YOASOBI – Never Ending Stories at Climate Pledge
Anime and J-pop fans from all around came out to support Yoasobi‘s first proper North American solo headline tour. One of my friends even had another friend visit from Austin, Texas to attend the show. Powered by Crunchyroll and titled NEVER ENDING STORIES, Yoasobi mentioned that every song is based on an original story. While I did see some tickets available right before the show, this was pretty close to a sold-out show at Climate Pledge Arena.
Amidst a sea of waving LED light sticks and even a couple of Frieren cosplays, the main stage sat to the side of the arena and displayed matching anime or video game scenes with each song the band played. On the stage were a couple of raised platforms with their own screens, making the platforms look like bindings of a book that changed with each song. This notably relates to their album titles: The Book, The Book 2, The Book 3, and their latest release, The Book for, (Not a typo).
The band’s discography is sprinkled with very large hits across the entertainment industry. In my opinion, one of the most recent popular songs is “The Brave (Yuusha)” from the anime Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End.
However, their song “Idol” from the anime “Oshi no Ko” was named the #1 Song of the Year in 2023 on the Billboard Japan Hot 100 chart and even won the 2024 Crunchyroll Anime Award for “Best Anime Song.” It’s also the song that was consistently repeating in my head the week following the show. You’ll find songs from them across many other anime, but their latest track, “Orion,” is a newly written track inspired by The Fall of a Sparrow, a short novel set in Tokyo—the new stage of Overwatch—which centers around the characters Genji, Hanzo and Kiriko.
Throughout the show the J-pop duo, songwriter and producer Ayase and vocalist Ikura, would take small breaks to chat with the crowd. This included small Japanese lessons for folks to learn “Konnichiwa”, “Hajimemashite”, and “Mo ichido” with the last one being the most important translating to “One More Time”. How else would you get them to return for an encore?
The band also talked about how much they loved spending a couple days in Seattle before the show. They took a cruise around the Puget Sound and saw some seals, ate food at Pike Place market, and rode the ferris wheel, which was quite scary for Ikura. Ayase talked about how they are super excited to grow and come back to Seattle bigger and better before their next return, but confirmed they will “absolutely be coming back” because it’s “officially one of their favorite cities in the world.” I also found it entertaining that they kept calling themselves “Yoasobi from Japan”.
After the band played through their set and walked off stage to thunderous applause from the crowd, the audience started chanting “AN KO RU” for the band to play an encore. At some point, the crowd switched to using a phrase similar to the previous one we learned for “One More Time,” now continuing to chant “MO IKAI.” After a short break featuring adorable camera shots of audience members displayed on the stage screens chanting, dancing, and being super shy, the band finally returned to the stage wearing their own Seattle Kraken hockey sports jerseys. The band played two more songs before closing out the show with more applause from the crowd and appreciation from the band. Outside I saw some fans being interviewed and others were hanging out spinning LED sticks around to finish the night.
As a final note, I want to call out how I feel that music consistently crosses language barriers. With our world being so interconnected nowadays, it’s easier than ever to throw on a “J-pop” playlist, jam out to Norwegian Death Metal, or browse “Viral Chinese Hip Hop” to explore genres you may have only dipped a toe into thanks to social media. You may even pick up a few words to share with international travelers like Yoasobi while wandering Pike Place Market.
Photos: Eric Tra @erictra