Live Report of -OZ- and DEATHGAZE's Two Man Tour: neo vision

The crowd poured into the impossibly small (and white) basement venue that is HeartLand STUDIO in Fushimi, Nagoya to the sounds of a System of a Down album playing over the PA. They were here to see the first of the neo vision concerts, a coupling tour of -OZ- and local band DEATHGAZE. The coupling tour would also be making stops at Tokyo and Osaka but, as this was the first concert, the anticipation was high amongst the gathered crowd.

A few minutes later than scheduled, the curtain rose to signal the start of -OZ-'s performance. The stage was bathed in a red light as music played for the band to enter to. They were accompanied by strobe in time to the music as each member took turns entering the stage and standing on a box placed at the centre of the front of the stage and. As the music became less charged, they would hold up and ignite a lighter, which the crowd would copy. It came to a climax as all the members did this together, once again along with the crowd.

The first song, Misty was a more subdued one, meaning that the band remained stationary for the most part and simply let the music carry itself. They offered a good, solid performance that the crowd seemed to appreciate. As the song came to a close, the vocalist climbed up onto the box and screamed in English, "Welcome to Nagoya!", and with that the band sprung to life. During Shangrila, Natsuki, Aki, Tama and Nao came to the front of the stage to play to the crowd for a while, which was followed by the vocalist encouraging the crowd to do arm movements along with the song. The band continued this sort of crowd interaction throughout the song.

After a short break, the band took the time to do a short MC and said "Thank you Nagoya, arigatou" before inviting the crowd to join them at their next Nagoya live at ell.SIZE on April 24th. The next song was less heavy that its predecessor until it reached the chorus. At that point, the crowd would head bang with the strobe lighting. During the softer parts, Natsuki gave a powerful and heartfelt vocal performance. As the stage fell quiet, Natsuki simply silently mouthed words into the microphone before launching into the next song, RAZE. It was a heavy song that was met with frantic head banging from the crowd and band alike. Natsuki encouraged the crowd to start an "Oi! Oi! Oi! Oi!" chant during one of the instrumental sections of the song.

ATHENA started with heavy, pounding instruments as the band all encouraged the crowd to punch their hands in the air. During the song's bridge, Natsuki was clapping from side to side along with the crowd. During the guitar-heavy instrumental, Aki and Tama took to the centre of the stage and stood back-to-back while performing. The next song saw the band remain reasonably stationary until the short instrumental sections, when they would all begin head banging. Aki could also be seen climbing the amp heads at the front of the stage in order to get closer to the crowd. During the song, it faded to complete silence, only to be broken by a gut-wrenching scream from Natsuki and continuing on with its initial heaviness.

To begin the next song, Blot, the audience put their hands in the air and bounced from side-to-side energetically briefly before Natsuki took the initiative to signal to the audience when he wanted them to jump up in the air. This continued throughout the song, much to the crowd's pleasure. As the song came to a close, the stage was once again bathed in red light before the fast and heavy section of Enmity, to which almost the entire crowd could be seen head banging along. The band moved around energetically, even taking this opportunity to swap sides on the stage.

After this, the vocalist took up his place at the centre of the stage and screamed, "Last song!" The set was closed with another fast and heavy song in the form of Butterfly, which was once again accompanied by a strong crowd reaction with lots of head banging and air punching as Natsuki smiled happily at the crowd. During the song's climax, the band took the opportunity to thank the crowd again and encourage a chant before the song ended and the band left the stage once again inviting the crowd to their next concert in Nagoya.

Set list:

SE
1.Misty
2.Shangrila
3.CRY the crime
4.CLOVER
5.RAZE
6.ATHENA
7.Zenith
8.Blot
9.Enmity
10.Butterfly

Once the first band had left the stage, the audience applauded. Several members of the crowd took this opportunity to leave the venue while as many (if not more) people arrived in anticipation for the performance of Nagoya kei band DEATHGAZE.

As the curtain rose for DEATHGAZE's performance, several members of the crowd held up their towels and whooped during Japanese Meliorism, before the band had even taken the stage. First onto the stage was Naoki, quickly followed by Kosuke, Naoto and finally Ai. The set kicked off with an almost overpoweringly heavy song, -1, which was accompanied by lots of strobe and head banging from the crowd. To begin Evoke the world, a bright backlight shone across the venue and a simple guitar part began followed by a much softer song than the first, although the Naoki's drum work made it feel heavier than it was. The performance was simple yet beautiful and left an even more poignant impression on the audience after following such a heavy track. This was followed by another song of around the same tempo to which the crowd head banged along although the band remained mostly stationary.

After a short MC, the band turned up the heat with unchain wing, which was met with a very good reaction from the crowd. Ai was almost flirting with the crowd for a lot of the song, licking the sides of his mouth. Naoto took to the front of the stage during his solo so that he could get closer to the crowd. After goodbye my earth was performed, Ai screamed “thank you” to the crowd and the band took a short break.

The next song, forsaken, started off slowly with just simple guitar and drums before building up to a heavy climax with the band all head banging along together. Ai gave another very strong vocal performance and it was clear that the band had found its stride. The song faded into silence and blackness before amends started again with a piano phrase, which was accompanied by guitar. The following performance was another simple yet beautiful one, where they let the music take the lead, which appealed to their strengths.

Afterwards, the crowd applauded politely and Ai took the chance to give a short MC introducing the band and apologising for not having played in Nagoya for a while. They also talked about the tour and invited the crowd to one of the shows in Osaka or Tokyo but appreciated that it might be a little far for the locals to travel.

As the next song, paranoid parade, kicked off, it was another one of DEATHGAZE's trademark heavy VK songs and the crowd bounced along happily to the music. Ai continued flirting with the crowd as he provocatively licked the microphone. The stage was filled with red light as the song came to an end and a new song began. Ai encouraged the crowd to clap and mouthed words at them as they sung them back to him before he took over the duties himself.

When the next song began, Ai brought himself to the front of the stage and made intense eye contact with as much of the crowd as he could, while Naoto jumped around energetically behind him. I'm broken baby showed a slight change of pace, bringing an almost speed metal element to the show which the crowd soaked up. Just as they thought there were no signs of slowing down, they were granted a respite. During this section, Ai encouraged the crowd to chant and was backed by simple sounds from the rest of the instruments. He then encouraged the whole crowd to punch the air and asked if those who weren't could hear him. This continued for some time before the song built up again to the same pace it had begun at.

Ai climbed onto the box at the front of the stage and let out a guttural scream, signaling the start of genocide and mass murder. The crowd welcomed this song warmly with arm movements and occasional head banging throughout the song. At one point in the song, Ai put the microphone in front of Naoto's face to let him do one of the screams.

Without a word of warning, the band left the stage while thanking the crowd. Immediately the crowd began calling for an encore, but rather than the usual chants of "encore" the crowd were instead chanting the band's name. The band appeared back on stage very quickly and took a few moments to talk to the crowd about the upcoming concerts in Tokyo and Osaka.

The encore kicked off with an almost dance-like song, something that the crowd reacted to in kind by dancing together happily. The final song of the night was started with Ai reaching his hand into the crowd and singing to them before drawing his hands back, clasping them around his microphone and singing whilst wriggling his fingers at the crowd. Once the song finished, the band left the stage and the curtain came down.

Set list:

SE(Japanese Meliorism)
1.-1
2.Evoke the world
3.insult kiss me
4.unchain wing
5.goodbye my earth
6.forsaken
7.amends
8.paranoid parade
9.fuck me
10.abyss
11.I'm broken baby
12.genocide and mass murder