I know this is supposedly a blog about solitary outings and what may come of them, yet not only did I write a whole post about a strange date, but now I am starting an entry about going to events with friends…
Pardon my betrayal. I have to admit it: I do have friends. Although, in my defense, the protagonists of today’s story have never really been my friends, and I am no longer talking to them…
Let's start anew and pretend this blog is a travel guide for edgy night owls visiting Japan. Even better, let's consider this entry a dissuasion from having friends and proof that, at the end of the day, you will be better off going out on your own. Or not?
As I mentioned in an earlier post about VENT, I was planning to attend the Mutek festival with Banana, the German guy who offered me a free ticket. He somehow met the event organizer one night while he was drinking alone at a random bar. I suspect he would have much more material than me if he were to write his own nightlife-themed newsletter.
A few days before the event, I got a text from him telling me that I should invite a friend because he had not one but two spare tickets. Apparently, he had already purchased his own ticket when he met Mutek’s organizer. At the time, I didn’t really have any actual friends in Tokyo, but I thought about Tomato, a woman I matched with on Bumble and with whom I had hiked Mount Takao the week prior. Since she seemed open to trying new things, I asked her if she would be interested. She was indeed.
I met up with Tomato a bit before the event. We were supposed to grab something to eat, but she was more than 20 minutes late (the second time that happened in three meetings), and by the time she got to Shibuya, Banana was already asking me where we were on a famous chatting app. Since we didn’t have time for a proper dinner, we decided to walk towards the venue and improvise.
It was my first time in the nightclub area of Shibuya, and the whole Spotify O-West, O-East, and O-Nest setup was very puzzling. We eventually found the right entrance, but Banana was nowhere to be found. As mentioned in the VENT entry, Banana is a klutz, and that night he did not disappoint.
It took him 10 minutes to figure out where we were because he went to the wrong venue. When he finally reached us, the first thing he told me was that he had made an even bigger mistake. The ticket he purchased for himself was not for the Saturday event but for the Friday event of the Mutek festival. He missed the event and would have to pay for a new ticket (he wasn’t going to ask Tomato to give back her ticket, after all). I thought about the fact that he somehow never realized that the 8th and the 9th were indeed two separate dates: Friday and Saturday, 金曜日と土曜日. Perhaps that’s why the event organizer gave him two free tickets for Nocturne 3; he probably understood that Banana’s pre-purchased ticket was for Nocturne 2.
I honestly can hardly believe how bad he is with scheduling. Seriously. Fun fact: Banana is a scientific researcher. Very reassuring.
Apparently, he did not mind much having missed the previous evening’s concerts and having to purchase a new ticket, despite the fact that a Mutek ticket was worth 7000yen. To this day, I have not attended any single night event as expensive as that in Japan. Even the all-day-all-night festival I later attended in May was only 4,000yen.
Banana was hungry; we were too, so we went to Lawson to get some snacks before the show. We then went to Spotify O-East, where Mutek was happening.
Mutek (Nocturne 3)
Spotify O-East, Shibuya City, Dogenzaka
At the entrance, Tomato and I flashed our QR codes and were immediately asked to add 700yen to get drinking tickets. I somehow missed that during my first two live events, but yes, in Japan, you often (if not most of the time) have to pay for one drink in addition to your concert ticket. Some have told me that it’s to pay the live houses, while the ticket pays the event organizer and the artists; others have told me that it has something to do with a convoluted Japanese law about bars and music venues.
Spotify O-East is a fairly large venue. Everything there is pitch black—the floor, the walls, the ceiling, the mezzanine, and the stage… It might not actually be completely pitch black; I just have the memory of a very dark space. Very chic, I guess.
There are handrails (for lack of a better word) in the middle of the mosh pit—not great for pogos but practical if you get tired in the middle of a show and want to rest while standing.
Mutek’s program was going to last more than three hours, so I figured it might be best to actually sit. They had chairs on the mezzanine, next to the bar, but 10 minutes before the beginning of the show, they were all taken already. Given my chronic fatigue and my latent grumpiness (consequences of the event I attended the day before), I found myself excessively annoyed at the idea that I would have to stand the whole time.
