Chrome Family Concert in Japan 2014
I had the good luck of being able to be in Japan for the 1st Chrome Family Concert. I had arrived at the Shinagawa Prince Cinema, where the concert was held (Stellar Ball) around 7am.
Clearly I was very early, so I hanged around the area in the Shinagawa district till approximately 10am, when members of HeartPop, Crayon Pop’s Japanese fanclub arrived to begin preparations for the concert. Eiichih-san was among the group and he passed me the tickets (including mine) for me to hand out to two Korean fans who had won the CrayonPop.me ticket give away.
Despite the language barrier, I had an enjoyable time trying to help out whenever I could. I was also given a HeartPop towel as a gift from Eiichih-san, which was made by HeartPop and sold to fans at the venue for ¥1000.
After hanging up the banners, along with some female fans from K-Much JP, a staff member came to inform them that they had to remove it.
Approximately at 11am, Crayon Pop arrived in a coach bus, and Choa, Soyul, Geummi and Ellin alighted first, followed lastly by Way. The rest of Chrome Ent. (K-Much, Bob Girls and Zan-Zan disembarked, along with Manager Suh and CEO Hwang followed suit.
Many fans gathered all with varying levels of outfits.
HeartPop also made 2 banners for fans to sign on giving their messages to the Chrome Ent. artists.
It seems due to school, a portion of the fandom was not able to attend the earlier session, which had approximately 200-300 fans showing up. Although the gates were supposed to be open at 1pm, we were not let in till quite a bit later, but apparently it was a common thing based on the Japanese fans’ experience. We were finally let in according to our zone, and ticket number. Zones went from AA, AB, BA, BB. And there was a 2nd floor where there is seating. I had AA27, so I got in fairly early, and got to be in the 2nd row. While walking to the concert venue, we see all the congratulatory flower wreaths by Heart Pop and K-Much JP.
When the concert started, Dahye from Bob Girls and Ato from K-Much were the MCs along with a Japanese MC. The concert started with K-Much performing “Good to Go”, “I’m sorry” in their SWAT team attire. There were a few female fans from Korea and Ato constantly winked to them. BornUs loved to lip bite and looked like he really enjoyed himself dancing on stage. Being the 1st time seeing them perform, they were pretty good, and I enjoyed the performance.
Bob Girls were next. Yujeong was still wearing sunglasses. They performed “No Way” and “Oh My Boy” in their white jackets. I felt Jina looked particularly pretty in person. After their performance, Dahye and Ato carried on MC-ing. Ato had changed into a suit with shorts.
Next up, was Zan-Zan, who seemed to be particular loved by Japanese fans. They performed “Chicken Feet” and “잔치”, where the crowd responded to parts of the song with ‘Zanx10. Mingu also introduced himself as the visual of the group, to tremendous applause and laughter.
After the performance, Dahye and Ato were back out to MC, along with all members of Chrome Ent out on stage, with Crayon Pop making their 1st appearance in their Uh-ee outfits. Five fans were drawn from the crowd and they were asked what was their favorite dance move from any member in Chrome Ent’s lineup. People did Ellin’s Dancing Queen’s ‘lonely dance’, Way’s Uhee’s ‘floor kick’; while 1 quick-witted fan said Zan-Zan’s 잔치’s ‘Zanx10’ part where he got the crowd to respond, and another said Mingu’s ‘visual of Zan-Zan’ part. Each member of Zan-Zan hugged the Japanese fan out of gratitude. A Japanese female won it overall, and got to take a Polaroid shot with Crayon Pop.
Bing Bing’s MV was aired followed by another short Ato and Dahye MC speech. It was then announced that Crayon Pop will be making their Japanese debut sometime in early 2015, along with a mini album that would include a new untitled song (Bbyong Song) and all their previous songs and new EDM remixes on 14 Nov 2014.
In what was the finale, a chaotic thing happened. A “Bar Bar Bar” remix was played (first seen at the Hallyu Dream Concert), however when it was supposed to be the beginning of “Bar Bar Bar”, a remix version of “Uh-ee” was played. The members looked confused too, but they quickly recovered by gathering the crowd and dance portions of it that were contiguous. The rest of the Chrome family came out to round up the show.
Overall the first session was a bit disappointing due to having so little Crayon Pop in it.
After a quick lunch/dinner break with another Australian fan, we got into the concert again. There were way more fans this time.
This time, my ticket number was AA88, so I was approximately in the 4th row. An estimate of about 500+ fans attended the concert. We started off with K-Much doing “Good to Go”, followed immediately by Bob Girls’ “No Way”. Zan-Zan then followed up with a cover song displaying their amazing live vocals, and “잔치” in their white attire. Bob Girls came out again, now in their “Oh My Boy” outfit and performed “Oh My Boy”.
Dahye and Ato came out to MC, and next it was Kiu’s solo, followed by Zan-Zan in black attire singing “Chicken Feet”, and another Japanese cover.
Ato and Dahye came back again to MC, and Crayon Pop was next, performing “Bing Bing”, “Saturday Night”, “Dancing Queen” in school uniforms with blue trackpants.
Ato came back to MC, and said that Crayon Pop as a senpai/sunbae really gets the best chants.
Following that, we had Danbi and Dahye each doing solos wth Utada Hikaru’s “First Love” and Oku Hanako’s “Kawaranai Mono” respectively.
Finally, after Ato and Dahye mentioning about subunit and solos, we have Soyul singing a solo cover of Younha’s 말도 안돼!
Next up were the twins/Strawberry Milk who sang a ballad, ‘알려주세요’, one of their upcoming tracks in their upcoming album, ‘Jackpot’.
After that it was K-Much back again for “What should I do” and “I’m sorry” in school uniforms. Finally Crayon Pop was back with Uh-ee, although it sounded like an EDM version.
Bob Girls then came back to sing a cover of BoA’s “Atlantic Princess”, before more Dahye and Ato MC-ing.
We then got “1234 (Korean version)” which Crayon Pop sang in their individual colored “Bar Bar Bar” outfits sans helmets.
As they walked off the stage, encores were shouted with Ato and Dahye coming in saying that an encore was indeed gonna be made, and what else but “Bar Bar Bar”. We got the remix again, with Geummi doing her solo of ‘I don’t wanna stick at home now’, before the rest joined in, and we got to the normal “Bar Bar Bar”, with the rest of Chrome Ent joining in the final verse.
The show ended with all of Chrome Ent having a handshake with attendees. All the members of Crayon Pop were surprised to see me in Japan, so I guess they can recognize me now? ^^ The second session was much better as a whole with more variation in performances and more Crayon Pop! One of the Korean fans who won the tickets also gave me a copy of ‘Hey Mister’. We at CrayonPop.me will gift it forward. We will post a thread on our Chrome Ent artists fan forum when details are more concrete!
Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to CrayonPop.me.
Some official videos:
