Miyavi @ The Circus, Helsinki 2014/03/16 (VIP.. sort of)

Well - it has been a tiny little bit of while since I last pressed the button "write an entry".. I've got no excuse, except all the studying during summer in order to past the resits of kanji-exams and all other things that have been keeping me busy for most of the year. End of discussion! Let's move on to the rant I promised to write 6 months ago.. (holy hell, has it been that long? I'd better start to keep up, so there won't be this much of backtracking in the future..You wouldn't believe how long even this post has been in my scraps-folder.)

For the first time in my life, I traveled back and forth between Vaasa and Helsinki because of concerts. And don't get me wrong; I love concerts, but this time the timing couldn't be worse, yet perfect. First of all, Miyavi's concert in Finland was scheduled to be on the same week as An Cafe's concert. Second, on that week I was scheduled to have a kanji-exam! But fortunately neither of the concert dates were on the same date as my school days or the day of exam - but instead the exam was between those dates. Because of this, I was spending money on train tickets.. as if the concerts themselves didn't cost enough already.

You all know the story and anxiety of waiting by your computer and the time hitting 9 o'clock and abusing F5-key on your keyboard, in order to get the desired concert tickets (don't rely on phone booking anymore.. you should all know by now, that doing it yourself online is much faster), we've everyone been there by now. Let us say though, that when the VIP tickets are sold on the same site as the regular ones, do not expect anything marvelous from the VIP tickets. I've learned it now.And here on out starts the rant you've been waiting for so long.

In the morning of the concert, we went to the door of the venue at 6 a.m. with Rousuke; my sis also came to line up with us just to kill time (she didn't even have a ticket, yet she waited till the doors opened with us!) and talk to us as well. It was a sunny morning and after a while we were greeted by couple of fans with regular tickets and, oh boy, the wonder in their eyes, when they heard we were VIP ticket holders and yet we came to the line that early. Then the lining continued with cold winds and sun hiding behind buildings, letting us to freeze our asses.

Hours flew by and by every second we were more glad, that we came at the line when we came, because in the end of the day, the VIP line was almost as long as the regular one. So, again, VIP tickets were overrated.

And as you might have already guessed, yes, I made another sheet for Miyavi. We collected some greetings from the line and here's the finished product:

We also guided people to the right lines and picked most of the garbage, because the official organizers were nowhere to be seen during the whole day and we wanted to keep at least j-rockers' reputation a little bit more positive, when it comes to littering.

Only around 1-2 hours before the doors were supposed to open for VIP customers, the VIP ticket and fan club membership holders showed up, so we had to let them go before us in the line. This is the reason I still go in line as early as possible, nevertheless I had all the memberships and everything else beneficial, because it might piss a little bit off those, who have been there from the very early hours. I want to feel like I've earned the spot in line, not just because I've paid more. Then again, that might be just me. These fan club members were sweet, though! Too bad, that I can't remember their names 8c

About an hour (or more) late the doors finally opened for us and I can't describe the disappointment, when we received the bracelet to indicate that we were VIP customers; it was blank orange, paper bracelet. So far every god dang VIP ticket I've bought comes with a laminate and a key chain. Again, this might sound like a small thing, but things like these will annoy you, if the rest of the purchased product doesn't sum up. This is what happened with Miyavi's meet & greet session, which was held after the concert itself.

The concert was enjoyable and Miyavi still had some energy in him, even though he admitted, that he didn't get to rest at all between Finland's and the last country's events; right after the meet & greet in there, he pretty much hopped on the plain and flew to Finland. Rousuke said, that we didn't sleep either, which Miyavi respond to with: "Oh, then shall we all get a sleep?" But of course not he didn't stop the live there. :'3 I still felt really bad for him due to the tight schedule he had.
   The tracklist was mostly candy to oldskool fans, and I really mean it. There was 1 or 2 songs that I've actually never had heard before! I know, I'm such a lazy ass fan and don't deserve to be in this fan base 8C
I've got nothing else to say about the concert itself, really. I enjoyed it and it was refreshing to hear Miyavi live again! Here's the setlist:

DAY 1
STRONG
Hell No/Chase It
JUSTICE
Secret
CHILLIN' CHILLIN' MONEY BLUE$
SELFISH LOVE
Please, please, please.
Kimi ni Negai wo
Guard You
Cry Like This/No One Knows My Name
GANRYU
SURVIVE
FUTURISTIC LOVE
Horizon

-encore-
Subarashikikana, Kono Sekai -WHAT A WONDERFUL WORLD-
Ahead Of The Light
WHAT'S MY NAME?

Then it was the time for the meet & greet...

First of all, I made a mistake by leaving the sheet I painted to the cloakroom and I had to get it before we could go to the meet & greet. So, I went there and had to say bunch of times that I need my stuff back. A couple of times later I finally got my things and while I was there, I saw that some concert posters were handed out for free for everyone already leaving the venue. With my things, I got back to the VIP line with Rousuke and started to get ready to meet one of our idols. The last instructions were "no talking, no hugging, no touching and any gifts will be left to a gift box". I'll let that to sink in for a moment.

Let me sum up here, what were the promises they made, when we purchased these tickets: early access to the venue, meet & greet and a picture with the artist. Only a week before the day of event, the ticket seller announced, that the photo will be taken in groups of 10 people.

So, what ended up happening, was that we left our sheet in the gift box, grinned at a camera with bunch of unfamiliar faces, a poster (the very same poster which was given up for free to the regular ticket buyers as well in the hall) and a card were given to us and right after we were pretty much kicked out of the room. Some of us looked at each other with the look "what the fuck just hapened?" on their faces.
I would say that even Miyavi had a wtf-face because we were all 'in a hurry' to get out of the room, which in reality was because of the organizers breathing in our necks with the look of "get out of here already!", AND he himself was the one offering handshakes and thanking people. Should we have been all silent at that moment, huh?
And lastly, the photos that were taken had to be hunted down from Facebook on a different page than the official artist page. I also counted the amount of VIP ticket holders via these pictures. In Finland alone, there was 175 VIPs...

(borrowed the photo from Rousuke's blog, because I was too lazy to search it up again)

After that it was pretty much ranting to myself and going back to my sister's place. Needless to say, regular ticket buyers got much more out of their money than VIPs. Miyavi slapped his fans literally - in the face.

Here are the physical memories (I forgot to put the ugly bracelet to the photo, sorry):

Yup, that's about it. Sorry, that I made you wait for so long and yet it turned out this short.. My apologizes!
Next up is going to be a entry about girugamesh's live at Nosturi from this summer! Stay tuned~
Bye~