AKBxJKT Concert – Man On A mission

I already managed to get my mum to fall in love with JKT48 by bringing her with me to their 2nd Anniversary Concert. Now it is time for me to get my still green cousin who came far away from North Sumatra (Currently on his first few months of going into college here in Jakarta) to get to love not only JKT48, but also the origin of them all, AKB48.
And I guess this is also a great time for me to rekindle my love towards Japanese idols which on a steady fade after Yossie (Yoshizawa Hitomi) graduated from Morning Musume (while her Gatas project was going nowhere). Yeah, you heard it right, I’m not really into AKB48 at that time.
Even today, I only know so little about the originator group. The learning curve is pretty high with that so much members and the so colorful history of the group. That’s why, this is my chance to know them better as well, how their MC is, etc.
Anyway, I know some their songs and I can sing-a-long (albeit awkwardly) with them provided there’s a lyric cheat sheet somewhere.
That being said, I’m a man on a mission, a mission to influence my cousin to like both JKT48 and AKB48, as well as to rekindle my love towards Japanese idols.
Opening Act
Arrived at the venue and we decided to wait a bit with my friends while letting my cousin to know them better. Went straight to the venue gate and queued until the gate is open. To be honest, I thought that this is going to be another gridlock queue, but who would’ve guess that the queue was sailing pretty smoothly. In no time, I already found myself inside and sitting in comfort waiting for the concert.
Not a very long time waiting and the concert start. I don’t have any light stick whatsoever since I prefer to sit and sing-a-long in a concert am a cheapskate. Knowing that it is a joint concert, I’m sure the big display in front of me will display the lyrics and yes it is. Hurrah! Now I can sing the songs I know! The lyrics came up with a somewhat pretty noticeable delay, but I can manage.
I will not delve into details of the song lists and who performed the song (Heck, I don’t even remember all of the girls name, be it JKT or AKB), but it really starts with a firecracker, everyone is enjoying the opening numbers and almost all of the seated audiences even stood up to enjoy AKB Festival!
Okada Nana and Jessica Veranda
Then the time for MC Session came. I was kinda worried that this dual language MC Session will be in total chaos. Thankfully, Rena and Haruka really nailed their role as both the moderator and translator. Haruka snide remarks really help in setting up the mood too.
Unfortunately, Okada Nana’s zoomed face on the big screen when in MC session is not really good for the audiences heart nor the currently talking member. Every time her face is on the big screen, the audiences went hysterical and totally ignored the currently talking member, which prompted some great reaction from both parties.
Chikariina displayed her shock (and then laughed) when her speech was ignored by the audiences who were captivated by Okada Nana’s cuteness zoomed on the big screen, repeatedly. Okada Nana herself? She’s as red as a watermelon and repeatedly press her finger against her lips, telling the audiences to keep it calm with no avail.
Can’t blame Okada Nana, the audiences, nor the cameraman for doing that though. She is just out-worldly cute in this concert.
Oh, and if the audiences created some ruckus and in a rave when Okada Nana’s face is on the big screen, Jessica Veranda (Ve) from JKT48 is having the opposite effect with the audiences suddenly becoming calm and somehow managed to create a very unique serene atmosphere with all those “Shuush!” voices echoed through the venue.
Those two girls and the audiences reaction somehow becoming an impromptu running gag in this concert.
I heard that Ve’s “Mosquito Sprayer Gag” (taken from the “Shush!” voice) is a recurring gag on the theater. I asked one of my friends and he told me that it is indeed a recurring gag, something like “Shush! Calm! The Rain Goddess would like to speak.” I dunno about Okada Nana, but perhaps it was an impromptu judging by the oh My Lord level of cuteness she has in this concert.
Game Session
Another thing I’m afraid will end in chaos. But what do you know, it went so smooth that I might, for once, believe in the story of Babel Tower. So the game is using an automatic counter something and the girls will have to wiggle around to increase the counts of their uh…wiggling? Not sure.
Four representatives of each team will have to face the challenge. If AKB48 lose, they will have to eat a slice of bread with sambal spread. On the other hand, if JKT48 lose, they will have to eat a slice of bread with wasabi spread. And oh boy, those punishment is more than enough reason for both team to give all they’ve got.
The battle is so full of laughter, I don’t know how the hell those girls do that considering there’s no professional translation help whatsoever. Their body language, their eye contact, speaks more words than what language could do.
