Wings of My Heart 3.0

Reading the blog entries and forum posts of guys who’ve been to over one hundred AKB shows and have built relationships (of sorts) with their favourite girls sometimes reminds me that I’ve never had that close a connection with any of my favourite idols. I think AKB wota actually living in our near Tokyo have a much easier time being AKB wota than anyone around the world; they’re there in the middle of the action, able to keep up with all of the latest buzz and rumours, and beyond that, they can go see their idols on a regular basis and even meet and speak to their favourite girls multiple times. (This is changing, of course, as the landscape of AKB adapts to their growing fan base, but that’s the way it’s been up until now and hopefully will continue to be for as long as possible.) Being over here in Canada, I don’t have the freedom to do that. Kim Heechul is my number one idol, and the way I feel about him is probably the same as the way those AKB theatre MVPs feel about their oshimen (the girls they support), but I’ve never seen him live, met him in person, or anything like that. I haven’t dedicated that much time and money to him; I haven’t been given the chance to build a relationship with him. Of course, that rarely happens outside of the AKB fandom, but it’d be nice to at least see a live or too.

This does lead me to remember, though, the live shows I have seen and the people I admire whom I have made contact with, no matter how briefly: I’m thinking about Dir en grey right now. All three times that they’ve been to Canada so far, I’ve made absolutely certain that I was free to go to their shows, and that I had my tickets safely secured as early on as possible. For their first performance here, as part of the Family Values tour, I asked my parents if we could come home from a week-long vacation one day early, so that I would be able to see the show. I was scared of being scolded for asking such a thing, but it turns out it wasn’t much of an inconvenience and they didn’t mind doing that for me. Back then, I didn’t even know the names of all of Dir en grey’s members, but I knew that I loved their music. It was a huge deal to me to see them live, and they did not disappoint. I also got to see each of them close up, as they walked by us in the back parking lot hours before they played, and after the show Toshiya stopped in front of a large group of us back there and waved, while we greeted him in awe. He had been one of the members I was less familiar with, but I would feel quite the affection towards him from then on. (And it helps that I have a thing for bassists.)

By the time their next show came around, my friends and I were prepared. We decided to buy presents for each of the members, and I got Toshiya. My friends all told me that he was known to like Doraemon, so I bought him a Doraemon plushie in Chinatown. Throughout the show I had to hold onto it, and it was very difficult to keep it in my clutches in a crowd setting like that, but I managed to hold onto both it and the t-shirt I’d just been given as a birthday present, if nothing else. After the show, we tracked down a roadie we’d met and talked to at Family Values, and he agreed to give them the presents. A friend of mine from Japan wrote their names in kanji on each of the presents, to make it easier. That day is made an even more amazing memory by the fact that so many of my friends were there, including friends from a number of different groups. To experience one of my favourite bands in the world while surrounded by friends was pretty damn awesome.

Finally, there was the show last November. It was the second time that I waited in a line outside in the winter for the band, and this time I waited even longer, AND it snowed. But I bought a key lime pie during my warm-up break at the grocery store and shared it with my friends in line; the members walked by and we yelled to them and made jokes about Kyo still not having made an appearance; Toshiya, friendly as ever, waved happily in response to our calls of “Toshiya-san!” as he walked by. The security guards inside the actual venue actually did a lot to make the experience less than perfect, but what I got out of the actual show was more than worth it: not only did I get to hear “Conceived Sorrow” live, with Kyo taking the mic away from his mouth and singing two lines out into the room while everybody shut up to listen - a moment that made me feel that much closer to that man on the stage - but I got to meet Die and Shinya when they signed autographs after the show, shake their hands, say thank you to each of them, and get their autographs on my copy of their newest CD. That was the closest I have ever come to any of the most important performers to me, my friends. Close enough to shake hands.

I’ve done a lot to support other bands I love, too, like Billy Talent. I saw them live for the first time a week before seeing Diru for the second time, after listening to BT for three years prior. Their music makes me feel like myself, like the same girl I’ve always been beneath the layers of whatever’s going on in my life at the moment; it sounds like home. This past June, they headlined Edgefest, with A.F.I. up before them, and I knew I had to go: Diru, BT and A.F.I. are probably my three favourite bands in the world, and A.F.I. was the only one I still hadn’t seen live yet. I got caked in mud at the rainy outdoor festival, but that couldn’t even bring me down, because I was hearing played live the songs that have sung me through life. I feel like whenever you’re at a concert, sharing the experience of the music with the band and the people around you, you’re building a relationship there. At that first Billy Talent concert I went to, Ben, the vocalist, asked everybody to hold up their lighters, cellphones, or whatever, and then to look around. As we did, he told us all that we are never alone. This was followed by a slower song they have about a suicidal teen, called “Nothing to Lose”, and it was a powerful moment I was moved by. I was so happy to have experienced it. Moments like that, and Kyo singing out into the room without his microphone - not to mention an octave higher than he sings those lines on the album - are moments that will never leave me.

I’m not saying that you have to go to concerts to have a connection with your favourite artists, but concerts are a powerful thing, and I’d recommend doing what you can to go to one if you’ve never had the chance before. It may be years before I’m free to go to Japan or Korea to see the artists I love there, but I comfort myself with the experiences I’ve had at home. In the mean time, I support Heechul, Nacchan, and everybody I love by buying their releases whenever I can, and  dedicating a lot of blog space to them on the internet. I upload Nacchan’s vlogs to Youtube and have a worship blog for her in the hopes that it will give her just a little more exposure, and possibly bring her new fans. That’s what I feel like I can do for her. Meanwhile, I wear a necklace featuring Heechul’s initial on a regular basis, because his words and spirit make me happy and bring me comfort throughout my day to day life, and as a fan I post about him all the time on coinlockersbaby. And once I bought the repackaged version of a Suju album I already had the initial release version of because Heechul had looked into the camera on a TV show and asked people to please buy music. My wota tendencies were obviously coming out that day!

Soon, I’m going to be seeing my first ever live performance by idols, as opposed to a rock band: the Wonder Girls on their tour with the Jonas Brothers will be performing here at the end of the month, and my friend and I have had our tickets secured for awhile now. After the performance, we hope that there will be a meet and greet where we can go and meet the girls, and that would be an amazing experience for me. While they aren’t one of my all-time favourite groups or anything, they are one of my favourite Kpop groups, and I own one of their CDs. I know all of their names and faces; seeing them in person is going to be surreal. I absolutely can’t wait to see what it’s like being up close and personal with Kpop idols, and I hope to show them that they have fans in Canada by cheering as loudly as possible when they perform.

If all else fails, there are always fan letters for those of us who can’t go and be with our idols in person. A number of AKB fans write many letters to their favourite girls, and I’ve attempted to write something to Nacchan in the past. One of these days, I will actually finish. I also hope that I manage to write to Heechul one day, though I feel like any letter I could send to him would have to be epic. Hopefully I’ll at least be able to convey how much he’s done for me, without ever even knowing me. No matter what anyone can say about idol fandoms, that can never be creepy. Taking comfort from a person’s blog entries, voice, and presence, be they a friend or a celebrity? That’s got to be a beautiful thing. After all, we’re all just people in this world.