Well, for those of us who still haven't left, some more info on the new opening acts:

B.E.N.O.M. or whoever the original 3rd opening act was supposed to be is gone.

Joining the Japanese-female fronted Lemon Drop Kick and makeup-clad goth band Secret Secret now seems to be Oriental Massage/The Bay Aliens (EigoManga lists one, their myspace says another), another Japanese rock band, and then Nikita and Blue Eyes, Nikita seeming to be a black dude with dreads who sings in both English and Japanese.

Pics/Myspace links: http://www.eigomanga.com/live/pillows.html


I'll be leaving in a bit over an hour. Won't be getting there right until or just after doors open.

just got back. it rocked. it went off without a hitch. there were bouncers at the sides of the stage during their set.

the other bands had really short sets thank goodness.

i saw zenkalia, overamped, and lepton. and a random girl said hi who had a cool drawing/poster or something of the pillows which i wish i'd gotten a pic of.

i stayed off to the front/side which worked out well, because i was right under a blast of cold air most of the time, and i mostly avoided the shoving/moshing. o__o

they played a really short song which might have been propose... i didn't recognize it at all so i could be wrong.

the meet and greet was not so hot... there were two sets of people interviewing them which took 30-40 minutes, and they did it right outside the kinokuniya so it was really noisy and you couldn't hear what they were saying. then the q&a was reeeeeally short. manabe says he feels fresh and good playing a different guitar, and he's working hard on the next nine miles album. and sawao's favorite pillows' song is hybrid rainbow.

I met up with Lepton in LA and told me he was meeting up with you.

And yay! New Nine Miles.

So what songs did they play?

-edit-

I have VERY crappy WMA file of PROPOSE somewhere in the LA thread. Its bad quality, but maybe you'll recongize something if it is.

[quote="terra"] sawao's favorite pillows' song is hybrid rainbow. [/quote]

He's such a liar. XD

[quote="terra"]and a random girl said hi who had a cool drawing/poster or something of the pillows which i wish i'd gotten a pic of.[/quote]
Ah man, I wish I had someone take a print of my piccu to the SF show now. XD

It is awesome to hear that the last show went off without a hitch though. Was anyone able to apologize for the ROSS incident at the Whisky?

probably very close to the same set list as the other shows...

blues drive monster
come down
rock and roll sinners
i think i can
the air resistor
funny bunny
my foot
third eye
beautiful morning with you
dead stock paradise
terminal heaven's rock
sleepy head
ride on shooting star
little busters
hybrid rainbow

encore:
crazy sunshine
advice

runners high appeared to be written down on the list, but it wasn't played.

i don't remember where the little unrecognizable song fit in, this is off the set list.

oh, and i saw thewaiverproject too... sorry i forgot you.

[quote="terra"]sawao's favorite pillows' song is hybrid rainbow. [/quote]

The tattoo on his right wrist didn't give that away?

That's a good point; however, call me cynical, but it sounds like a crowd-pleaser kinda answer. Hybrid Rainbow is probably their most popular song, at least in the US if not in Japan. I'd guess that he said Hybrid Rainbow to please the fans, rather than saying a song like.... oh, maybe Strange Chameleon or Swanky Street... or Shiroi ... because Sawao thinks most of his fans here don't know those songs.

Then again, there is the tattoo.

im very tired so tired.....
unfortunately i was caught in the mosh pit, but some friends and i used that opportunity to push up from 10th row to 3rd row center... but lost 3 lil soldiers along the way...
i'll post pics on webshots of the concert and the meet and greet so i'll give a link as soon as i do that
oh terra i have that footage of you asking them " what finally convinced you guys to come to the us and tour? the long pause and then finally sato saying "we love america!" while pumping his hands in the air
i theres a link for that in another topic

it was a great show- except for the lack of clean air and water!
they played a quick nirvana cover! i wished i recorded that - only videotaped 1 song

i stayed behind to try to sneak into the back but got kicked out
so we waited out side and got to take pics and talk with the opening bands
but we missed the pillows and only got to see them drive by
oh well at least i got to meet them at the bookstore

oooo, did they play breed? or was it molly's lips? i know he jsut played that with the preadotars at a live show. see if any of you guys recognize these two songs on this video: [url]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QoQjXaqyXHs[/url]