Well yeah, it is just a wiggling contest with no substance whatsoever, but still, I was amazed at how they could interact each other so good with so little preparation time, there’s even a small cat fight on stage that caught all of our laughter. JKT48 lost the battle and yeah, hilarity ensues.
I think Shimada Haruka and Rezky Dhike (Dhike) really shines in this segment.
Second Half Through The End
Alas, I can consider the second half as dead for me due to someone on the left side of my cousin that keep on whining very loudly whenever JKT48 is on the stage. I was perplexed and somehow irritated since it was such a fun concert and dear Lord, what in tarnation did I ever do to suddenly bear this unwanted role in a one-way talk therapy?
It turns out to be someone I know when I get back home and Tweeted about it, which disappoint me now even more (I first thought it was a “purist” or #truefan). He already apologize for that though, so yeah, all is forgiven and let’s leave it on the past. And hey, losing a friend over a trivial and superficial matter is not me.
I just wish for a more lenient and efficient way for audiences to change their seat due to the unavoidable vis major.
Mission: Cousin
Unfortunately, the story is not the same for my cousin. When we get back home, he bluntly asked me, quote: “Big brother, is that the true color of AKB-JKT fans rivalries? If yes it is, I’d rather not involve myself further then. I’ve had enough hate and I don’t need to add more to my dictionary. ”
Well of course I told him that not everyone is like that. He just smiled and said, “I heard derogatory remarks from other people too, you know. It is just that, apparently, my hearing is better than yours.”
YIKES! If this is Mortal Kombat, I’d be the loser with my body ripped in two! He might be a shy guy, but he’s sharp, man!
This might be his first and last experience in getting to know both of the groups. But oh well, I might try again one day. You know me
(Besides he’s a hunk and good looking dude that even makes our cool-headed Tilly went wiggly-wiggly, could be well my tool of the trade, MWAHAHAHA)
Conclusion
Despite the drama told above on the second half onwards, this is might be one of the coolest concert I’ve ever attended. The firecrackers opening, the MC, the audiences, the performances, the collaborations, everything is a such a joy to behold. If one day they make this kind of concert again, then please, I’m begging you here, spare some time and WATCH THE CONCERT.
Waku Waku Japan might broadcast the concert somewhere in April, so cross your fingers.
My cousin conclusion:
It was pretty interesting. I might have take a liking to some of the girls.
Full Setlist
M00. Overture (Combined AKB48xJKT48)
M01. Kibouteki Refrain (AKB48)
M02. Everyday, Kachusa (AKB48)
M03. AKB Festival (AKB48)
M04. Flying Get (AKB48 & JKT48)
M05. Kimi no Koto Ga Suki Dakara (AKB48 & JKT48)
M06. Manatsu no Sounds Good! (AKB48 & JKT48)
M07. Shoujotachiyo (AKB48 & JKT48)
M08. Kaze Wa Fuiteiru (JKT48 Senbatsu)
M09. Wink Wa San Kai (JKT48 Team T)
M10. Eien Pressure (JKT48 Team KIII)
M11. Juuryoku Sympathy (JKT48 Team J)
M12. Kampeki Gunone (Haruka, Kawamoto, Takeuchi, Hashimo)
M13. Blue Rose (Chikano, Kuramochi, Morikawa, Naomi)
M14. Heart Gata Virus (Nozawa, Ayana, Andela)
M15. Choose Me (Kitahara, Matsui, Okada, Hirata, Ve, Shania)
M16. Ame No Doubutsuen (Shimada, Uchiyama, Natori, Oshima, Yuvia, Michelle, Tata, Nabilah, Kinal)
M17. Temodemo no Namida (Yokoyama, Melody)
M18. Only Today (AKB48)
M19. Reset (AKB48)
M20. Yobisute Fantasy (AKB48)
M21. Hashire Penguin (AKB48)
M22. River (JKT48)
M23. Ponytail to Shushu (JKT48)
M24. Gingham Check (JKT48)
M25. Namida Surprise (JKT48)
M26. Aitakatta (AKB48)
M27. Kokoro no Placard (AKB48)
M28. Mae Shika Mukanee (AKB48)
M29. Sakura no Hanabiratachi (AKB48 & JKT48)
E01. After Rain (AKB48)
E02. 10 Nen Zakura (AKB48)
E03. First Rabbit (AKB48 & JKT48)
E04. Hikoukigumo (AKB48 & JKT48)
E05. Heavy Rotation (AKB48 & JKT48)
E06. Koi Suru Fortune Cookie (AKB48 & JKT48)
Great impression from Angga
Anw, i consider myself lucky then, my seating section is as calm as Veranda hahaha
Great concert, Yui is GODLY, AKB is smooth as alwyas, Naachan, Sayaya and Ryoka are cute too haha
The JKT is not slacking either, they really can keep it up this time (hints 2012)
Kudos to Rena and Gon for their dual language capability
In the end, i’ll come again, for sure
I’ll make sure I’ll come too for their next joint concert (if any)
“Even today, I only know so little about the originator group. The learning curve is pretty high with that so much members and the so colorful history of the group.”
