Magazine Archive

Home -> Magazines -> Issues -> Articles in this issue -> View

Trip Around The World

TOKYO

Article from Sound On Stage, March 1997


Sometimes doing shows even in a safe, socially constipated place like Tokyo can turn lethal without warning. I'm on my way to show number three of four Michael Jackson concerts at the Tokyo Dome. Anna has decided we will walk part of the way, because she wants to show me something. She is carrying the map for three reasons: she lives in Tokyo, it's her idea, and if you saw Anna, you would immediately understand that Anna gets anything she wants.

It's unusually warm here for late December. Anna is dressed accordingly, and I'm enjoying watching the chaos she leaves in her wake as we sail along among the Japanese businessmen. Suddenly we are at a dead end. We need to be a block over to the west, but there is no way through, except across an overgrown, bramble filled vacant lot, uphill over an intimidating stone wall on the far side.

"Follow me," says Anna.

Anna is Hungarian: 6 foot 4 inches in six-inch spiked heels, wearing fishnet stockings, and a white minidress ensemble; Botticelli saw her face as The Birth of Venus. She takes the underbrush and stone wall like a gazelle, and within seconds, we are standing in a well-tended garden at the rear of a large compound. As we make our way around to the front, I begin to notice security cameras, hidden in the trees, following our progress. The front of the building is a huge stone facade with two large, closed gates that are obviously locked. We are inside. There is no way out.

Suddenly, three Armani-suited men appear from nowhere.

"Can we help you?" they ask.

They mean 'Don't move'; even the dark sunglasses can't hide full-cammo eyes.

Anna reaches into her bag. That distinctive sound that can only be identified as small automatic weapons being unsheathed and safeties being flipped off screams through my brain. I say nothing — this is Anna's show.

"Ve are lost. He is vith Michael Jackson, und ve are in a hurry," she says in her usual Mata Hari as she pulls out the map. The muzzles of the Mac 10s lower just enough to let the blood flow back into my major organs.

Always carry production telephone numbers with you. One of the most sacred duties of a production manager is to produce bail money instantly, but a phone call and some tickets to the show are all we need to be on our way.

"Peasants," Anna whispers as she takes my arm. We hurry out the gate, past the sign that says 'Australian Embassy'. They will be rethinking their security arrangements in the wake of Anna — so will I.

THE BIG EGG



The Big Egg Dome in Tokyo is not one of my favourite places. I've done 15 or 20 shows here, and gave it up as bad juju after about the third one. It is one of those inflatable buildings, kind of an architect's love doll, where they ran out of money for a roof, so they built a bubble over it and pressurized the air inside to keep it up. It holds about 45,000 people. This compressed atmosphere always makes the PA behave strangely — the sound tends to settle on the floor like nerve gas on a battlefield.

I have delay towers up and I've done all I can so there isn't much else to do, but watch the crowd. Japanese audiences are the strangest of the developed economies. The strict regimentation of the society spills over into the way they act — even in the dark. They are enthusiastic, but they never get dangerously excited. At the end of the show, after house lights are up, they sit quietly — all 45,000 of them — and are dismissed in sections, a few hundred at a time. Try that in Italy.

I enjoy touring here. Clair Brothers Audio Japan have always taken good care of me. After a show, I like to go out with the Japanese crew, my friends Forest Green and Ito-san. They know all the strange little back streets with restaurants where you can eat things that have been on the endangered species' critical list forever — some are actually extinct — and animals you would never guess in a million years were even edible. The beer is good and copious, and so is the company. I learn how to say important things in Japanese like 'put a shim under that elk', but always forget it by the next morning.

I first came to Japan in 1974 with the Moody Blues. It was much different then. Between Douglas MacArthur and Led Zeppelin, we had these people pretty buffaloed. The Budokhan was the big venue, 8,000 seats, with the silliest load-in imaginable: straight down a 50 foot drop to the stage. There were no hanging systems so the place was impossible to cover, but it didn't matter; the screaming was so high pitched and so loud, you never heard the show anyway. It was just the vibe of the place.

There was a club called Byblos. Between the hot sake and the most cooperative women on the planet, they had us pretty buffaloed.

I've been back every year since and watched it change. The ascendency of the Japanese economy and the lacklustre performance of the West, economically and socially, during the '80s shocked the Japanese. These giant foreigners, who bombed them into submission and made the Emperor renounce his godhood, were apparently not the omnipotent beings they had come to fear and revere. For a while, it was downright unpleasant to be here. One could feel the contempt everywhere. Since then, their economy has gone down the tubes, and both of us have mellowed a bit, I think. We meet more on equal terms, more a mutual respect, although I still find them impenetrable at times — there are no real words for 'yes' or 'no' in Japanese, only 'I understand'. I still miss the bath houses though, but a respectable audio publication is no place to trot out those memories... or the photos.

Trip Khalaf is the Senior Engineer at Clair Brothers Audio and works with lots of famous people. He sometimes lives in the US, although he won't tell us where. He refuses to be photographed for legal reasons.


More with this topic


Browse by Topic:

Live



Previous Article in this issue

Feedback

Next article in this issue

The Power behind the Tone


Publisher: Sound On Stage - SOS Publications Ltd.
The contents of this magazine are re-published here with the kind permission of SOS Publications Ltd.


The current copyright owner/s of this content may differ from the originally published copyright notice.
More details on copyright ownership...

 

Sound On Stage - Mar 1997

Topic:

Live


Feature by Trip Khalaf

Previous article in this issue:

> Feedback

Next article in this issue:

> The Power behind the Tone


Help Support The Things You Love

mu:zines is the result of thousands of hours of effort, and will require many thousands more going forward to reach our goals of getting all this content online.

If you value this resource, you can support this project - it really helps!

Donations for June 2025
Issues donated this month: 0

New issues that have been donated or scanned for us this month.

Funds donated this month: £0.00

All donations and support are gratefully appreciated - thank you.


Magazines Needed - Can You Help?

Do you have any of these magazine issues?

> See all issues we need

If so, and you can donate, lend or scan them to help complete our archive, please get in touch via the Contribute page - thanks!

If you're enjoying the site, please consider supporting me to help build this archive...

...with a one time Donation, or a recurring Donation of just £2 a month. It really helps - thank you!
muzines_logo_02

Small Print

Terms of usePrivacy