Tuesday Tunes: Yakitori and Oasis

One of the absolute highlights of my last trip to Tokyo was going to my first Japan concert. My sister had told me that it's an entirely different – read: humane – experience and boy let me tell you, she was underselling it. Y'all, concerts in Japan are such a pleasant and easy experience. Go to one and you'll realize we are treated like absolute crap when we go to large sporting or entertainment events in the west. No clear bags, merchandise tents and pleasant, 57,000 people exiting is organized and safe, and concerts end well before the last trains, making sure everyone can get home at a reasonable time. Why can't we have nice things?

It turned out that Oasis would be in town for their much-ballyhooed reunion tour and thankfully, resale tickets really weren't all that bad all things considered. We paid €450 a ticket, which is a lot of money but given that it was likely to be the only big concert I would go to for like five years, I was down.

The funny thing was: I didn't actually consider myself an Oasis fan per se? Sure, I listened to nothing but What's The Story Morning Glory and Definitely Maybe for two years straight and "Wonderwall" was the reason I picked up a guitar, but I hadn't thought of this band since. Maybe it was all their constant brother nonsense, maybe I just moved on quickly to my Lilith Fair era. But I can honestly say I hadn't thought much or cared much about Oasis since 1997 ended.

Fifteen minutes into their set I was openly weeping after singing every word to every song. I was overwhelmed by the nostalgia, but while most of the time nostalgia has been a toxic state of mind for me, this was nothing but love. How this band came through my life for a very short amount of time but absolutely grafted itself into my bones, and that made me think of the people who did the same. I was standing there singing my heart out to "The Masterplan", "Don't Look Back in Anger", and "Acquiesce" thinking about the last 30 years, the people who have come and gone, experiences that left me rattled and changed, how in the world I went from a freshman at college to an unemployed sportswriter jamming out on a rainy night at the Tokyo Dome, an opportunity that I might have missed if I had been employed lol.

And in the small moments when I could finally dig myself out of my own head and look around, I was in awe of the moment itself, of watching 55,000 Japanese fans love these two dumb brothers just as much, just as hard, just as loud as any Oasis fans anywhere in the world. Every time Liam slathered "Arigatouuuuuu" with his Manc accent into the mic, I giggled. Oh, and give all credit to the boys, they sounded incredible and the vibes were immaculate. I even got a shot of Liam giving Noel a hug.

The world is beautiful. We're all where we're supposed to be. Everything is perfect.

As such, here are your Tuesday Tunes:

If you're paying attention, it should come as no surprise to you that I am a big Noel-head. He is the heart and soul of Oasis and it's not his fault is bratty little brother got the looks and rock star charisma. I will always love their 1996 MTV Unplugged set at Royal Albert Hall, where Liam refused to go on at the last minute, leaving Noel to do the whole thing himself. I will forever argue that every song is better when Noel sings it. He wrote them, after all. They're his words. His heart. His soul.

Never heard of Asian Kung-Fu Generation? Well now you have! They're a hugely iconic 90s Japanese rock band, who are absolute legends. They were tapped to open for Oasis on the night I went and I was so excited to see them. So were ALL THE DUDES in the the Tokyo Dome, who might have cried more tears during their 30-minute set than during Oasis. Why? Because AKFG sang the opening songs for a bunch of iconic anime, including Naruto (above), Full Metal Alchemist (below) and Bleach. They are as 90s sounding to me as Oasis.

Switching gears from two bands I know very well to one that was literally introduced to me by Oasis THAT WEEK. Oasis played Tokyo Dome on back-to-back nights and the second night a band I had never heard of was listed as the opener: Otoboke Beaver. Upon further research, I learned they were an all-woman punk band from Kyoto (???) and they named their band after a love hotel that was near their high school in Osaka (!!!).

I stopped in my tracks. Wait...JAPANESE...RIOT GRRL?????

I was in. I looked up some YouTube clips and GODDAMN I HAVEN'T BEEN THIS EXCITED FOR A NEW MUSIC DISCOVERY SINCE I DON'T KNOW WHEN. And I'm not the only one. Every big rock band that comes through Japan has been tapping them as openers, including Foo Fighters. Dave Grohl called them "the coolest fucking band I've ever seen."

Not surprisingly, because the world is what it is, Otoboke Beaver seem to make Japanese dudes very mad lol. They got a lot of online hate when they were announced as Oasis' opener, but as you can probably guess if you watch enough live footage of them, these badass ladies don't give a fuck. Like I said, truly punk.

And jokes on all the lame boys. I went to Tower Records in Shibuya and Shinjuku in search of their records on vinyl and they were completely sold out and, according to the information folks, they had been for a while. And they just got back to Japan after a tour through South America, which looked dope as hell.

Otoboke Beaver, I love you! Keep on rockin' in the free world!