Rock Star

Asia » Japan » Ehime
September 25th 2007

Published: March 7th 2008

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Yellow Head

UoshiMAX

taking it to the next level

The chance to become a rock star doesn’t present itself to you everyday. However, one fine summer afternoon it became a reality. I have never performed in a band before and I would most closely liken my singing skills to that of a broken Chinese erhu, however, trying to stay true to the “ichi go ichi e”, or try everything once, spirit of things I somehow found myself on the long road to becoming one. And it was a long road indeed.

Our small island town had decided to host a famous Okinawan band named BEGIN to perform at their summer music festival. It was impressive considering the area we live in. Nothing usually happens around here and all of a sudden a famous band would be in our midst. The news acted as a catalyst and brought our somnolent island town to life. All of a sudden there was a rush among the locals to set up bands to perform before the main show. And I was persuaded to take part in one… as the lead vocals. Now I have never been much of a musician. I like to listen to it but my interest has never gone further

uoshiMAX

"the best band in the setonaikai baby"

than that. The thought of singing in front of a crowd of people is usually enough to make my stomach quiver, however, I was able to conjure up the courage and signed my humility away on the dotted line.

After the initial agreement I found a cavalcade of late night band practices knocking at my door. My free time as I knew it would be a think of the past. My life turned into a balance between work and song. And it was a rough road to follow. My other band mates wanted to nail the final performance on the head and they felt that practicing every night was the only way to achieve this. I struggled to stay alongside them.

Around sixty practices later we found the big day quickly approaching. By this time I had been singing the same song, “Smoke on the Water”, every night for around two months. It is needless to say that I wasn’t exactly fond of Deep Purple’s catchy tune any longer. I dreaded the thought of even hearing it and I longed for the day when everything would be done and over with.

Then the big day arrived. We

UoshiMAX Impersonators

the back up band

traveled to the island together, trying to keep the group morale up and help each other forget about the butterflies circulating about in our stomachs. It was a nerve-racking ride to say the least and I think we were all feeling it. When I first saw the stage and the crowd, I have to admit, I freaked out. I tried to put everyone out of mind and look off onto the horizon like I have been told to do many times before. It’s like the saying, “out of sight, out of mind”, right? No…wrong.

I stood there quivering like a leaf in the wind for a seemingly never-ending length of time as they struggled to set up our equipment. Then the beat began. It took me over and I forgot about the crowd spread out in front of me. I sang the hideous tune spot on and our band left the stage with a huge applause and shouts for an encore. We had nailed the performance on the head and it felt great. All of the months of practice had paid off and we had finished it like rock stars. I’m sure Deep Purple would have been proud.

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