Walk-In Performance! (Sports Nippon - Japan)

Time of publication: 31.10.2003

Tatu's Walk-In Performance at a University Festival

The Russian chaos-merchants Tatu gave an unscheduled performance at the Bunkyo Gakuin university festival in Tokyo's Bunkyo Ward. This was their first ever live performance in Japan. At the end of their performance, Yulia (18) and Lena (19) went crazy, giving each other a deep kiss that lasted for 7 seconds. They gave enthusiastic renditions of two of their songs amid cheers from the crowd of around 400 students.

When the two girls, who were introduced by festival organisers as "Our special guests from Russia - Tatu!!", arrived, both holding small video cameras, the venue erupted with excitement. There were loud screams from the audience, who had no idea that Tatu were going to appear. The performance began amid a volley of flashes from mobile phone cameras.

Tatu's return to Japan was decided only the day before they arrived, after they expressed a desire to interact directly with Japanese fans of a similar age. When they first came to Japan, in June, they suddenly walked out on a live programme on which they were appearing. They performed a song for the press corps at a karaoke box, but this was the first time they had sung for their fans in Japan.

The two girls gave enthusiastic performances of "Show Me Love" and "Not Gonna Get Us", saying "We're going to sing for all of you." When fans sang along with the Russian version of "All The Things She Said", they were delighted, saying "We're amazed that you were all able to learn Russian so easily!"

They also said "Show us your love. If you show us a beautiful kiss, we'll show it on a big screen at the concert in December." They got three couples - two women, two men and a man and woman - to get up on stage and demanded that they kiss each other. Finally, as if to say "This is a real kiss", they gave each other a deep, lingering kiss lasting 7 seconds.

It was an astounding performance that lasted about 25 minutes. The university's Professor Hiromi Hayashi seemed relieved that the appearance went off without incident, saying "Why shouldn't they kiss? It's all part of their desire to delight their fans by showing them something special."

Tatu's scheduled visit on the 27th to Otsuka Pharmaceuticals, one of the sponsors of their first ever Japanese concert, was cancelled because of security concerns on the part of the company, but the girls are due to appear on at least 5 TV and radio programmes while they are here. They are scheduled to return to Russia on the 29th.

Thanks to Lenochka0.

Return to "Articles"