DJ Night @ Penang Anime Matsuri 2015: Summer Party

In May, we had the chance to attend Penang Anime Matsuri for the weekend. Unfortunately we didn’t get to attend much of the first day’s concert, but we did attend the second day for the DJ Party night, and it was a blast!

Penang Anime Matsuri was held in May 23-24, in Penang, Malaysia. The event was produced by Sozo, together with Penang Global Tourism. On top of that, it was also supported by various organizations, including the Consulate General of Japan in Penang.  Therefore it goes without saying that the event was tons of fun!

Aside of the concert, Penang Anime Matsuri also featured a hall where you can shop for merchandises—both official and fanmade, as well as doujinshi and apparels. It also featured an outdoor area that mimics a Japanese summer festival, where you can shop for Japanese street food, clothes, and accessories, play games as well as other things like trying out a yukata and get your picture taken in a specialized booth.

The show started around 6pm, somewhere around sundown. It was a sunny and hot day, which made the wait felt slightly longer than it actually is, but the MC Shun kept on coming out to check on us and crack jokes to entertain us. Somewhere in the middle of waiting, Yuyoyuppe who was doing his soundcheck appeared and said a single phrase to the waiting audience, “…sudah makan?” (Have you eaten?) which successfully drew a huge wave of laughter from the audience. He then told everyone that the staffs are doing their best at setting up the stage, and for them to please wait a little more for the show to start.

The show was then opened by a few speeches by the Consulate General of Japan in Penang, His Excellency Ryuji Noda, Consul-General of Japan in Penang, followed by His Right Honourable Chief Minister of Penang Mr Lim Guan Eng, as well as Shawn Chin, the Founder and Executive Director of Sozo. The speech mentioned that the event was sponsored by the tourism board of Penang and they hope that through this event, people overseas can come together to Penang to have a good time, and celebrate Japanese culture and pop culture alike.

Soon after that, the show kicked off, with Yuyoyuppe under his DJ name DJ’TEKINA//SOMETHING taking over the stage. As usual, it was a hot show by Yuppe as he riles up the audience during his turn at the set.  With a hyped up scream of, “Are you ready, Penang?!”, Yuppe’s stage snowballed!

Yuppe’s setlist consists of a wide range of songs, such as well-known Vocaloid tunes like Just Be Friends, Melancholic and Aikotoba as well as anisongs such as Maware! Setsugetsuka, Only My Railgun and some Love Live! Songs. Not only that, his set list also covers Western songs, such as Taylor Swift’s Shake It Off, EDM like Avicii and Showtek’s Booyah, to the soundtrack of Disney’s Aladdin, A Whole New World during which he sang parts of on stage. Of course, he also included his original tracks, Kick His Hole, prompting the audience to follow the choreographed movement that was made for the song. His stage ended with another one of his original songs, You Need A Fxxkin’ Anthem.

During the transition, HachioujiP came out to prepare for his stage, but not before riling up the audience further by twisting in his remix into Yuppe’s Anthem. While that happens and Hachiouji prepares for his set, Yuppe was having a load of fun running around the stage and riling up the audience. Soon after, Hachiouji took over the stage from Yuppe with an excited shout of, “I’m so excited, Penang!!”.

HachioujiP’s set, on the other hand, was leaning more towards Vocaloid songs, such as his original songs Baby Maniacs and Sweet Devil, as well as other songs like Weekender Girl and Tell Your World. He too included a few English songs like Avicii’s The Night, and not only that, he included his remix of Frozen, a Japanese cover version which was sung by Hatsune Miku.

Towards the end, Hachiouji played the ending song for the anime Yuri Kuma Arashi, Territory, that he composed together with Yuppe. Of course, as if on cue, Yuppe came out to have more fun on stage for the rest of Hachiouji’s set. “We made this song together!” Hachiouji remarked as he continued to work the turntables. Soon after that, Hachiouji put on Senbonzakura, during which Yuppe showed off his kendo skills to the audience!

The show ended that night on a high, with Hachiouji and Yuppe taking a selfie together with the audience behind them on the background.

And with that, Penang Anime Matsuri 2015 ended safely. We’re already looking forward to Penang Anime Matsuri 2016! It’s certainly going to be an even bigger, better event that offers even more of fun, so we can barely wait!