Saturday, March 18, 2017

The Last Live | X Japan

X Japan gives the most spectacular opening for a rock show you may ever see.  It's not clear which Last Live this was but it doesn't matter as you will find when you listen.

This is rock as hard as it gets but there's not the tiresome vibe that anyone wants to start sacrificing chickens or any affected rubbish like that.

Yoshiki switches from drums to keyboard at about +47:00 into it and the show changes vastly since he's a formidable pianist which is all the more remarkable in combination with his drumming.  The man has more talent than any ten people.

Take it away, X Japan.




For me, this vibe goes so much better than simple head banger rock.  The band is so laser beam tight with their changes that it dazzles me every time.


Mates, I know we saw a lotta, lotta, rock shows and quite a few of them as a motley horde of freaks when we saw them together but I really don't think any I ever saw could match this.

The parts which grab me the most are the most killin' lead guitar work but it's also the changes in the songs which are much more intricate than most, and Yoshiki's drumming is as much multi-limbed madness as anyone could ever handle.  The singing is the biggest difference, to my taste, since the basic scream rock will be largely, to my appreciation, amelodic whereas X Japan seeks much more of a dynamic than that.

Yoshiki is a walking phenomenon.  He also does piano recital tours and who would expect that coming from a band so metallic.

I might have been looking all my life for this band.  Who knows if they will ever perform again after the last show in New York a year or two ago since that was a rarity after they disbanded around 1997.  No-one thought that New York concert would happen so there's no predicting what will come.

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