Banana wanted to get in the front, despite being 186cm and towering over everyone else in the venue, and that’s where he went while Tomato and I stayed in a corner near the locker room, where there was enough space to sit on the floor. Yes, I sat on the floor. And I was wearing a miniskirt, too. Thankfully, I had tights on that day.
The artists performing that night were Black Boboi + Yanneek, Ida Toninato & Pierre-Luc Lecours, Phew & Oren Ambarchi + Akiko Nakayama, 404.zero.
Each musical act was accompanied by a visual artist’s display on a screen at the back of the stage. From what I’ve been told, in Montreal they have 3D projections, and the audience members get to lie on super comfortable pouffes. Knowing that, I was obviously extremely disappointed, but it was free for me so I should be grateful. I couldn’t help but think about the More than Music event I was missing, and of course, Mango would later try to instigate FOMO in me for not attending (which is not cool at all).
As I write these lines, I realize that recounting my Mutek experience might not have been the best idea, because I somehow forgot almost everything about the music and the art. Yeah, it’s bad. Thankfully, almost everything is documented on the internet nowadays and I simply checked Mutek’s wesite and social media to remember.
The music was actually very decent—quite experimental but not boring. Unfortunately, I'm not cool enough to fully appreciate electronic music, and even if some of the visuals were cool, I am old school and I have an aversion to digital art. This is why the act that stood out for me was Phew & Oren Ambarchi + Akiko Nakayama. Nakayama’s ink work was absolutely mesmerizing. I could spend a whole day contemplating drips of colorful ink clashing and mixing.
Banana would join us between each act to chat a bit. At first, he seemed a bit wary of Tomato (and vice versa, I guess), but they eventually found an opportunity to break the ice during one of my numerous restroom breaks. A girl needs to wash her hands often to stay healthy, you know.
No much stood out in our mundane conversations. I did mention the free shots incident from the night before, and they seemed mortified. All foreigners do when I tell that story, which makes me feel worse each time I bring it up.
Thanks to Banana’s deliciously broken English, Tomato and I mistakenly understood that he as studying 9 hours of Japanese every day. Mind blowing given he was supposed to work fulltime in a laboratory… Of course he meant 9 hours a week, which is a fair amount too.
Other than that, it’s a blur. I never cared much about these two… They were curious and adventurous, but their personalities were bland.
After three hours of lukewarm creative experimentations, we decided to get something to eat. I still wonder why I went along with that idea; it was already past 11pm, and I did not care so much about spending more time with them. Still, we went to an izakaya in the middle of Shibuya to eat horumon1, offal. Now that I mention it, I realize that these two are some of the rare non-Japanese people I know who gladly eat offal. Which is a shame. French cuisine also has a long tradition of eating innards, but kids nowadays are not adventurous anymore; most of the people I know only eat Western standardized and bland food.
After our speedy meal, Tomato and I had to catch the last train. She went to the opposite direction, which I found surprising given that the line she was taking was next to mine. She later admitted that she made a mistake but somehow did catch her train. Lucky girl, I guess?
Afterwards, Banana told me he would like to hang out with me and Tomato again. I realized then that he might be one of those yellow fever guys (Tomato is of Chinese descent). I am always surprised to discover that even the guys who technically did not choose to go to Japan somehow still have a very strong preference for Asian women. Which is fine, but curious. Then again, as one of my closest friend’s boyfriends would say, “You don’t enter a ramen restaurant to order pizza.”
I know some people might find that offensive, and irrelevant in this case because Tomato is not Japanese. And perhaps Banana just wanted to make more friends. It doesn’t matter much anyways. I myself have since adopted a Japanese men only dating habit, which obviously has not been working out for me, but I am used to playing life in hard mode. I wouldn't have anything to complain about if I didn't, right?
I would later meet Banana once, without Tomato, for a nice daytime outing I will not recount in the newsletter because there is not much to dwell on. Our friendship then ended when I bailed on him last minute after an incident that made me realize that I absolutely did not want to hang out with Tomato ever again. That too will be omitted, but I still have one more story to tell about her…
Atmosphere: darkness everywhere/10
Music: I forgot/10
Beverages: what is a drink ticket?/10
Final judgement: I am not sophisticated enough to really enjoy this.
Horumon is the term commonly used in restaurants to describe offal meat. It sounds like “hormone” but the word supposedly orginates from Kansai dialect 放る物 (hourumono), “discarded goods”.