WE ARE X

[rose_of_pain]

Let me start this report by saying I found it pretty special that our concert was the last in the tour and that the date fell on 10/10/10 'cause after all X is also the roman numeral for 10. XD;

Started the epic journey by getting up pretty early in order to get to Courtney's where we then waited for her friend Francisco, aka our driver, to arrive. Also made the realization that I had sorta met him before at AnimeUSA last year. He was the L cosplayer Corey (as Break) fought over sugar with. lol He was running a bit late so didn't show up til around 8:30 and then we immediately headed out. Somehow we missed our first exit though and ended up back in Virginia. Pfft. So that delayed us a little right off.

And for some odd reason we were all...downright starving pretty early. Which is weeeeeeird for me as I can like never eat before noon but I was really hungry so we stopped at one of the Maryland houses past Baltimore and had Roy Rogers. Which probably wasn't the best idea to eat greasy chicken that early for my poor stomach but I didn't really see anything light and cheap at the other places. Continued on, making the occasional stops for gas and whatnot. Heard a lot of Gaga during our radio surfing and even got rick rolled at one point. XD; Listened to Fran's Distant Worlds CD which was pretty damn cool. Though I'm ashamed to admit that I hadn't listened to any from those concerts before then. Really want to go next year if they do it again and don't do it during Otakon. >>;

Lots of traffic going into the Lincoln Tunnel but that was to be expected really. Got into the city I think around 2:30pm ish or so? As we were going in, Courtney got a text from one of her friends that was already there saying that the line was really long already so we pondered about skipping out on the idea of shopping around like we originally planned and instead going straight there. On the way there we went by a NYPD station and after seeing a gazillion cop cars all over parked, Fran started blasting One Winged Angel as he felt it appropriate. XD Found actually a pretty close parking garage that wasn't full (though it was pricey but that's NYC for you) though it was valet so there went our plan of possibly going back to the car later though I think we had all decided to just go straight to the concert hall so I guess it didn't matter anymore at that point. Headed over and immediately got into line. Didn't even get to see the front of the concert hall as we came in from the other side. lol There was some street festival going on the street behind the place too which was amusing. Went through it to get to a bagel place that had a bathroom. XD; We bought water bottles so we would count as customers first. And well I really wanted a water bottle anyways so it all worked out. Our spot was right in front of the back door of a theater that was near the concert hall and suddenly realized that I was...lulz...on Broadway so that I was actually right up against a Broadway theater where actors kept coming out to have their smoke breaks. XD The theater geek in me found that pretty cool.


There were quite a number of really good Japanese X cosplayers in line. They all rather impressed me. Though I totally forgot to get a photo of the really good Celebration Cinderella Yoshiki.

One of the groups of cosplayers was handing out print outs of a drawing they did with "Happy Birthday Toshi!" written on it and pffft we all totally didn't realize it was Toshi's birthday as well! So that was a pretty exciting revelation (lol I only ever remember Yoshiki's and hide's birthdays).


Some guy had made a b-day cake for Toshi and he kept wandering around to show it off to everyone and to try to see if he could find a way to get it to the band. He must have eventually because we saw a concert staff girl with it later on along with the roses one of the cosplayers had brought for them. I was glad they were able to get the stuff to them. ^^

Marissa met up with us in line and joined our little line party. The Japanese couple in front of us had brought newspaper to use to sit on so they wouldn't have to sit on the ground and passed it on to all of us. lol So we sat down on our "chairs". XD; The street was very cold but it was better than standing the whole time. We were there for a while when suddenly one of the theater dudes comes out and tells us we can't be there and we're like "...uh...what?" and he brought out barricades to put on either side of the back door and broke up the line on either side of them, right where we were so we ended up right behind the 2nd barrier and that made us a little nervous, wondering if we were going to get cut off from the rest of the line and we couldn't really move elsewhere because at this point we had hundreds of people behind us. He was telling us that in an hour there would be about a "thousand" people coming to this street in order to greet the actors after the show let out and that they normally stand behind the barriers he had put out and that we thus couldn't be there. Which was like...um...we're not moving. So they were all freaking out and we're freaking out trying to figure out what's going to happen. Though in the end I guess they realized there really was no way to move us after they went around and saw how long the line had gotten. lol After we calmed down a little over that, we sent Courtney and Marissa out to the McDonald's to get food. I hate McDonald's but it really was the only place close enough to get quick food for us all. So had chicken nuggets though I only managed to eat 2. Let Courtney and Fran have the other 2. While we were eating, some of the staffers came over with their camera, taking photos of parts of the line and since lol we were right behind the barricade, guess they decided we were a good group to take a photo of and so we're like "oh shit hide the food! ...and X~" lol

Then the chaos happened...lol 'Cause the theater security came out and pushed both sides of the line out of the barrier sections so that the fans could go in there and pffft that so wasn't a "thousand" people. More like 50 or so. It was insane though because they had those people there and then there were people in the street and the cars for the actors so regular cars couldn't really get through and we're all squashed because we couldn't get the line to back up that far because as we said A LOT of people behind us. And then the actors come out and people were taking photos and getting autographs and spazzing and we're just like "...lulz". And of course at this time was when Tina shows up though she managed to get to us right before they stopped letting people go through and such. But then Magenta tried to get to us just to hang out a little before the concert (she wasn't going but wanted to meet up with me before plans changed and I was unable to go anywhere else but the concert) and she got mixed up in the confusion though we did manage to find her and pull her around the fans when there was a break between actors. lol

During all of this, we look behind us to see a bunch of fans being given a box of pizza and we're like "...lol Did they order pizza while in line and had it delivered here?" but then we see the staff girls are carrying them around and one comes over to us and hands us a box. "This pizza is from Yoshiki. ^.^" and we're all "...are you fucking kidding us?! OMG!" So yeah. Yoshiki bought the ENTIRE LINE pizza! And it was good NYC pizza too.


Yoshiki pizza~! XD;

Soon after that the whole actor thing finished up and lol the guy from Will and Grace was there and everyone was like "holy crap its him!" though I've never watched the show so I didn't know who he was. ^^;; And obviously some of the other actors were pretty big since their fans did seem pretty excited and the one actress had like a handler for her purse dog and her driver drove up to take her out. I don't know but that really amused me for some reason. But after that finished up, they removed the barriers and we were like "we can finally join the rest of the line! yay~" though -_- the people now in front of us were NOT the people in front of us before so obviously some people were able to get in the gap that had formed and butt in line. Some people butted in behind us too. >>; Pffft.

After that it wasn't too long before the line started actually moving and we gradually worked our way around the corner to the actual concert hall. On the way passed the end of the line which was like "OMG it really wrapped all the way past the front all over again?!" Pretty crazy man. I didn't think there would be enough space for all these people in this place. And as we're passing the ends of the line, I spot my friend Alex from college and we had a moment of "O_O What are you doing here?!" lol hugged and then I had to go 'cause the line was moving again. XD; But then we got to the front and were actually going in! Yay~ Went through security check who lol I noticed seemed to really only search the guys and not so much the girls. Just looked at the girls' purses but otherwise let us go even if we were wearing hoodies while they would check the guys pockets and stuff. Had to throw our water bottles out which kinda sucked 'cause they obviously wanted us to only buy ones from the bar and stuff. Went over to the merch booth but it was taking waaaaaay too long to get the people's attention to get my shirt even when I was like waving my money in the air while other people were taking too long to get theirs out. I was a little annoyed they kept taking other people instead of me who had been there for a bit. So I just gave up. n_n While there though, next to us was a group that came all the way from England to see the concert. The one guy had an English flag around his shoulders and he was like "I want one...of everything!" XD He had a Rose of Pain tattoo on his shoulder which of course gained instant respect from me. *dork* Fran bought like lol over $100 worth of stuff so he went to coat check to keep it safe. Tina and Marissa went to the bar and Courtney was chilling with them but I was like "I want to get in there before it gets really full" but they all wanted to wait so I went into the crowd on my own.

Initially got a pretty close spot a little to the left of the center. And the folks around me were all pretty cool. We talked while we waited. Several Japanese girls (there were so many Japanese in the audience lol) and a few guys, one of which was very obviously hitting on the one very pretty and tall Japanese girl. Pffft. But at least he was pretty nice about it. Couldn't help but laugh at him and him and his friend were actually pretty cool. One knew Japanese pretty well due to work and we were all of the older crowd so it was all kinda "oh hey cool, no one here is a weaboo. Yay for cultural knowledge~" and such. Then the opening band, Vampires Everywhere (their name still makes me lol) came on and I actually didn't think they were that bad. I mean I don't think I'd buy their album but they were better than a lot of other opening bands I've heard and they were at least amusing to watch. The keyboardist was kinda hilarious 'cause he was so hyper and his expressions were great. And obviously they were all pretty into what they were doing. Felt bad for them though as a lot of the audience was kinda shockingly rude to them. Like X fans are usually the more mature crowd so I didn't expect that. 'Cause like at least the people around me and myself all clapped and tried to give them some support even though we wanted to save our energy. But like when the vocalist was all "we have two final songs for you" there was a loud wave of groaning from the audience and we were like "Ouch! That was a little uncalled for!". Poor guys. But they didn't seem to let it get to them. And said they were had had a blast touring with X.


