Tokyo's Coolest Sound

On Sunday June 17, I went to see Vanilla Beans who were holding their 4th one-man live. I had been to the first held in December 2009 (report), and have seen them many times at various other events since, but it had indeed been a long time since I had seen a full show of theirs.

This show was held at Shibuya WWW, currently my favorite venue as it reuses a theater screening room though the seats have been removed but the floor where the audience stands goes up in a stairway fashion towards the back. This usually gives everyone a good view of the stage, although this show was sold out and the place was quite packed. It was still a pleasant show though as Vanilla Beans fans are very well behaved, as long as you don't mind most people clapping their hands the whole time when not mimicking the girls' dance moves. I do the same or at least sometimes try. :)

On Saturday June 2, I went to see Portable Rock at small venue Club Crawl in Shibuya. It was the first of two "one-man" shows (no opening band) the band played. This one featured guest Suzuki Keiichi (leader of Moonriders), while the other show on the next day would feature Suzuki Saeko (drummer of Cinema, and ex-wife of Keiichi). I only made it to the first show which is what this report is about. While the band played shows in Kyoto and Nagoya last year, it was their first time to play in Tokyo in 6 years (report of previous show)!, except for a short appearance at Maki's 30th anniversary show last March (report).

Portable Rock is a band from the 80's new wave scene that featured Nomiya Maki as vocalist, with Suzuki "Chibun" Tomofumi on guitar and Nakahara Nobuo on bass. It was also the glue between Maki's early 80's short time as a solo artist and Pizzicato Five recruiting her around 1990, at the same time putting an end to Portable Rock. Suzuki Keiichi of the Moonriders was much involved in Maki's "Pink no kokoro" solo album, and later lent his home studio to Portable Rock. Suzuki Tomofumi was part of the same music circle as Konishi Yasuharu and Takanami K-tarō, leading Maki to eventually join P5. There was talk during the show about Portable Rock playing karaoke-style shows in the late 80's, influencing P5 to do the same later.

Enough of history class! My friend and I arrived just in time, as the band entered the stage. Maki wore a white-dotted green dress. The audience was all seated, but there were no more seats so we stood at the back near the bar.