Sean Lennon @Mercury Lounge
October 10, 2000
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Sean Lennon (click each one for larger pic)
There were so many people lining up in front of the Mercury Lounge when I got there at 9:40pm. They were all the people who were waiting to hear Sean Lennon!
I saw Timo first and said hi. I said "hey Timo, this flower is for you!" and then tried to get one out of three sunflowers I was holding. I somehow tied them up really tight, so it took us a while to cut the ribbon with Timo's keys. I felt kind of silly standing there, trying to get one sunflower out, but it was fun actually. I'll never tie up flowers that tight, though. I swear.
I saw Yuka talking to her friends on the line too. I said hi to her and she said "Hey Sujin!" and we talked for a few minutes (or secounds)about the Cibo Matto Message Board eating up messages lately. Yuka herself comes to the message board and posts info about their(Sean, Timo, Yuka and other Cibo related people) shows and talks about music and stuff. Actually, she was the one who let people know there would be two Sean Lennon shows in October on the Cibo Board, so people on the board(aka o/g club people) knew the info way before!( haha. jealous? if you are, come to the Cibo Matto Message Board and join us.)
Once we( people call us audience) got into the venue, we had to wait a little bit more peeking at the band sound-checking. Sean, Yuka(on keyboard), Timo(on guitar), Japa(on drums) and David Muller(on bass) were the members of Sean's band that night.
Sean was wearing a brownish colored T-shirt and Yuka was wearing a T-shirt saying "I love Slayer". When the show started, Sean said, "It was my birthday." and we said, "Happy birthday"/ "woohoo!". Sean started the first song saying " We are going to play new songs tonight. no one has ever heard them yet except my band, and my mom."
Here is the set list he played that night.(exactly from the list Sean had.)
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Yello Moon Spaceship End of the W Burger #1 an encore:Dream |
Yello Moon and Day Dream were sweet and beautiful songs. School Bus had a fun rhythm and guitar play. Forgettable may be one of the most beautiful songs by Sean Lennon, I think. It sort of reminded me of a song called Betty by a swedish group whose name i cannot remember for right now. Sean mentioned each song's title before he played. He joked a lot and seemed to be very excited to play his new songs. when the part of "now get creative and make some noize"came( he didn't say that though. it was for the band themselves. of coures, the set list is not for audiences, what am I trying to saying??), each member of the band started creating weird and strange "avant-garde"sound which was so cool. (imagine something wilder than the later part of Mystery Juice) It was like they created a some kind of unique space with their sound, if you know what I mean. It felt like the sound was all over the places and started wrapping up your body. Before he played Spaceship from Into the Sun, he said," we are going to play an old song from my debut album, it's called Spaiceship. it's going to be the only song we will play from Into the Sun." and the audiences went like,"uhhh~~" with a little bit disappointment not being able to hear more of his old songs. Sean added, "I'm sorry if there is an English here, I don't mean to mock Englishes. it's just my habit.":-) I liked End of the World a lot. it was a song which proved Sean is a metal head. Don't forget to listen to it carefully when Sean's new album comes out! For the last song, he introduced it with saying " This is our last song tonight, it's called Burger #1. it's a temporary title, and actually it's a beautiful song and it deserves a better title." and Timo said "Cheese burger." Sean turned around to Timo and said "Yeah, where were you, man?" We(still the audiences) were laughing and Sean said, "okay, he already got enough attention tonight."with :-). Burger #1 was a very beautiful song as he said. After that, they played an encore, Dream which is one of my favorite Sean songs.
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They said "thank you and good night." and left the stage. I wanted to see Sean after the show, so I follwed them. They disappered into a door which said "staff only", so I had to stop there. I was hanging around there for a while and I met Japa who played drums that night. He is a really nice person. I thanked him for signing my guestbook. I also saw Miho! I had expected to see her with Yuka and Sean at other shows before, but she was never there or I hadn't happened to see her at all, so it was a total surprise for me. "Hey, Miho!" I said and she said "hey!" She made an expression like 'hey you look familiar,but who are you?' so I said " I have been a lot of Cibo Matto shows, but it's first time to talk to you." Actually, I had said hi to Miho once last year when I came to NYC to see Sean Lennon/Cibo Matto show, but I don't think she remembered me because of that. maybe I looked like someone she knows or something. Anyways, Miho was really cool. she signed her autograph on my sketchbook and even made a little drawing of a girl's head with bubble which says"SUZIN"(actually, Z is supposed to be a J) floating above the head.
I asked if I could come in to see Sean, and she said it would be okay so I follwed her. Sean was there talking to his friends and people. I was waiting and when he finished talking, he gave me a hug and said,"Hey Sujin, thanks for coming." It was the first time for me to hear him saying my name, actually. so I thought, 'hey, he pronounces my name exactly right!' because...! there are so many people who mess up with my name. it would have sucked if he had said something like "hi Sunjin" or "hi Sujim" which I have heard so many times... but he did pronounce my name just fine and it was awesome.(don't understand? then go to a foreign country.) Anyway, I told him that End of the Worldis my favorite. We took a picture together and Sean left to talk with someone. I saw Timo and asked when his solo album is coming out since Sean said that Timo's solo album would be out soon on stage. Timo said that it would be three weeks or four weeks later. He said," if you want, I can play the CD for you. I have it with me now.." I was like" are you serious?" He said "sure but i will be right back, i have to talk to someone." Happily, I and my roommate( she is mentioned just now, but she was there with me the whole time even though she was really tired from mid-tems and stuff, Thank you, roomie!)were wating for Timo. Sean appeared in our(I and my roomie)sight again and I forced my roommate to ask Sean to get his autograph. She was too shy to talk to him. He said,"okay, I have a new version of my autograph." and he printed his new version very neatly. while he printed each letter with lots of care, he explained why he is taking a lot of time doing it. He said, " I met my favorite artist (he mentioned his name, but of course, I forgot, :-( who is a comic book artist, and he signed his autograph like this, so I asked, 'why take so much time on it?' and he told me that scribbled autograph is from an arrogant mind. so i thought yeah, that's right." Isnt Sean awesome? so that was why he got a new version of his autograph, which requires much more time.. This defintely shows what a humble and positive attitude he's got, doesn't it? I was looking at him finishing it and he looked at me and said,"okay, I'll do one for you, too." and once again, he took much time on it. Thank you Sean!!!
I saw Miho again and told her that I went to PS1 to check out the new Cibo songs. I asked her if Swords & Paintbrush would be on their next CD. She said they might do that, but she said she didnt know. Please! It is one of the best Cibo songs ever!
I went upstairs to look for Timo since he promised me to let me listen to his new songs. I was really curious, and I found him loading their instruments on a van. Timo said it would take 15 munites to finish it so I decided to wait a little bit longer because I knew that it was going to be worth it. All the members had to leave and Timo had to go with them, too. I felt like I was really eating up their time, so I told him that it's okay if he didnt have time for me. He said, " no, no, I promised you twice and you have been waiting, so you can just borrow it. just make sure you will give it back to me." I was like 'eh? he must be kidding me.' but he was serious. I told him that I would be able to give it back to him on thursday night show. and they left waving at me.
I listened to Timo's new songs over and over again when I got home and they are really good! Actually, I expected to listen to really heavy-rock like he played at his shows the other day, but the songs on CD are different from that! I loved them as well. Wow, how many new songs did I hear one day? it was too many songs and too much happiness for me, I guess. Thank you Sean, Yuka, Timo, Japa and David for the really good show!
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Timo Ellis on guitar(click for larger pic) |
Japa Keenon on drums (click for larger pic) |
I didn't get a good picture of Yuka since the automatic zoom camera I had always dreamed of! but it let me down just because I didn't think that it would be crazy to focus on moving subject matter with an automatic lense. oh well. do not forget to change the focus set up into manual. that's today's lesson.