Lawson Ticket.com YCCM Tour Interview 03/2011

Lawson (the Japanese convenience store chain) is currently promoting the ticket sales for the final two stops of the YCCM tour next month. They've put together a special little page with an interview, profile etc. Here's the small interview part for your reading pleasure. 'tis rather short...


Maaya Sakamoto Live Tour 2011 - Additional Performances! Interview March 2011
Original text: Ishizumi Yuka here.


Maaya Sakamoto’s new album ‘You Can’t Catch Me’ sees in the sixteenth year since her debut. Not only does it bring many creators and sound producers on board including Horigome Takaki (KIRINJI), Tomita Keichi, Suneohair, Suemitsu Atsushi and Shibata Jun, the album also has significance within the frequently fragmented J-POP scene as a real and honest pop record. The result of which was probably the favourable reaction to the album, scoring number one on the weekly chart.

Sakamoto: Not producing a summary just because it was my fifteenth anniversary, but taking a chance to do something a little edgy – I wanted to show the people who come something that they can’t imagine, as well as feel that freshness for myself.

Each of the twelve songs has its own surprise but it’s the lead song ‘Himitsu’, within which a woman’s feelings are laid bare, warts and all, that her expressions as a lyricist are particularly fresh.

Sakamoto: That part was a challenge I set myself: I wonder if I can express something about who I am now that I want to hide from others into words?

There’s a part of me that has become able to put up a defensive barrier when I come into contact with the world, but actually at the base of that there’s a me that’s not made-up for others. It’s probably the foundation for a variety of ways I express myself so I thought that from now on it might be ok to show people who I am inside, just as I am, a little muddy.

A work which has a borne a rich harvest, both musically and mentally, is now taken on tour.

Sakamoto: This is surprisingly the first time I’ve done a concert based off a record. So I want to keep the atmosphere of the album.

For this record, from the middle of the recording process I was working on the assumption that there would be a concert and so created the sound with that in mind.

Instead of getting absorbed in performing, I would like a concert where the sound is delivered simply. On top of that, because this is the first tour where I’ve done so many stops I’m interested to see what happens to me, or rather that while I’m doing this tour I’m looking forward to discovering something new!

Fin