This time, we slept in a bit and didn't get out the door until around 11:00. Our first stop was the vodafone shop. Our keitai (cell phone) was supposed to be fixed by this day, but we still had not heard from them. Turns out that it was ready, and we exchanged the loaner phone for our phone. The battery still needed to be charged, so before leaving the vodafone office, we plugged the phone in for a half hour or so and waited.

Since PanTan was full of manga that I read, the waiting passed fairly quickly.

It was about 13:00 by the time we headed to the eki to catch the densha to Tokyo. In Tokyo, we transferred to the Toukaidou line and headed into Kanagawa-ken. I was hoping to see a little of Fujisawa before we headed to Yokohama for the Far East Native (FEN) concert.

When we debarked at Fujisawa-eki, it was around 15:00. We found our keitai wasn't quite as charged as we thought, and I was expecting a call, so we found a place to plug it in for a bit. After that we went to a local gyudon (beef bowl) shop for lunch.

It turns out that most of the stuff I wanted to see in Fujisawa was near another eki further down, but we still had fun walking around and exploring this area of town. This area was evidently a "Fujisawa Culture Zone", or so it said on the metal tiles imbedded into the sidewalk. Some featured birds, and others insects. They were really quite pretty.  My picture doesn't do them full justice.

The tiles weren't metal, they were stone. We saw many of them along the sidewalk. There were also bigger murals in some areas on the sidewalk. 

We also found a cute conservation poster. In it a girl is getting ready to go out the door and all her appliances are telling her to turn them off. The table too... In Japan, most homes don't have central heat. People just heat the space where they are. Traditional Japanese tables often have a quilt over them and a heater under for comfort while sitting around the table.

After a while, we decided to go ahead and head to Yokohama, so we would have plenty of time to find the live house, Yokohama Guppy. 

It turned out that we didn't need much time at all. Between the directions and our map book, it didn't take us long to find it. We got there a couple hours early and found the band still rehearsing. We sat down and watched them rehearse. 

To start with, we weren't sure what direction to go, so two men tried to show us directions. One of them was black, and he was speaking Japanese on a slightly lower level than me. The other was a middle-aged looking man, and between the two we ended up taking even longer for us to figure out it was straight down the road. 

After they finished, we had an opportunity to sit down and talk with the band members. They were all very warm and pleasant to talk to.

KD-san, the bass player, and I had communicated before. We had met through his website's BBS. I was glad for the opportunity to speak with him in person. ^-^

Although I knew of Young-san, lead vocal and guitar, through the Far East Native website, this was the first time we'd met. He also was warm and fun to talk to. It was interesting trying to explain to him, in my not-so-perfect Japanese, the difference between Washington state, where I live, and Washington, DC. ^-^

We held up a menu, turned it on it's side, and pointed to two opposite ends. "Washington is over here," We'd say touching the upper left corner "And Washington DC is here." We'd say while pointing about mid-way on the right side. Every time a new person joined the table, we had to explain all over again.

Aso-san, the drummer, was a surprise. Even though I knew a lot about his career (member of Far East Native and Yoshiki Fukuyama-san's band, former member of Humming Bird and Meriken), I had no clue that Aso-san could actually speak a fair amount of English! I think he did as well with English as I did with Japanese... maybe better. ^-^

We found out that Aso-san's wife is an English teacher. 

While we were all talking, I had another big surprise: Yoshiki Fukuyama-san showed up and joined the conversation. 

Also with us was a friend of the band, who was later joined by her daughter. The daughter was 17, just like Eleanor, so the two of them had a lot of fun talking. When she first showed up, she was wearing a blond wig. After she took it off, Fukuyama-san and FEN's members had fun trying it on. A few days later, Fukuyama-san posted a few of the pictures on his website. ^-^

Chiho's wig. That was insane. Really insane.
She showed up wearing it, and everyone thought she had a make-over. She went along with this ruse until it started to slip a bit so she took it off to fix it again. Everyone was chatting and didn't really notice until I exclaimed. "Ah, it's a wig!" Then everyone couldn't get off the subject until they had done a bunch of pictures with the wig on.

Far East Native was actually the second band to perform that night. The opening act (I can't remember the name) played a kind of bluesy rock and didn't sound too bad. However, the band's lead singer started off drunk and quickly was working his way to totally blitzed. I certainly hope he wasn't driving home... he could barely stand! Mercifully, the act ended before he could reach the passed out stage, and they cleared their stuff away.

It was time for Far East Native.

Like the Colorado in Tama Plaza, the Yokohama Guppy was long and narrow, with the bar and counter on one side of the room and tables along the opposite wall, although this place also had a small balcony seating area. It also had a real stage area at the end of the room.

While FEN set up, a group of us grabbed the front two tables closest to the stage: the friend of the band and her daughter, Eleanor, I, Fukuyama-san, and Hasegawa-san, who I had met a couple nights prior at Morita-san's concert. (I had noticed that he had come in later, shortly before FEN was due to start.)

I had listened to the CBGB Boogie Woogie cafe internet broadcast of FEN's concert in New York - several times- so I was familiar with most of the songs they performed: Mama's Water, Hiroshima Fact File, Paradise,  Hara Kara No Uta (a personal favorite) and several others.

Hara Kara no Uta is my favorite song done by them. 
Before we came to Japan, we had played it pretty much every other night after dinner.

Seeing them live was even better than the internet broadcast. The sound mix was good, the performers in good form (and sober), and the energy level fully charged.

I spent half the time taking pictures on the balcony above.
I was afraid due to the darkness of the room, and the flashing lights, that I wouldn't come up with any real good pictures, but they turned out pretty good. Which is very much a Yay-factor.

Far East Native's members:
 Young (above), Aso (below), and KD (left)

Aside from the fact that FEN's music is just plain good rock, much of it also carries an underlying message of a desire for world peace (heiwa). That message also shows up prominently on the band's website and especially on KD-san's website.

There's a couple cool video clips of Far East Native on the "tracks" page of their website, but nothing can quite capture the excitement of seeing them perform live.

For the encore, I got a double treat as Yoshiki Fukuyama-san joined them, playing Young-san's guitar and singing harmony. ^-^  

For the encore, they called Fukuyama up to sing with them.
After he was up there, the place was really jumping. Between Fukuyama's fancy guitar work and FEN's songs, it turned out to be quite an incredible night.

Unfortunately they didn't play my Mom's favorite song, Heiwa, but the concert's heated passion made up for anything they left out. 

After the show, everyone hung around to laugh and talk for a while, but too soon it was time to head back. We went back to the eki. Hasegawa-san talked with us as we rode until we reached Shinjuku-eki. Then he headed north on one densha and we headed west toward Asagaya on another. It was the end of an exhausting, but extremely enjoyable day.

FEN Links: (Japanese)

KD's Website

Radio Blues City West

Boogie Woogie Cafe

Free Studio Shonan