Picture of the stage I got after they started taking the Vampires Everywhere set-up down. Shows you how close I was originally. They didn't have hide's guitar out which made me a little sad as I thought they were going to do that for all their concerts. They did have a plushie of him to the side and may have had something more but once again not on the side I was on. Since they had that near where Sugi was. But then again I guess it makes sense to have that a little more subtle since it's been a while since they started the tours and its no long really a "reunion" as more a reforming of the band entirely as they aren't planning to stop any time soon from the looks of it.

The set-up for X started and oh my god it took a really long time. I wonder if it was that long at the other concerts 'cause it was a lot longer than any other concert I've been to and we were all getting a little antsy. My leg kept cramping up and people kept gradually pushing forward so we were getting more and more smushed. At least the guys behind me took it pretty well, laughing it off and making jokes to try to lessen the awkwardness of us all being smushed together. Then the house lights went off and it started...

This video is taken pretty far away but I like that in the sense you can see just how packed the place was. And there isn't any real good quality of the beginning from the floor because it was pretty hard for anyone to record because as soon as it started...there was a sudden push forward and none of us could stop it even though we tried to hold our ground. We got SHOVED forward so much it was starting to get REALLY painful.

But I still tried my best to rock out to Jade which is what they started with. But the shoving continued and we were like being pushed around back and forth in waves that were so huge, we had to literally pull on the person's shirt next to us in order to stop from falling over. Like there were a lot of girls around the same size as me around me and we all shared the same look of panic as this was happening. And we totally lost our guys that were helping us before and some other guy was behind me who um...I'm not sure if it was on purpose but was too close than I wanted a guy to ever be so I kept trying to push him away and it got really uncomfortable for me besides the extra pushing going on already as I wasn't sure if the guy was taking advantage of that and trying to push up against me on purpose...so yeah by the time they got halfway through Rusty Nail, I was like "I can't do this!" and screamed at the people near me to let me the fuck out and at first they wouldn't budge until I was practically clawing my way out to get a path finally. The other girls saw me do this and took the chance to make a beeline after me since I was clearing us a path. Luckily a few individuals did notice us and helped us get out. One guy in particular reached out for us and helped pull us out who I am so grateful for as it helped a lot. Finally got back a little bit and more to the left side and found a group that was a lot more calm than the center but still rocking out so me and one girl stopped there and joined that area as it was still pretty close to the front and you could see everything well. The other girls had to get out completely as they were close to having panic attacks though so we helped them get out and then took up our new spot, sweating and breathing hard from that ordeal.

Really wasn't fun for that and I was trying really hard to stop from crying because that was really awful and I had already missed Jade and Rusty Nail as a result and I was upset that I had to lose my good spot and was tempted to try to go to the back and find my group so I could have a little support but then mentally thought to myself that my spot at the moment was good and that I can't give it up. I need to suck it up and get over that. And plus the other girl with me (one of the Japanese girls) seemed equally determined to stay so that helped. And the spot was so much better as the people in this section were all pretty cool.


I did manage to get this photo before I gave up my original spot during Jade. Not sure how I managed it with all the pushing. Horrible photo but once again shows you how close I was initially.


And this is where I ended up in the end (I think this is from Drain since Yoshiki isn't on the drums). Which as you can see wasn't really too much further back but I also have this zoomed in some. Though lol I had some pretty tall guys in front of me so made it hard to get photos in genearal. Damn my short arms. n_n

So yeah only got to rock out a little bit to Jade and pretty much missed Rusty Nail entirely due to the panic of trying to escape. Though once I was in my new section, they started up Silent Jealousy and I was able to finally focus on the actual concert. And oh man in general it was AMAZING! Like they really are so amazing live. Some bands I see tend to sound different live than on the CDs but X really had the same quality on their CDs as they did live. They were all so perfect~ Toshi did have a few issues with his microphone but it wasn't enough to really ruin the quality of the songs.

Silent Jealousy:

I like this person's videos 'cause its around the area I was in. Just a little closer than I was. Probably was one of the group of guys in front of us who had their cameras up like almost the whole time. lol

Was pretty excited to hear Silent Jealousy as it was one of my old favorites. ^^ And was just great in general to be singing along and have EVERYONE around me sing too as I'm used to J-Rock concerts where only a few people know the lyrics to the songs so this was a really nice change. Especially to have fans who all love the band as much as I do. Felt pretty happy to be surrounded by them.

