[ I wrote this report from my memories, and by ah... listening to it again in my headphones as I type. Of course I mean by that that I remember so clearly it's ringing in my ears... especially if you're an official with Tokyo Cinema Club or SEXX who can arrest me. As E-Machine is more about the music and the band, unlike a solo performance when it focuses on one person and their whole attitude, the middle part of this is a review mainly on E-Machine's first music as I first heard it. Keep that in mind. Thanks! ]

Uguisudani. The location of Tokyo Cinema Club. The name is literally that - two kanji for Tokyo, three katakana - KI NE MA, and three kanji that don't appear to be anything but read properly spell KU RA BU. This left me utterly confused. The place is a breath away from the train station. For personal nostalgia reasons, I'll say I'd arrived alone, been alone, and spent my two and a half days in Japan thus far waiting for this moment. The night before I met Haruka for the first time since the Solo Live. I was waiting in Shibuya when I looked up and she was poking my shoulder! I squealed and we hugged and ran to SMOKER for our appointment in 15 minutes. Fifteen minutes to take the train one stop and sprint through a university and down the street. My hair had a week before been dyed a dark, lovely shade of crimson burgundy or some other lovely sounding color. But the expensive brand failed and my hair was almost orange again. Disappointing. My SMOKER bitches did the routine, having expected my hair this time. They attached the same beads Kenichi had attached... in fact they had a set already made up for Ken fans who passed through obsessively. As I waited for Haru to be finished, my hair sticking up and this heavy bead thing dangling, Yoshio Yokohara walked in - we lovingly call his ugly mug the POSSUM - he has always done hair for Iceman, Daisuke, Ken to this day... if you've seen any photos of Iceman backstage or Ken's feel nows, you've seen Yoshio. Oh my god... he's such a possum! I was honored to be there. Heh heh. Creepy geek be I.

I slept carefully, and rose the next day, simply waiting to go back into Tokyo's middle and be a creepy geek at Ken, not just his hairstylist. The time came. Uguisudani I went. I'd only learned that day of E-Machine's expensive goods. WHEE! We got to the place, which was coated in EM posters like whoa. We watched the bitchgirls set up toys and then bought them. My total: 6300 yen. Owch. But I got it all! Two phone straps, twelve postcards, and a CD. Mmmmm.

We ate some dinner (I got beef curry and was scolded for only eating candy for breakfast), and I doodled stupid things on napkins. Met some people. Met up with Mr. Tea, who spotted me at the Solo Live and said NOTHING, but who speaks fluent English, has followed DA Family since right around Access' (first) breakup, and thinks I am the best Ken cosplayer she ever saw! Wow! :D I learned some new things from her, including the cute fact that Japanese fans see Ken as DA's apprentice and best friend, as DA was to his "teacher", T.K of TMNetwork. The joys of fluency in my first language! We watched the crowd build immensely. Eventually there were so many of us they put up signs and divided us into massive groups that backed up to the train station and over a bridge. Apparently Kenichi with a New Band was a Very Special Thing! We would later discover we weren't the only ones who thought so...

Japan being Japan, this place is on the fifth floor of a building. So they called us up in droves, sent us up ELEVATORS, and we then handed over our tickets and crowded inside. There are four members in this band, right? A drummer in back, and three people up front. So naturally there was a giant crowd around the far right of the place... Ken's traditional side. SAD. So I SADly joined the idiots. I met up with my friendly friend the Snake from Solo Live! We were a happy group of people. We spotted Ken's old band members in the balcony and waved. They cutely sometimes waved back. Snake girl freaked and pretended to faint at this. She's quite fangirly! I chatted with Mr. Tea in English a bit... she had seen Kaori, Ken's old drummer, and thought it was D.K, so she was also panicking.