That's "Breed" from Nevermind and "Molly Lips" from Incesticide

OMG, that is so F ing cool, I can't believe it

so they played Stay Away at the show? hm, i don't even remember how that songs sound. been a while since i've actually lsitened to nirvana

...monkey see, monkey do ( stay away-ay ) XD

It's awesome that they chose something a bit obscure to play as a cover, even. They could have easily gained more recognition by playing something more recognizable such as smells like teen spirit or something, but they didn't. the pillows kick ass. '-'

Yep, they played the Breed cover. It seemed to me like it wasn't even planned; Sawao was tweaking his guitar for a few mintutes (hopefully it wasn't damaged by that jerk in LA, but it kept giving out and he eventually swapped it for another one), and then he just started jamming on that riff and I saw Jun and Manabe give him astonished/intrigued looks and then they just came in and rocked face. It was really cool.

The performance was great! Sawao seemed a little tired to me (heck, I know I couldn't make that trip and perform in two back-to-back nights, presuming they drove), but that's the only thing I could nitpick. In particular, Beautiful Morning With You was AWESOME. Manabe is such a beast.

I've also gotta say that Jun kicked ass. In LA, he played One Life, and contrary to some people who complained that he massacred it in previous shows, it was pretty much perfect. In short, the guy rocks. I didn't pay particular attention to him last year, but during these shows I was rather impressed by his performance.

A few downsides to the show for me. I looked for you terra, but I didn't see any 9/16 shirts. They also sold out of the Buster-kun shirts (AGAIN) so I still don't have one (I like its design less than the other two, but I still wanted to get one; I should have bought it before the show was over, because as soon as it ended the merch stand got swamped). Additionally, since I drove from south of LA (took about 7 hours) I just barely made it in time, and walked in as soon as the show started (actually it looks like I missed Blues Drive Monster). That meant I had to stand right near the entrance. I wish I coulda got closer.

Even worse, though, was that after the show was over, I was waiting around outside with my copy of Kool Spice for about 30 minutes hoping they'd come out eventually and sign it. The crowd eventually dissipated until I was the only one still there, and it was freakin' cold. Then, I saw some activity behind the doors - some guy came up and super-locked the doors with a chain and a lock among other things, effectively stamping out my hopes. I waited around for several more minutes, but it looked like they were probably loading up behind the building (which was chained off, with a guard). Eventually the cold combined with the uncomfortable feeling of being in a potentially sketchy part of a town that I don't know got the better of me and I left. Disappointing, but there's always next year.

I think it's a lot more fun to bring older albums for them to sign, because they make great comments. Manabe was like "Oooh, Living Field! Where did you get it?" and Sawao was all "Hehe, this is very old album." Shin-chan didn't even blink cause he is such a badass. Last year they made similar statements when I brought PML.

Oh, and I read some people whining about how Sawao mentions furi kuri... well, he says "Do you like furi kuri?" and then the crowd cheers, and he says "Well then here is the furi kuri song" or something like that. I think this was actually a good thing for him to say since ROSS is to my knowledge the only song that was actually written for the show, and he did this to distinguish the pillows from the anime a bit. It's good that they played so many My Foot songs, as well as the two Penalty Life ones; they're surely aiming to get the people into their other music rather than just the anime soundtrack. Unfortunately I didn't get a very good vibe from most of the other show-goers... buncha newbs!

I just saw some kid's pictures on LJ. Sawao was using a new guitar I see. Squire '51 in maple. Indivi is telling me that the Cyclone was giving out. [i]I wonder why, LA?[/i]