I see. That explains why you and your friends keep insisting on the idea that Renai Kinshi Jourei in AKB48Group is nothing but a myth. Anyway, great article as usual. Thanks.
Hmm…I wonder where my very solid source for that myth claim would be? Ah right, somewhere in this site articles archive
. If your gear is okay, I’m sure you’d find the red dot.
And you are very welcome!
EDIT:
Ah one thing though, I wrote about it being a myth on my personal blog Which I believe you also read. Which means, it represent my own opinion. My fellas in this site might have different opinion about that. Heck even if I wrote it here, I always filed it under “Opinion”.
he is just honest to the dot. claiming he knows so little doesn;t mean he knows nothing.
sorry for my english.
Oh, seriously. I REALLY REALLY REALLY wish I could went to the concert. :'( You all talk about it while I’m here being left out. Still, congrats for the concert’s success. I feel relieved that everyone and even AKB members give positive reviews about the joint concert. Looking forward to their next concerts, hopefully it’ll be many more in the future.
Amen to that Annie, Amen!
well i have mix feeling bout this concert . . ..

overall performance of the AKB and Jkt teams are great including the mix performance
but on the other hand the AKB fan (purish) behaviour dissapoint me .. . .
i sat on the fourth row of the platinum seating, row 1 to 3 is filled with AKB hardcore fans .. .
when the show start and akb member performing the immidietly stand and provoke other fans to stand as well . ..
i mean come on .. . i didnt pay 500k plus to watch the show standing. . .if i wanted that i might as well buy the festival ticket
it was total chaos as the fans started to stand cause the front fans are standing and blocking their view .. . it was not until the 5’th or 6’th song then some secuirity comes and tell the fans to sit down .. . almost blow my fuse and wanted to throw my light stick at em
they only chant when AKB member are performing and totaly silence when the jkt are performing

well in my opinion 2/3 of the concert fans are AKB fans and only 1/3 are Jkt fans….while im sure not all AKB fans behaviour are like that, but i guess haters will always be haters . ..
no intention on dissrespecting Akb Fans that came there .. . just letting out some vent out some frustration from yesterday concert
here, dat fucking purist, especially with black tshirt, with title AKB48 Concert in Indonesia. meh, where”s JKT? its not real just a myth. lol
Dat purist,lol
when JKT mv being played they’re silent, when Green Flash mv they’re excited.
then silent again, when Kibouteki excited again.
the silence also on the wink wa 3 kai, eien pressure
and take a short break when JKT perform…. lol
even there are saying, “when JKT perform I’ll colsed my eyes” lol
they are so persistent, dat purist….
purist?

dat cocky inferior expression towards jkt & fans.. lol
worship jpn48, and jkt is shit, full of scumbag.
even jkt is not exist in their eyes.
http://oi60.tinypic.com/nx2ebq.jpg
yes its them allright lol . .. .by the way the video screen shot you take is from my video lmao


and as you can see on the back of their T-Shirts .. . AKB concert in Indonesia 20th Febuary 2015 .. .
.i mean WTF are you blind purist
you all loco
My own take about the “AKB48 Concert in Indonesia” T-shirt and omitting JKT48 deliberately from it:
Well, yeah, it is a douchebag move. But in the end of the day, they were only expressing their preferences silently, so I’m not really troubled by it.
We already know how they behave and how they act. All that I can do is raising questions of why’d they do that? What’s the motivation behind it? Is it merely just for for the lulz? There are so many unanswered questions on my head now and I’m really confused.
All I can do now is just guessing that it was perhaps too hard for them to accept something foreign into their comfort zone. But that is just my guess.
My only message to you guys above is: You already saw how they behave, use it as an example of not how to behave in a concert and post-concert. You may ask their motivation publicly, but don’t hating on the other sister groups too.