It all began very suddenly, with someone killing the lights. We cheered when a video screen rolled down (clever way to kill time, fuckers with only one single out, play an ass long video!, I thought!), and an ass long video began. It featured, in their words, Rehearsing, Photographing, and General Probe. This meant videos of the group playing in the studio, Yohei recording his voice onto the single (he was cute), getting their photos taken and struggling not to die as they made serious faces at each other, and milling around the very floor we were standing on, pointing at the stage and commenting on it. Which Ken really needed to do, you know, check out Tokyo Cinema Club's setup, seeing as how he didn't play there eight other times or anything. In between all of this were little interviews. Little Sharkie (Hideki, thus named for his hair... nobody has yet to disagree with my nickname for him) only answered "Daa", his grunt being translated with subtitles. Listening to this again, Yohei is really so dorky. He's dramatic about himself even just saying his name.  I wanted to punch all the Ken fangirls. This was the way it went:

Video- (panning around at the members... there's Ken in the corner for one second!)
Girls - (SCREAMING)
Video - (showing Kenichi again!)
Girls - (SCREAM!! SCREAM!!! KEN-CHAN!!) Remember, this is only a video.
Video - (interviewing Kenichi)
Girls - (simultaneously explode in bursts of blood and guts from too much screaming and excitement) This is only what I wish happened.

The video ended, screen rose, ominous music played. Flame effects started playing on the stage, it looked very neat. A powerpointish "Endorphin Machine" logo also showed up... the music became more junglebeatish. It was pitch black, but easy to see Mizue, Sharkie, and Ken walk out and mess with their instruments. Now the girls were really bursting my eardrums (right as Ken came out, of course), fuck damn it! But I felt happy. Ken looked like Wolverine from X-Men after a kill - his hair spiky, long, and kinda messy looking, in a sexy way. The way he was only visible by silhouette made him look like a scary beast man. BEAST MAN!! Yohei walked out last, wearing a GIGANTIC PINK FLOWER on his shoulder... I guess in some way symbolizing that the audience should be most hyped for the singer, but we'd had our moment when Ken walked out. Poor little Yohei. He's trying so hard to be popular!! But he was just never in Iceman!!! Sob sob moving on.

The dramatic music faded in the start of the first song. Be Myself Be Yourself..... This song's opening sounds so funny (in my opinion... it sounds better to Japanese people because they don't know how the English should really be said, maybe)... but after moving beyond it and getting into the general beat of it, the whole thing rocks. It's very...jamming, not to make a Ken pun... with a fast thrusting kind of beat, and a very loud drum backbone. I instantly noticed a difference in Kenichi's attitude, the second time seeing him. He was completely into this. He kicked and jammed down to his guitar solo, eliciting screams from the girls (and myself, I can hear). Yohei is a sight. My initial report the next day has this to say, and I won't bother rewording it. "His dance moves are a combo of Hiroyuki [Takami, of Access]`s hips, Kuroda`s sexy twists, and a stuck pig". His voice is very, very good though. Sharkie kept to himself at the drums (he seems like a shark of little enjoyment for attention). Shinichiroh, as usual, merely smirked and rocked out.

What am I saying? This live was already narrowing itself down to focus on Pink Flower and Wolverine. Beautiful Pain was the next song. What a good song. It's one of those not slow, but not completely insanely fast songs with plenty of English.  This is also a song they played at their Peggy Rock preview, and it was received very well. After the song, Ken introduced the band.. "Konbanwa. Hajimemasite, Endorphin-Machine desu." Endorphin-Machine, an English speaker might think, is said en - door - fin - ma - sheen. Well, you are WRONG! It's actually said en - door - ree - feen - ma - shin. Ken sure showed us English speakers something or two!!!! He asked how we were feeling and one girl screamed TANOSHII!!!! (FUN!!!) and Ken started dying in giggles. Ken asked us then how the weather was outside. We told him not so good (to which he went "Aaah" in that "Damn it" sort of way), but plenty of fireworks were about... he told us a hurricane was coming (was it?). Yohei then introduced himself as the vocalist, and said... plenty of things in very fast Japanese. Then Ken introduced (Shinichiroh) Mizue, who quietly said hello, and after that, Ken said this is our leader (ba ha), Hideki Mizue. Sharkie stood up and they all talked about him while he said nothing. Poor sharkie. Yohei and Kenichi batted around some conversation, Ken randomly strumming his guitar sometimes. This began the weird moments when you knew Yohei was cute as hell, and talented as well, but Ken was just better at this stuff. Yohei - we will gladly judge you for what your face looks like, not for what band you were never in and Ken was.

