On September 20th, popular group Arashi held the first day of their 2-day live “AraFes” at the National Olympic Stadium. At the concert more than 70,000 were in the audience and it was announced that they would be releasing a new album “Popcorn” on October 31st, and holding a big Dome tour.
Starting at Kyocera Dome Osaka on November 16th, Arashi will make the rounds in the 5 big Domes of Japan (Kyocera Dome Osaka, Sapporo Dome, Fukuoka Yahoo! JAPAN Dome, Tokyo Dome, and Nagoya Dome). With a total of 16 performances, and including this 2-day “AraFes” concert, the total number of audience will reach 870,000 people for 18 performances. (You can check the schedule for the Dome tour here.)
As announced previously, this ”AraFes” concert was different from Arashi’s regular concerts, as its set list was based on fans’ requests which were sent about 270,000 of them. Arashi performed about 40 songs that were ranked top among their singles, tracks from albums, as well as the coupling songs. Also, there was no Johnny’s Jr. members who usually appear as the back dancers, for this concert, so when each member performed their solo tracks, fellow members participated as the back dancers. This hard stage made the members out of breath fast even during the first half of the concert, and a member Ninomiya Kazunari said, “I’ve never felt grateful toward Jr. members this much before.”
As the member Matsumoto Jun declared “Arashi’s summer never ends. Five of us will make 70,000 of you happy!”, the 70,000 audience kept giving Arashi enthusiastic cheers during the whole 3 and a half hours concert.
Source & Image: Oricon + Johnny’s net
