It's been three months already since the concert so I guess it's high time for me to write something about this amazing event.
Let's just start with the fact that I especially chose December / January for my third trip to Japan so that I could go to Ayumi Hamasaki Countdown Live 2014-2015 concert. Though I bought airline tickets in March 2014 before it was even announced I was pretty sure the annual CDL will happen again. I had been to Ayu's concert before in April 2010 in Saitama (Rock 'n' Roll Circus Tour) and despite the most fantastic concert ever (absolutely top notch, no kidding, I should review it as well) my sits were absolutely horrid (I wrote a little about it in my YELLOW FRIED CHICKENz World Tour SHOW UR SOUL.I Berlin 2011 -concert review-).
Bad seats were the result of a lottery. In Japan to go to the concert you pay for the ticket not for the seat which means you don't know for which seat you pay and the price for each of them is the same. However, there are some ways to get better seats, for example if you are in a fan club (Team Ayu) you still don't know what you'll get but you have much higher change of getting a good seat. After FC there's the general sale, you can buy tickets in machines placed in combini stores (small stores that are open 24/7 like Lawson or 7Eleven). I saw lots of people getting good seats this way but it's all luck. Finally, there's the general internet sale and personally I don't know anyone who got a good ticket this way. Unfortunately, it was also how I got my ticket in 2010 and got bad seats and this time they were also very bad (like the absolute end and as high as possible). As a foreigner I couldn't enter the lottery myself (not sure how this works if you are in the international FC) and I'm not sure if I could get the tickets in Japan, few days before the concert from the machines so I decided to ask "friend of a friend" to get me internet lottery tickets. I was actually hoping for good seats but of course I had plan B in case they turned out really bad.
The seats I got this time were balcony 2nd floor seats sector A for the December 29th and E for December 30th (I don't remember the seat numbers anymore). It was even worse because I was told while still in Europe that the tickets were for December 30th and 31st (the actual CDL that will be later released on Bluray and DVD) but they were 29th and 30th. I thanked and payed for the tickets but plan B was already forming in my head.
The thing is, lottery is NOT the only way to get tickets. Lottery guarantees the regular price but you don't know the seat, however, there are places called "reseller stores" where you can chose a seat but the price is higher depending on how good the seat is.
At first I was just planning on exchanging the worst seat (2nd balcony sector A) for some really good one and I was prepared to pay quite a lot of money. So I went to Shibuya where it took me about 20 minutes to find the store (following friend's instructions). They had about ten tickets, some of them were double (for two people) and the best one they had was Arena Floor B2 sector and the price touched the limit I established beforehand, I could have spent more but I felt the limit was crazy enough and there weren't any better tickets anyway. I didn't think for a long time and bought it at once. I got back about half the price I already payed for the bad seat ticket which was nice.
I left Shibuya and went back to Ueno and then it hit me that there's no reason I should keep the other bad seat ticket and I could have checked other tickets and exchange the other bad one for at least slightly nicer for a little more cash (nothing extraordinary this time). I knew there's one more reseller in Ueno as well so I decided to give it a try. There were no A or B tickets but there was one C sector and it wasn't expensive (slightly more than the original price) so I exchanged the other bad one as well (and even got back almost all of the original price).
Summing up I exchanged December 29th 2nd balcony A sector (in balcony seats A is furtherst back and in arena floor seast A in right under the stage, keep it in mind as it may be confusing) for December 31st arena floor B2 sector and December 30th 2nd balcony E sector (the middle of the side balcony, at very top) for December 30th arena floor C5 sector.
December 29th, 2014
Even though I did not have tickets for December 29th I decided to go to Yoyogi, buy some goods, feel the atmosphere and maybe hear some rehersal songs. It was really great, nuff said.
Sorry for potato quality, I think I had my camera but still I just took photos with my crappy phone.
I had a look at the goods, I wasn't going to buy much, I'm not that kind of person who needs to get everything. I knew I wanted the light stick for the actual show, I liked the key chain and wanted to try the Manju cookies. I was considering buying parka and bag but I didn't like them that much so I passed. I knew how the buying works so I wasn't scared of the barried language or anything, they have a poster of all goods next to each stall so if you don't know Japanese you can just point and show the amount on your fingers. I've decided to try my basic Japanese and it went fine as well.
I tried to locate where I will have to go the next day and at first I thought I need to get through the main gate but then I saw some people entering some kind of back entrance and realized there was a sign saying "ariina" so just that you know, if you have floor tickets locate this sign as well.
The key chain was sold out fast the first day. There were rumours on forums that if something get sold out the first dat they don't restack it. It's not true, the key chains were back the next day and weren't sold out even after the concert finished.
December 30th, 2014
And this is my seat for the December 30th. It may look far from the stage but in reality it was fine, not great but fine. Whenerver Ayu came to the center stage the view was good. If that was my only concert I might have been a little disappointed but since I know my final date ticket is better I was just enjoying the awesome show. There were two elder people in front of me and they were sitting most of the concert so the view was nice.
Just so you know, the seat numbers are at the back of your chair.
And this is what I bought and how the Manju Steamed Bread cookies looked like (there were delicious and gone by now). I bought two key chains because I really liked them and I knew the fake silver will wear off after some time of using it so I wanted to have one more for later use. Although I must admit any Ayu fake silver concert goodie I ever had lasted so much longer than any fake-silver thing I ever has in my life.
December 31st, 2014
On December 31st my seats were almost awesome (few more seats and I'd be almost at the center stage), I was at the far left of my sector (right next to cameramen so I knew if only they will shoot the audience the camera will be right in my face, they were shooting the main stage most of the time but they turned toward audience during AyuReady break) and the far right seats were almost under the stage but still these are the best seats I ever had. Whenever Ayu came to the center stage I was awed.
Snatched one photo during the actual concert. Again, my phone's camera is pretty bad, the guy sitting next to me was taking quite a few photos with his iPhone and I found them on his instagram and they are of great quality.
And here's a photo taken by the person sitting to my right, I think we took them during the same song.
At each final CDL concert there are balls, ballons and "ribbons" you can catch. I didn't get anything on 30th but on 31st I managed to catched one single ribbon, it felt like that was the last one coming down (there were so few, on DVD it always looks like a lot).
Here's the photo I took from my seat at Arena Tour 2010 ~Rock 'n' Roll Circus~, as my memory serves me Yoyogi Hall is smaller but I just wanted to show how much better my seats were this time.
And here's ME! The concert was transmited live and was available online the very next day. It took me a week of watching and pausing when the camera was showing the audience (I knew I was close to the cameramen) and finally I found myself :3
So far there are no angles from the camera that was close to me but once the Bluray / DVD is out I hope there will be new angles and maybe I'll find a better shot of myself.
Originally I wanted to review the concert itself here but the post is a bit long so I did it in a separate entry, you can read it here.
If anyone is interested in the locations of the reseller stores (I found two out of four) I will post it later.
Comments
Post a Comment