Any Kenichi fan might immediately assume they are about to play a song from Ken's solo works, "Tonight", as the next song, Tick Tock, begins. The opening is the same sounding guitar strains. Then drums feed into it.. and at least in the live version, Yohei kinda hums along in a cute way. He starts singing "tick, tick, tock"... but it sounds like "sweet sweet saa". Seriously, only re-listening and knowing the name of the song can I figure out that is what he is saying. There is more English I cannot for the life of me understand, but "time has gone, alooo~ooone" is in there..maybe..."alone...toki no naka de (in the middle of time)." Yohei really stretched out his vocal chords for this one, and Ken totally whammy sticked it... which he always does when its just not being called for, like during a slow song. This is a slow song!! But, it ends on a cute little guitar note. We all clapped respectfully as it ended, except for the few random chicks screaming "Ken-chan!!!!". I swear, next time I'm gonna scream "HIDEKI-CHAN!!!" and everyone willl stop dead, and Sharkie will have a heart attack.

Please Don't Be Blue began. This song sounds like an anime ending theme... I can just picture Inu Yasha and Kagome, or Pikachu and Ash, or somebody walking slowly through a field or staring angstily at the stars, like in every single (most) anime ending theme. "Please don't be blue..... I want to see you... you cut my best away..." sounds like the English. Yohei really killed himself again, rattling his throat... this song was all about him. The guitar in the middle is incredibly perky little strains of cute sounding notes that Ken plucked out carefully. At certain points Yohei strained so much he sounded like he was attempting to sing opera. Poor little never in a band with Daisuke boy (I wonder how many times I can word that dying joke differently..). After Please Don't Be Blue, there was an awkward pause and Yohei walked away. We kinda chatted until the spotlight shone suddenly on Ken. "Ehhhh..." he said, in that wacky kind of way, as he groped for something to say. He had been drinking water. He blinked and said sorry, I'm trying to drink. The spotlight went off and we cracked up. We could still see him chugging it. Then it turned back on. "Ehh..." again. He said now there were only three people. Duh. He then went into the concept of Endoropheen Mashin... "More Happy". He translated a little...shiawase is happiness... and then promptly started arguing with Mizue about how wrong that sounded. Poor Mizue hadn't even been part of this conversation Ken was having with himself!

Ken: (with confidence) More wa....motto. MOTTO HAPPY.
Mizue: Motto...??? (sounding dead confused)

They argued about Happy, saying Happy as much as possible, maybe three times every sentence. Mizue listed what makes him happy, in that list being lives and delicious food. Ken asked us about Happy. When are we happy? Ima (now)??? We replied IMA!! Ken giggled, "Ima happy." Yes Ken, ima happy. Finally Ken just said "Ja, kitte kudasai (So, please listen), Happy." in that final way that meant NOW I WILL SING IT! We screamed. That's all we wanted dude, you didn't need to argue about it!! He proceeded to jam down to Happy, by the Rolling Stones, covered by Ken in a VERY Mad Soldiers way (so Mads that I wonder if Daisuke did the original backing for it...). A true Ken fanatic knows it was a Rolling Stones encounter as a teen that prompted Ken to first buy a guitar. How special! Yes, he also sang this song at the solo live. All in bad English. Lyrics are here, if you are interested in what Ken mangled. Uh... and I mean....seriously mangled. Only reading the lyrics can I sort of figure out what he was trying to utter. Sure, he sounds really good singing it but... it totally ruins the experience if you know what the words really are. I think Ken is like me... singing another language, he just says what he hears, without necessarily knowing or understanding if it's correct. So being no better than him... I still love that guy.

