Ordinarily, I avoid music festivals like the plague. You see, I have a bit of a phobia about large crowds. … But for you, dear reader, I overcame my phobia this year and headed down to Japan Nite, part of Austin’s annual South-by-Southwest (SXSW) film, music, and interactive technology exposition.
Unfortunately, I missed the first show by Jinny Oops!. It’s really unfortunate, because their music seems fun and upbeat, and I’ll bet they put on a good show. But I managed to see all of the other bands – Riddim Saunter, Okamoto’s, Red Bacteria Vacuum, Omodaka, Chatmonchy, and Dolly.
Here is a slideshow with all of the pictures I took accompanied by “TOKI” by Jinny Oops!:
For some higher resolution images, you can go to the Japan Nite set on my Flickr account.
And for you Chatmonchy fans, here is their performance of “Smoke of Love” (恋の煙 – Koi no kemuri).
Chatmonchy “恋の煙” (Smoke of Love) LIVE at Japan Nite 2010 from Austin Otaku on Vimeo.
Based on the feedback I got from my fellow audience members, the real breakaway performances of the evening probably went to Riddim Saunter, whose CD’s sold like hotcakes shortly after their performance; the Okamoto’s, whose 19-year-old lead singer had the stage presence of Mick Jagger and Jim Morrison; and Omodaka, whose music should’ve gone over like a lead balloon in a club like Elysium, but actually swept up the crowd and had them dancing.
On a personal note, I now have a crush on Red Bacteria Vacuum, who I bought a round of drinks for and took pictures with. In all seriousness though, they were a really fun group of women.
