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As the title of the festival says, we literally had beautiful days in Asagiri this year. We hear that there was a bit of heavy rain the day before the festival opened its door, when we got to the site, we found no trace of rain at all. It was not too hot nor too cold but lovely two days were waiting for us. Although the tickets were sold out within a couple of hours after they are on sale, it was not crowded at all, but some kind of laid back air was covering the whole of the area. I would have to mentioned that, still, there was an amazingly long line of people to wait for a bus to leave the site when the festival was closing the shows. Nevertheless we see no miserable faces from those who were waiting there, but lots of smiling faces were found as, we guess, they had such a lovely time in the festival. For the last couple of years, this Asagiri Jam has full of love and peace vibes all over and there is nothing to make complaint about except the weather once in a while, but sometimes I wonder what the people are coming here for. This basically is a festival with mainly music, but the tickets are sold out even before the line-up is announced. While the Fuji Rock audience constantly making a complaint about the line-up in the BBS of the fan site, fujirockers.org, we have never ever heard any complaint about Asagiri at all. I do not believe those who leaving a message in the BBS of fujirockers.org are the majority of the festival goers to Fuji Rock, the gap of the vibes in between Fuji Rock and Asagiri seems to be pretty huge. Surely there is a big gap on the price of the tickets, but considering the cost of getting to the site from major cities, the entire cost would not be that much different. Although the costing of accommodation is far lower as most of the people are camping here, then there would not be a big problem if one camps at Fuji Rock as well. Isn't it right? 
No matter what the reasons might be for Fuji Rock goers' complaints, getting to the site of Asagiri, nobody even wanted to talk about that boring money stories. Right in front of Mt. Fuji with beautiful air and unseen energy from the green, which is not much different from Naeba of Fuji Rock Festival apart from the existence of Mt. Fuji, we feel huge differences there. One of them might be the fact that none of an advertisement and banner of a multi-national corporations comes into our sight. Surely there is a big amount of money behind this festival if you consider the size and cost of it, there is no smell of commercialism at all. So many questions bubbling in my mind there, but so what? Let's have fun and chill out! Another one of myself in mind is shouting there as well.That's what people here are doing. In fact I have come across with a sight that even those who working here do not appear like them working really. Reflecting those factors, I guess, all of the musicians are chill out as well while giving amazing performances to us with full of lively vibes. How many times did I experience a moving moment through the festival? I was not running up and down in between the 2 stages, still I did have an incredibly moving experience while facing to some musicians on stage. One of them was Kazufumi Kodama, one of the ex-Mute Beat, a legendary reggae outfit in Japan, singing a song of the Nenes, an Okinawan chorus group, and his vocals and words tugged at my heartstrings direct and straight. The peak was the final tune, his version of a classic song, "Wonderful World" and so many people around me I saw teas in their smiling faces. Why are we here? Facing the sights of those smiling faces with tears of joy, I asked myself. The answer was nothing to do with music business at all, but, I guess, we are here to just to make sure that our lives are wonderful and beautiful as the festival says so. Yes, it really was a beautiful day there and that is the reason why everyone wants to come back here once one experiences this. |
Asagiri Jam - It's a beautiful day!
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comment by hanasan and photos by naoaki |
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over all photo documentary - hoya's version, naoaki's version & saya38's version |
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6th (sat) Oct Rainbow Stage Mad Caddies (review) Abd Al Malik Malajube (review) Hanaregumi (review) The Bays (review) The Cornelius Group Moonshine Stage Bagdad Cafe The Trench Town The Mattson2 The Pnuma Trio Tom Middleton Boys Noize (review) Takkyu Ishino Hexstatic (review) |
7th (sun) Oct Rainbow Stage A Hundred Birds Orchestra (review) Bettye La Vette(review) Yoshie Nakano Ozomatli (review) Soulive UA (review) Overground Acoustic Underground Moonshine Stage Kicell (review) Para Abe Duque Recloose Fridge Kodama Kazufumi with 1945 a.k.a. Kuranaka Very Be Careful (review) |
 mag files : Asagiri Jam Jam Special '06 : JAP / ENG (06/10/07 - 08) : photos by hiroqui, hoya, naoaki, & saya38Jam Special '05 : JAP / ENG (05/10/01 - 02) : photos by hanasan, hiroqui, saya38, keco, ikesan, sam & yusukeJam Special '04 : JAP / ENG (04/10/02 - 03) : photos by hanasan, ryota, sama & yusukereview (02/09/28 - 29) : review by akira noguchi, photos by hanasan & maki今年は雨 (02/09/28 - 29) : review by nob, photos by ikesanphoto report (02/09/28 - 29) : , photos by ikesan |
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The official site Asagiri Jam http://smash-jpn.com/asagiri/ The official supporters' site Asagiri Jams http://www.asagirijams.org/ |
check the albums? |