After that I can't remember the exact order of all the songs so this is most likely not the correct order but I still want to say something on each...

I.V.

lol They started this one with just Toshi singing the chorus and trying to get us singing along though...took us a while because lol I know I for one was kicking myself 'cause I still hadn't learned the lyrics to this one yet. Been trying to but when Toshi sings in English it takes a while to figure out what exactly he's saying and I even meant to try to memorize it before the concert but didn't have the time. So he kept having to repeat the chorus lines over and over til we seemed to get a better hang of it and thus the whole band started up the actual song and we sang the back-up chorus part for the whole song...which was pretty cool to do. ^^

Born to be Free - The one and only song I didn't know before the concert. lol 'Cause its their NEW-new one. It was pretty good but then again there isn't an X song I don't like. XD;

Drain - OMG they did Drain! This is like one of my favorite songs to listen to live so was pretty excited even though its one of the few songs Yoshiki doesn't take part in 'cause in the past this was always right before they'd start doing their solos, usually led into hide's solo first so I got a little teary-eyed 'cause my mind automatically started thinking of the opening to Pose from the Dahlia Tour. So I think this is when they did at least one of the solos...though not sure as this is the part of the concert I'm not sure on the order for.

Sugizo violin solo

Electric violin~! I was expecting just regular violin so was pretty excited when I heard the first few notes. XD; He did a pretty badass version of The Star Spangled Banner. lol

Yoshiki + Sugizo piano/violin duet - Here's my own tiny clip of this. lol My camera kinda sucks though...and of course their duet was a lead-in for Kurenai...

Rocked out pretty hard to that one. ^.^

During the line, the staff girls told us that Yoshiki was requesting that after they finish Kurenai and are doing their little talk, that Yoshiki would give us some sorta sign and then we were all supposed to shout out "Happy Birthday Toshi!" so we figured that'd be a good time to hold up our signs. I lost mine in the pushing at the start but the girl with me let me hold one side of hers. lol Originally the plan was to take those out during the encore but this seemed like a better idea. We sang (really out of key lol) and Yoshiki brought out a "fucking 100 pound cake" as he called it. XD; He did the birthday song again on piano and it was all very cute~

Yoshiki drum solo - Fucking epic as would be expected. ^.^ I mean nowhere as amazing as his past Japan ones but this place also didn't really have the same amazing epic set-up as those ones did. I was just happy to see it at all.

X - lol I love that the person recording is jumping while recording XD;

Of course this was one of the biggest highlights of the whole concert. We all went pretty much berserk on this one. I went all out on it myself. As I've ALWAYS WANTED TO DO THAT TO THIS SONG!!! OMG it was a dream come true! 'Cause I always got so jealous watching concerts and seeing the audience jump and make the X sign and now it was finally my turn! Screamed "X" at the top of my lungs and jumped every time...even if my arms and lungs were killing me by the end. And lol oh man when Toshi jumped on Yoshiki's drums? Awesome! XD And Yoshiki banged the gong and knocked it over just like old times! ^.^ Squee~

Then they all went off stage and thus started the various chantings for the encore. Was a bit of a wait but not as long as the wait for them to start at least. While waiting one of the guys from the initial front center group found us and we talked with him for a bit, about how crazy it had been at the beginning and everything.

Then they came back on stage for the encore...lol with a change of outfits. Heath had probably the best outfit on of the group. It was pretty rocking! I really liked it. And well Pata is...Pata. lol Never changes that one. Yoshiki had some kind of kimono looking robe on that was rather pretty. And Toshi was in a black leather coat (he was wearing a white fluffy one for most of the concert). While Yoshiki gave his little speech, I noticed that Sugizo hadn't come back on which I thought was actually respectful of him to let just the original members be on during the emotional moment. ...unless he was there and I just didn't notice him. ^^; But anyways Yoshiki started talking about how he and Toshi have known each other since they were 4 and how at age 15 they said they would make a band and eventually be big enough to perform in the US and now they were finally living that dream as here they were in the US finally. His voice cracked a few times, obviously him tearing up as he talked. Which made me all T_T of course. And yeah I know Yoshiki does that a lot but it's still one thing to hear it in a video and another thing to hear it in person. And Toshi hugging him was like T____T.

Here's the video of it, shaky camera but only one I can find of it and you can hear the audio pretty well at least...

And of course they did Endless Rain after that. The song I was waiting for the most of all...and it was insanely emotional oh my god...another song I've ALWAYS dreamed of getting to experience live...

