Live Tour: Yellow Voyage (Japanese pronunciation:[ɾaibɯtsɯꜜaːieɾoːbojaꜜːdʑi]) is the third live video album by Japanese singer-songwriter and musician Gen Hoshino, released on June 22, 2016, via Speedstar Records. Alongside a tour documentary, the album features Hoshino's performance at Osaka-jō Hall during his Yellow Voyage tour, promoting his fourth studio album Yellow Dancer (2015). Issued in both DVD and Blu-ray versions, the video album was promoted with two performances uploaded to YouTube and received both standard and limited releases, with limited prints coming bundled with a booklet. Live Tour: Yellow Voyage reached number one on Oricon's DVD, Blu-ray, and music video charts, and was certified Gold by the Recording Industry Association of Japan (RIAJ).
Background
The Osaka-jō Hall in 2014
Japanese singer-songwriter and musician Gen Hoshino released his fourth studio album, Yellow Dancer, on December 2, 2015.[1] His first album in two and a half years since Stranger (2013), Yellow Dancer focused on incorporating black music genres such as soul, jazz, R&B, and jump blues into Hoshino's previous sound whilst trying to maintain a Japanese pop style, for a result Hoshino described as "yellow music".[2] The album was comercially successful in Japan; it reached the top spot on both the OriconAlbums and Billboard Japan'sHot Albums charts and was certified Platinum by the Recording Industry Association of Japan (RIAJ) within a month of release.[3][4][5]
Alongside the album's announcement on October 14, 2015, Hoshino revealed an accompanying national touring effort, the Hoshino Gen Live Tour 2016: Yellow Voyage, with 11 shows.[2] Two more dates, at the Tokyo Nippon Budokan and Osaka-jō Hall, were later added to the performance list.[6] The Yellow Voyage tour began at the Nitori Culture Hall in Sapporo, Hokkaido, on January 9, 2016, and ended at the Osaka-jō Hall on March 21. The final performance was seen by an attendance of roughly 100,000.[7]
Promotion and release
On May 17, 2016, Hoshino announced that the Osaka-jō Hall performance of Yellow Voyage would be released as a DVD and Blu-ray video album, titled Live Tour: Yellow Voyage. On the first disc, it would include the show's 21 performances; among the track listing were all songs from Yellow Dancer minus "Yoru", a cover of Crazy Cats' "Sūdara Bushi", and a cover of Akira Fuse's "Kimi wa Bara yori Utsukushi" by Hoshino's alter ego character Akira Fuse. The second disc would feature Odoru, Ima (踊る、今, lit. "Now, Dance"), a 45-minute documentary to the entire tour, and audio commentary from Hoshino and his collaborators were to be included for both discs.[8]
In promotion of the release, the album's performances of Yellow Dancer song "Week End" and Hoshino's debut single "Kudaranai no Naka ni" were uploaded to YouTube.[9][10]Live Tour: Yellow Voyage was released by Speedstar Records in regular and limited editions in both DVD and Blu-ray formats on June 22, 2016.[11][12] The limited editions included a special booklet containing interviews with Hoshino and a conversation between him and choreographer Mikiko.[13]
Reception
The live album was received positively by Japanese critics. Rockin'On Japan's Shōichi Miyake, who had viewed two of the tour's shows before watching the album, described the tour as composed of "luxurious arrangement and direction", reflecting "Hoshino's serious love for music". He called Live Tour: Yellow Voyage a monumental release for Hoshino, highlighting his evolution as an artist and proving him as an entertainer.[14] Shinji Hyogo for Real Sound [ja] wrote in an article about the album that the tour prioritized music over flashy effects and a video jockey style, which he felt fit with Yellow Dancer's black music themes; instead of utilizing newer technologies and trends, he found the tour's set was simple and constructed with dancers and orchestra as enhancements of its entertainment value.[13] Hamaguchi at Tower Records Japan recalled that finishing the DVD felt like he had been at a concert hall, writing that he was surprised to have been so entertained by watching a video at home.[15]
Commercially, Live Tour: Yellow Voyage debuted at number one on Oricon's weekly DVD and Blu-ray charts dated July 4, 2016—Hoshino's first time on top of these charts—and also reached first place on the combined DVD and Blu-ray music ranking.[16] In total, it charted for 64 weeks on the DVD chart and 54 on the Blu-ray ranking.[17][18] In January 2017, the album was certified Gold by the RIAJ for 100,000 sales, becoming Hoshino's first video album to receive a certification.[19]
Track listing
All tracks are written by Gen Hoshino expect where otherwise noted.
^ ab"星野源、2年7カ月ぶり新アルバム「Yellow Dancer」リリース決定" [Gen Hoshino to Release First New Album in 2 Years and 7 Months, Yellow Dancer]. Natalie.mu (in Japanese). October 14, 2015. Archived from the original on February 19, 2024. Retrieved April 11, 2024.
^"星野源の全国ツアー「Yellow Voyage」に武道館＆城ホール公演追加" [Gen Hoshino Adds Budokan and Jo Hall Performances to National Tour Yellow Voyage]. Natalie.mu (in Japanese). January 10, 2016. Archived from the original on May 11, 2017. Retrieved April 11, 2024.
^"星野源、約10万人動員の全国ツアーがファイナル。「また近々ツアーをしたい」" [Gen Hoshino Ends National Tour to Audience of 100 Thousand: "I want to tour again in the near future"]. Barks [ja] (in Japanese). March 22, 2016. Archived from the original on April 11, 2024. Retrieved April 11, 2024.
^""ニセ明"の熱唱も！星野源「Yellow Voyage」城ホール公演を映像化" [Osaka-jo Hall Performance from Gen Hoshino's Yellow Voyage to Receive Video Release]. Natalie.mu (in Japanese). May 17, 2016. Archived from the original on March 24, 2024. Retrieved April 11, 2024.
^"星野源が煽る! 思わず踊りたくなる"Week End"ライブ映像を公開!" [Gen Hoshino Teasing Audience in Dance-Inducing "Week End" Live Performance Uploaded to YouTube!]. Rockin'On Japan (in Japanese). June 7, 2016. Archived from the original on March 22, 2024. Retrieved April 11, 2024.
^"星野源、大阪城ホールで"くだらないの中に"を弾き語るライブ映像フル公開" [Gen Hoshino Releases Full Acoustic Performance of "Kudaranai no Naka ni" from the Osaka-jo Hall]. Rockin'On Japan (in Japanese). June 7, 2016. Archived from the original on April 11, 2024. Retrieved April 11, 2024.
^ abHyogo, Shinji (August 7, 2016). "星野源はどう音楽を伝えてきたか? 兵庫慎司がライブを素材に考察" [How Did Gen Hoshino Come to Convey His Music? Shinji Hyogo Highlights His Live Performances]. Real Sound [ja] (in Japanese). Archived from the original on February 28, 2021. Retrieved April 11, 2024.
^Miyake, Shōichi (July 2, 2016). "完全体になった星野源の、体現" [The Embodiment of Gen Hoshino's Complete Form]. Rockin'On Japan (in Japanese). Archived from the original on May 7, 2019. Retrieved April 11, 2024.
^"星野源、映像作品でも1位獲得! オリコン映像ランキング主要3部門で1位に" [Gen Hoshino Tops Charts with Video Album! Takes First Place on Oricon's 3 Major Video Charts]. Rockin'On Japan (in Japanese). July 2, 2016. Archived from the original on April 11, 2024. Retrieved April 11, 2024.
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