad you enjoyed it, sounds like it was an ace gig. Im more interested to see the new beachballs that have been doing the rounds recently! Any pictures would be ace when you can ge them up!

[phaseblue]

Im more interested to see the new beachballs that have been doing the rounds recently! Any pictures would be ace when you can ge them up!

I unfortunately didn`t get any pics of the balls, but I did manage to video most of the affair. I was changing tapes right when the balls were released and I raced like hell to get it done so I could capture as much as possible. Luckly, the whole thing transpired over a few minutes and I got plenty of video of it.

[lloyd]

thanks for the report
sounds like you had a great time :)

[Buji]

Bit of video of the Beach Balls at Fuji 08!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=is4Ns0cp8kQ

Nice bit of guitar over Jumbo too!

[DaddyAdv]

...

Parc


Thank god, it's no a one-time-only song !:o
Was it the same as the Amsterdam/BellsBells Version ?

[TheBang]

Thank god, it's no a one-time-only song !:o

They've also played it, at a minimum, at Atlanta and Mexico City this year.

[gillenium]

I'd be interested in knowing if they devolved Parc. The Atlanta version had different lyrics and (of course) different improv in the middle, plus a better vocoder solo from Rick.

[phaseblue]

I just put a video of the balls up in the news section of darktrain.jp. I know it's a little unstable at times, but with all the excitement - and trying to dodge huge balls at the same time - it was the best I could do!!!:o

[TheBang]

From the the pics on uwlive today, it looks like the light wheel from The Oblivion Ball last year made a return. I guess it lives in Japan?

[phaseblue]

it looks like the light wheel from The Oblivion Ball last year made a return. I guess it lives in Japan?

That is true! They used it during Moaner. I was surprised to see it again too...but I love it!:D

[crazysugarboy]

From the the pics on uwlive today, it looks like the light wheel from The Oblivion Ball last year made a return. I guess it lives in Japan?

It would be really cool if they could ship the light wheel over to Brixton in November;) Love it!:)