Yohei re-emerged wearing a cute little shirt that looked as tho it had been stolen from Kuroda's private closet. NO Yohei! NOT Iceman member! BAD Yohei! But it was cuter than the horrid pink flower and droopy suit. Yohei looks better in streetish clothes. Element began. It sounds downright... like a Kuroda solo song! WTF? It really does seem that when writing it, Kenichi was seriously inspired by his old bandmate. Still, it is rather catchy. "Doo mash the halibut" sounds like the English Kenichi blurts out. Um... I'm hoping I'm wrong about that. The middle guitar solo just completely continues to remind me of a Kuroda song. It's rather scary. And meaningless if you've never heard Kuroda's solo music... which is basically completely different from anything ever done by Daisuke or Ken. Thus, I was surprised but pleased by this un-Kenlike, refreshingly different song.

As Element ended, Ken was again caught off guard. The spotlight went to Yohei as Ken wiped his sweaty brow with a towel. Yohei, not knowing what to say in a completely unscripted moment, just kinda went "Ee...er...uhhh..." and the spotlight was back on Ken, still preening. He looked startled and held up his towel, giving it a little mock commercial with a big commercial actor grin. Crackup. Applause. Ken and Yohei bantered back and forth, Yohei sounded very dramatic as Ken kinda chortled and chuckled his way through it all, making faces and showing off his tallness. Yohei introduced the song SPIRAL as "Spilal". The opening is downright creepy, but it feeds into a rocking fast paced song... "Born, to, be, SPIIIILAA~AAAL!". Learn your R's and L's, Japanese children. Of course it's Ken singing the spilal thing.... poor guy. The song features a nifty guitar noise that sounds like it's SPIRARLING down. Very clever, very clever, you Japanese dudes.

Ken ended, "Domo arigatou." (mad gigging from Ken). Shit, he giggled a lot. He giggled at everything. He tried to get Sharkie to talk, ordering him to speak, to no avail. This elicted more giggling. AGAIN he and Yohei bantered back and forth. Ken often broke into song, and pouted. I swear, this man is fucking Mr. Godamned Multiple Personalities of the year. At some point Kenichi forgot some very important information, looking stumped as Yohei and the audience goggled. He remembered whatever it was, screaming OOOOH HAI HAI HAI!! (mad laughter). What the fuck dude. Yohei finally shut him up, introducing The Super Star. Mizue totally rocks the opening with some deep, deep bass guitar. I distinctly remember this song being one of the most impressive the first time around. English... "Boy is Super Star, Super Star"?? Maybe. Maybe this is a song about Yohei totally wishing he was Ken. Again Mizue and Hideki totally rock the middle with a sweet, sweet bass/drum solo. Then Ken gets his solo (or else the fangirls might have rioted)... but it was all about the bass and drum solo, people, you know it. Sadly the most easily remembered thing at the end of this song was the chicks freaking the hell out. Yeah, it was rocking.

"Tanoshii wa." "TANOSHIIIIIII!". The vote on The Super Star was unanimous. We loved! Ken kept on repeating himself about tanoshii, then Yohei blurted too close to the mic "NE! TANOSHII.", exploding the world. Yohei told us this would be the last song. EEEEHHHHH? Oiiiii! Mada!!! Yeah, sure, fucker, you bands always do Encores. Always. But we acted so scandalized anyway. Ken decided to teach us some English... "One, two, sree, four, five, six, seven...yeh yeh yeh~" (this was semi-sung, confusing the fans who had never heard the song...which was almost everyone)....he said this was no countdown. It was a countUP! Poor Ken doesn't know that "count up" is actually not good English, so countdown is better, even if it makes no sense. Make sense? Yeah... Anyway, he seemed to feel bad about his "mistake". Sweet. 1-10 ~ your dream countdown started differently from the recorded version, with a little techo thing in the opening. Yet it goes without saying... this is my favourite E-Machine song thus far. It rocks, it's bouncy, and during it, Kenichi got so worked up he spun in circles (Fate Weather style), nearly kicking Yohei's ass off the tiny stage. It seemed Ken was thinking of a time when he was on a BIG stage. At this moment I went insane and joined the other fangirls being a really big loud dick about Kenichi. Yohei was also into it, so much that he was nearly singing opera again. Jeez, I just love this song! Seeing it live absolutely rocked my world. Not that I had heard it before this concert... that's not legally possible... (looks shifty) Moving on... Yohei forgot to start the "countup" once and kinda trailed in at seven, looking sheepish. How adorable, for a guy who was never in Ic... I give up. Ken joined in once singing in his lovely falsetto. They ended it slowly, dragging, dragging, dragging... and that was it. I yelled YAAAAAAAYYY!, the only yay amongst the "Ken-chan Ken-chan Itooooooo!" etc. My Snake friend was fanning herself after they left, whimpering "Kakkoii...kakkoii..." (So cool, so cool...). We lamely clapped, I yelled for an Encore, and my Japanese posse also screamed (in English with me!) for an encore.