The previous video cuts off shortly after the song starts but here's my tiny video of the part of us singing during the audience part of the song (just like how they always used to do it T_T wai~) and lol a little embarrassing 'cause you can hear my voice on it and definitely not my best singing but one sings a little different at a concert when you're more focused on being loud and being heard than actual quality so please don't judge. ^^;; That and its a bit hard to sing when you're choking up as I was.

But here's the whole song in all its glory:

Then Yoshiki did another piano solo which at first I thought was just a normal solo and all and then I'm like "...wait a second...I recognize this..." and then he starts doing EPIC PIANO TANTRUM~! I was like "ok I can die happy now" lol I mean it was full out! Arm slamming and while he didn't sit on it, he did fall off the stool dramatically. XD; And I'm still standing here going "...but this sounds so familiar...wait...wait no...they can't be..."

...and then the guitar kicks in. And I'm all "OMFG THEY'RE DOING ART OF LIFE!!!!" Like the entire concert hall went CRAZY! Because omg of all the songs I don't think ANYONE was expecting that one. I mean they rarely ever did that one live ever. Granted it was obviously not the full 30 minute long song. lol It was more the radio cut one starting with the piano tantrum and going on from there obviously but STILL OMG!!! What a perfect way to end the concert!

The piano solo/tantrum and the beginning of Art of Life...(there is one person who put up the whole Art of Life bit but the video is so shaky its not really worth linking, lol I think everyone was too busy rocking out to be able to take good video of it as even this person goes a little crazy)

So lol you'll just have to take my word that it was epic for that one. Unless I find a better video of it later on.

Then of course the recording of Forever Love played while the members came out and did their final goodbye to us which was pretty awesome 'cause they took a photo of the band in front of the audience like they've been doing for all the shows on this tour. ^^ Sugi was taking photos too but he was on the other side, as I said earlier. lol And the girls in front gave Yoshiki a huge teddy bear for Toshi's b-day I'm assuming, which he then chucked at Toshi. XD; And then threw their water bottles out and lol you can so tell the difference between an older band and younger bands. ALL the other J-Rock concerts I've been to, the J-Rockers throw their water bottles at the end and they never really get any further than maybe halfway into the crowd. X-Japan has more experience with this and they threw those things FUCKING FAR! It was pretty impressive. One even landed in the Mezzaine area up above. And of course because they threw them so far and so many, almost everyone got wet so it was great that we all got to experience that. I got a few drops of one of Yoshiki's, a bit of Heath's (would have caught Heath's too if the guy in front of me wasn't so damn tall so he caught it right in front of me n_n;) and then...pffft Toshi totally nailed our whole section. XD;;; I was like soaking wet it was great!!! XDXD And they were pouring them on each other just like the old days, it was so great~

They did their final bows and walked off. Was so sad seeing them go but all good things have to come to an end. I went to the back and was able to find everyone, who also had all pretty much gotten soaked by water bottles. XD Turns out they were on the same side as me, probably just a few yards behind me since I couldn't see them when I turned around to see who was around me several times but couldn't be super far back from me 'cause they still got wet from the water bottles and saw everything I saw. But still glad I stayed where I was.

Said goodbye to Marissa and Tina so they could go catch their buses and then we went back over to the merch stand. Was going to try to get that shirt again but it was super crowded so I just gave Fran my money so he could get it for me as I couldn't take any more crowding. lol And so Courtney and I went outside while we waited. It was amusing to see the cosplayers with their hair all frizzled and most of the Yoshiki cosplayers had pretty much stripped down. XD; People were still singing and shouting out as they left and there were like people everywhere around the area. lol Once Fran got the shirts, we headed back to the car and started the long trip back. Got a little lost trying to get out of NYC and totally went the wrong way for quite a bit and had to completely turn around so that added a bit of extra time. And we were all like...dying. I felt kinda sick myself as I think I overdid it (but it was worth it!) so I had to kinda keel over in the backseat for a good part of the trip, going in and out of sleep. We made many rest stop stops in attempts to get stuff to keep us alive. Courtney kinda kept going in and out of sleep even worse than me so she was no help. lol In the end, for the last hour or so Fran asked me to just ramble on about things to keep him awake and since I was too dead to really think of things, he just asked me about cosplay and I just said whatever popped in my mind or would go on about the directions to my house, just anything to keep him up as I could tell he was fading and that...wasn't good. Was actually really worried about them after they dropped me off, if they'd be able to find their way back ok but I guess they did fine as I talked to Courtney earlier and she seemed...sorta alive. lol

But yeah, omg best day ever!

~Lyn