PS: I’m still learning to control my bewildered self too. One step at a time, I guess.
When they asked me and my friends to stand, we stand also but one of the fans shouted us to sit down. I thought that was one of the security. And then we stand again following the purist at 1st row and then the real security told us to sit down. Hmm confused with this I just sat down until KFC where members told us to stand and dance together :p
ahahaha, I laughed a lot reading comments above, but hey is they really that bad? because from my view in festival area, which is of course many akb fans who didn;t really pay attention to jkt, they still respect the girls and enjoy in every performances either jkt or akb.
The only one that makes me sad is, when jkt perform, people who did the chant mix is not as many as when akb perform. (except river, I guess)
Angga, I’m sorry to hear that your experience was somewhat tainted by irresponsible acts by those “pure” (?) fans.
Personally, I’m not a fan of JKT and I honestly can’t stand listening to 48G songs in Indonesian ( with the exception of First Rabbit and KimiKoto ) but I also can’t stand people that don’t appreciate others who are trying their best to make others happy.
I weighed those dislikes, and I decided that I will NOT be a person that even I myself hate. And you know what – I enjoyed that concert with all my body and soul.
Sure, if I had the option to switch languages that I am hearing like those bilingual modes in modern TVs, then I’ll probably set my settings to Japanese by default – but seeing the JKT members trying their hardest is not something that I think a REAL “TRUE” fan can ignore.
48G is all about effort.
People who can’t appreciate effort ( shown LIVE in front of them!!! ) obviously can NOT be a fan.
So those “true” fans? The “purists” you mentioned earlier? They’re simply wannabes who just happen to understand a little Japanese, know a little about AKB48, and listened a little to their music.
Please, don’t even try and group them with us.
Heya Kev! Nice to see you here.
Naaah, I’m not trying to giving out suggestions that the general AKB fans is an obnoxious douchebag. It is just that perhaps I might not be so lucky that there are only several people who can appreciate both groups on my seating row in the Platinum area.
I’m not that kind of a guy who would chant in a concert and prefer to just sing-a-long to the songs and listened closely to the bass-line. This is perhaps due to my background in the early (circa 2000-2001) local J-fandom where we had to channeled our love towards it by performing in a very small area in a cramped, small cafe in South Jakarta. (Maybe one of this site readers ever heard of “Nirvana Cafe” weekly event back then?)
So yeah, maybe I also contributed to the general opinion of “the platinum seated AKB fans are people who can’t appreciate others.”
Sad thing is Kev, I know some of the people that seated on Platinum are people who knew AKB way long before with enough knowledge for their history and so forth. Which kinda put me in a loop of confusion, something that I have never see before in J-Culture fandom. A some sort of isolated extremism that you can only find in religion, political views, and sports fan.
What I hoped to be a beautiful collaboration concert have turned out to be a bragging stage to show who got the bigger genitalia between AKB and JKT fans. It is still a great concert, but the fights and brag between the fans post-concert had left me with a very bitter taste on my views towards both fandom. It is silly and totally uncalled for.
I just hope that those people can be like you Kev, who can still appreciate others.
But anyway, I still love the girls, all of them, regardless of their origin. And hey, at least the girls are giving out an example on how to behave: Loving and respecting each others
I’m confused, did we really go to the same concert?
What I experienced and what I’ve been hearing from you are two totally different things, even though we’re only one section apart.
You know what, I’m glad I didn’t get my Platinum ticket and settled with Gold. I’d be pissed off if I come all the way to Australia, paid top $$$ only to sit surrounded by a bunch of whiners.
Ya know Kev, if I could rewind the time, I’d gladly exchange me and my cousin Platinum tickets to Gold
I got the gold and yeah it’s better, especially front corner position, it was so clos3 to the member , for Rp. 330.000 i’m satisfied. But no surprise in this concert
Hahaha this is all about ruckus that ruined ours big day eh. I it happened to me too. Young ruckus behind and beside me were annoying enough . The one behind me spreaded his ‘jigong’ everywhere on my back even hitted my head with his bag accid3ntally, and then one besid3 me moved his body just like ‘i never exist’ beside him lol. But i’m not the one who keep silent, i gave those two my mad eyes and yelled to them ‘please respect…’ and those two were stop acting s**t anymore. God bless you. Note: the one in front of me and right side of me were really a god boy (even no chant s
husssh… )