Perfume – Attack of the exploding balloons
In the most amusing performance in recent memory, Perfume appeared on Music Station’s Christmas special, where the producers thought it was a good idea to roll out giant balloons into the crowd. The balloons bouncing around the stage created an attractive visual, but as they were batted around by the audience, they started exploding, flinging debris onto the stage. I thought it was hilarious.
The Perfume Music Station performance is on Youtube so you can check it out for yourself. Perfume is one of the biggest success stories in the past year and a half, vaulting from obscurity into a very popular group in the Japanese music industry. I’m a big fan of their electropop music and their inexplicably hypnotic and bizarre dances.
I’ll walk you through the performance. Perfume begins with an abridged “Polyrhythm”, the song that made them a household name. Before you ask, yes they’re lip-syncing, as they do in pretty much all their performances because of the vocoder use in their songs. At 2:10, they transition into “love the world”, which is when the balloons start rolling out. The balloons explode throughout the song, but the best part is around 3:55 when… well, Kashiyuka gets attacked.
Amazingly, aside from a quick flinch, she was unfazed and continued her dance without a break. A true sign of a professional!
Images from Jpopmusic, you can find a high-res copy of the performance at Jpopsuki
