Tokyo's Coolest Sound

On November 7 was a show by Nomiya Maki (ex-Pizzicato Five) at Billboard Live Tokyo. With the title "Miss Maki Nomiya Sings Shibuya-kei Standards", it was the 2nd of the series that began the previous year, an effort in passing the word on great Shibuya-kei and inspirational songs so that they don't end up forgotten. Last year's show was to be released on CD a bit later, so this doubled as a release party. There were two representations in Tokyo on the same day, and I went to the later one starting from 21:30.

The weekend before the same show was also first held at Billboard in Osaka, so I spent the week avoiding any spoilers online. Still, as soon as I reached my seat I couldn't resist opening the booklet on the table, and before I realized I already knew half of the set list, oops! :) That just made me yet more excited to hear some of the songs listed there.

Maki's band was formed of a pianist/keyboardist (on Fender Rhodes and piano), the bandmaster on keyboards (Hammond) and percussions, a bassist and a drummer. Maki appeared in an elegant off-white dress, and started the show with Pizzicato Five's "Tokyo wa yoru no 7ji (The night is still young)", the obvious choice especially that the first set started at 7pm.