I Just Read About That…

[ATTENDED: October 31, 2023] Japanese Breakfast

This was my third time seeing Japanese Breakfast. But more importantly, it was my first time going to a show on Halloween (that’s not true, I saw Skinny Puppy on Halloween in 1988), but this is my first time since I had kids.

I wasn’t sure we could pull it off–my daughter wanted to go trick or treating after all.  And I was willing to not go to this show.  If my daughter wanted us home, I would have happily stayed home.  Although this did promise to be a super fun show.  Costumes, a cool poster and the notification that this would be the last J Brekkie show for at least a year.

Zauner had shared her plans for her second book, mentioning the year-long hiatus she plans to take in Korea.  “I’m moving to Korea December 29th to live for a year and work on my second book where I am going to study the language and document that process,” she told Hsu. “And I think it was such a natural response to writing a book that was so rooted in the past and so much of what was hard about it was like it was so obviously emotional, but also it was hard to remember all of that.”

Our daughter gave us permission to go out and we arrived at the show in time to see the opening act. I could (should?) have waited on line for a poster (the above picture with a foil outline), but I decided against it.

Originally Hop Along was supposed to open but that changed at pretty close to the last minute.  (Well, they had enough time to make posters with the new band, Crooks and Nannies) on it.  I’m not a huge fan of Hop Along, but I do like the and was a little bummed at the loss.  But Crooks and Nannies proved to be weirdly delightful.

After Crooks and Nannies finished (at 8:30) it was a short wait and then a woman in a clown outfit came on.  It was comedian Sarah Sherman who Michelle Zauner said “insisted she come out on stage.” She did her routine which was funny and irritating.  And when she was done, Japanese Breakfast’s crew started setting up for their show.  I was sure that the comedian was  a way to distract us while the crew set up.  But instead, it was just a delaying technique.  J.B. didn’t go on until 9:45.  Good grief.

And indeed, it was Sherman who returned, this time dressed as Gollum, ready to introduce the band.  And when she did, it was revealed that the whole band was dressed like Lord of the Rings characters.  And there were clips from the movie (and cartoons and more) projected behind them for the whole show.

Michelle Zauner herself was dressed as the evil Saruman with a full wig/beard and everything.  She refused to take off the beard even though she said it was hard to sing with (it certainly didn’t impede her voice).   Her guitarist (husband) Peter Bradley was dressed as Gandalf (she chided him for taking off his beard pretty early on).  Her violinist/keyboardist Christabel Lin was Legolas, complete with pointy ears.  Keyboardist Craig Hendrix was a tree (an Ent, I suppose).  Even their guitar tech and drummer had costumes on although I couldn’t really make them out.

They opened with “Paprika,” probably my favorite song of theirs.  I love seeing this live because she smashes her gong over and over.  This time, she used her wizard’s staff to smash the gong, which lit up beautifully.  They followed it with “Be Sweet,” another of my faves–for me this was a front loaded set to be sure!

Even though this was roughly the same tour that my wife and I had seen back in 2021 (there’s been no real new music since then), the show wasn’t exactly the same.  Well, most of the same songs were played, just in a different order.

So the older songs “In Heaven” and “The Woman Who Loves You” were played right after.  Indeed, this show was longer than the previous one and there were more old songs thrown in.  I assume this was because it was a home town show and was the last for a year.

So after the delightful “Kokomo, IN” she returned to Psychopomp and then went back further for “Road Head.”

In the middle of the set, they played a new song, “Orlando in Love” which she said was going to be on the new album next year (this trip to Korea os for writing purposes).  They also played “Glider,” a song from soundtrack that she created for the game Sable.

Each time I’ve seen them, Japanese Breakfast has played a song from her first band Little Big League (usually Boyish).  Her bassist Deven Craige was also in Little Big League–he was Gimli the dwarf.  This time they also played “Lindsey” with special guest guitarist Kevin O’Halloran (who was in Little Big League).  She recalled playing shows with Little Big League at Kung Fu Necktie and the Khyber Pass and how much she hated Khyber: one show she was “electrocuted like 10 times.”

After a few more songs, the confetti cannons went off during “Slide Tackle” and we were right in the middle to get pocketsfull.

They ended the set with the wonderful “Everybody Wants To Love You” (my first favorite JBrekkie song) and then they left for an encore break.

Zauner came back out (still in costume) and performed “Posing for Cars” solo before the rest of the band came out for the instrumental outro.  Then they put a giant Eye of Sauron on the screen and ended the night with “Diving Woman.”

As the band left the stage, credits rolled naming everyone in the band and all of the crew.  It was a remarkably sweet touch, which I would have loved to watch, but we really did want to get home.

I’ve stolen this picture from Rockin the Burbs because it was much better than any of mine and I wanted everyone  to see some of the costumes

 

 

October 31, 2023  Fillmore	August 7, 2021  Union Transfer	June 3, 2018  Union Transfer
Paprika ♥	Paprika ♥	Diving Woman §
Be Sweet ♥	Be Sweet ♥	In Heaven ¶
In Heaven ¶	Kokomo, IN ♥	Road Head §
The Woman That Loves You ¶	Slide Tackle ♥	Machinist
Kokomo, IN ♥	Posing in Bondage ♥	Boyish (Little Big League song)§
Heft ¶	Savage Good Boy ♥	Heft ¶
Road Head §	Tactics ♥	Rugged Country
Boyish (Little Big League song)	In Heaven ¶	12 Steps
The Body Is a Blade §	The Woman That Loves You ¶	Triple 7
Orlando in Love [new]	Road Head §	Till Death
Glider ⊗	Ballad 0 (Bumper cover)
Tactics ♥	Boyish (Little Big League song) §	This House
Savage Good Boy ♥	The Body Is a Blade §	The Body Is a Blade §
Lindsey (Little Big League song) with Kevin O”Halloran	Everybody Wants to Love You ¶	The Woman That Loves You ¶
Jane Cum ¶	encore	2042
Posing in Bondage ♥	Posing for Cars ♥	Year of the Sunhouse (Little Big League song) with the original band lineup
Slide Tackle ♥	Diving Woman §	Lindsey (Little Big League song) with the original band lineup
Everybody Wants to Love You ¶		encore
encore		Everybody Wants to Love You ¶
Posing for Cars ♥
Diving Woman §		Little Big League: Ian Dykstra, Kevin O’Halloran and Deven Craige

⊗ = Sable soundtrack (2021)
♥ = Jubilee (2021)
§ = Soft Sounds from Another Planet (2017)
¶ = Psychopomp (2016)