Encore indeed. They paraded back on, much to our dellighted. Ken again made sure ..."Tanoshikatta desu ka?" Was it fun? We assured him, so he told us September 23rd (two months from then) would be the next E-Machine live. He played around with his guitar a bit more, and they promised us a second single on the same day. How More Happy (pardon my English) we became. Yohei dramatically said "Be Myself Be Yourself.." as the song faded in. OMG YOHEI YOU ARE JUST SO COOL not. So they played their main song once more, we jammed down, once more. Ken bounced more crazily, going nuts on the whammy stick. After, Ken told us to come to the second live, and it was nice meeting us! Sharkie was the last off. He kinda poked back on and made a little hand gesture at us. We screeched. Then, it was over, this time for real. Poor me had been spoiled by the Solo Live where Ken did two encores. Poor, poor me. D:>>

I got my drink and we filed out slow as hell, having no goods table to mill around or guitars to stare at this time, we grouped together outside. A buttboy was handing things out, and I took one of his papers. I saw it was an advertisment for the announced E-Machine live... and... something? The kanji for Utage?!! Banquet?! NO FUCKING WAY?!?! Mr. Tea confirmed it. Ken was having another banquet in a month. I DIED. I was SO fangirly and happy. Oh my god, I still am. I thought he said he was NOT doing more solo activity for a while! I spent two thousand dollars to see him in March thinking it was my last chance to get soloness out of him! God, god, god! It was a happy moment. We did photoshoots, filled out comment sheets, watched fangirls chase "Michihiro Kuroda" (or so everyone had claimed to see) down the street (which doesn't shock me, that he probably came... I would be curious too), and I floated as Mr. Tea. her friend, Haruka, and myself went to Jonathan's for dinner. Here I learned Mr. Tea about American DA Family fan customs and beliefs. She was QUITE learned!

Alone, I returned to Ouji, without much to look forward too at this point. I was alone for four more days, with little money, and nothing but expensive internet, and my new single. So I listened, and started my countdown to.... the TERRIBLE BANQUET OF KENICHI ITO! Coming soon...?

Overall - they did well, I was impressed, I look forward to more. WELL DONE, ENDOROPHEEN MASHIN!! Thanks for a wonderful night.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Set List
1. Be Myself Be Yourself
2. Beautiful Pain
3. Tick Tock
4. Please Don't Be Blue
5. Happy
6. Element
7. SPIRAL
8. The Super Star
9. 1-10 ~ your dream countdown
En. Be Myself Be Yourself
 

Happy
Rolling Stones

Well I never kept a dollar past sunset,
It always burned a hole in my pants.
Never made a school mama happy,
Never blew a second chance, oh no

I need a love to keep me happy,
I need a love to keep me happy.
Baby, baby keep me happy.
Baby, baby keep me happy.

Always took candy from strangers,
Didn't wanna get me no trade.
Never want to be like papa,
Working for the boss ev'ry night and day.

I need a love to keep me happy,
I need a love, baby won't ya keep me happy.
Baby, won't ya keep me happy.
Baby, please keep me

I need a love to keep me happy,
I need a love to keep me happy.
Baby, baby keep me happy.
Baby, baby keep me happy.

Never got a flash out of cocktails,
When I got some flesh off the bone.
Never got a lift out of Lear jets,
When I can fly way back home.

I need a love to keep me happy,
I need a love to keep me happy.
Baby, baby keep me happy.
Baby, baby keep me happy.