XodiacK tried in 2008 and partnered with HearJapan to distribute their first EP and single, but it ended up on Tainted World almost immediately. HearJapan issued a statement expressing their disappointment with the international community, and how we didn’t support the band. Back in the day, I heard rumors that the band fronted almost $10k to make it happen, and they certainly didn’t make their money back. That certainly demonstrated to other indie bands that the international scene wasn’t worth it unless you were big enough. A part of me even suspects that the general reluctance from bands in the early 10’s to put stuff on digital platforms has some roots in the XodiacK leak. That’s honestly why I’m surprised JILUKA is doing a world tour, and actually hitting several continents at that. Even though I can’t see them, I hope it works out. We don’t need a XodiacK part two.
$10,000 just for a website to host and sell a few mp3s? They honestly could have just gotten better results with iTunes, which is where most of the VK bands were uploading their music for international sale.
I think the mistake bands are making is assuming that promotions need to include these high budget, flashy moves and not just going back to the basics. Hop on a message board, “Hi. My name is x and I play x for the new band X. Come listen to our first single”. $0. The reason why I bring up Kiwamu is because for the longest time, he was literally the only guy who did that. He heard about Duel Jewel playing Dallas in 2002, knew that they were virtual nobodies at the time and decided that he (also a virtual nobody at the time) wanted in.
Until 4D technology advances, I don’t think anyone is going to be able to pirate the full experience of being at a concert, so there’s always going to be a market for people willing to travel for bands. Problem is, someone who can afford to travel two or three times a year for one band can also afford to travel to Japan once a year for a dozen.
Fans are willing to support bands who try, but it has to make sense. If bands weren’t allergic to working with one another, it would make more sense to more people in the fandom.
They also had to do the recording, promotion, the PV, etc.
Sorry to side bar, so that’s essentially the same thing they would have done anyways? Unless they wanted this to somehow be a “Western exclusive” EP, but…no one ever asked for exclusive releases?
Either way, best of luck to Jiluka.
Probably logistics get a lot messier for them once you factor in different labels, from an international business and tax perspective it’s gotta be a major hassle not worth getting into. And these bands are aiming for their fans/gain more fans to go to THEIR shows and buy their things, not for casual taiban goers who probably won’t spend much on merch anyways. It’s a different culture that’s probably not as profitable to them and not worth getting 8+ people halfway across the world.
Hahaha, no. I csn easily travel to 3 countries in Europe and it will cost less than the flight to japan. Also I can make a weekend trip to other countries in Europe but if I have to take a 12 hour flight I want to stay at least 4 weeks and that is not so easy to get time off from work.
The end of coupling tours is an interesting topic because it happened already even at the height of the weeb boom. Prior to 2009 they weren’t unusual (ones off the top of my head: Matenrou Opera/Versailles, Exist Trace/Black:list…)
Another thing that happened is that the setlists got shorter. The Gazette for example went from around 20 songs to 16 throughout their European tours, D’s second appearance in Helsinki shrunk from like over 20 to 16 (albeit the first time around also had them playing the first songs a second time because some people missed it) and MUCC also went from 20 to around 15. Nothing changed regarding the venues, so they just realized that they’d get away with less. Towards the end of us getting concerts here most of the shows were around 70 mins give or take and that’s what I’d except Jiluka to do as well.
This just reminded me how I saw Mikaru’s post-Distraught Overlord project and despite them having like one single out I think that show went north of 2 hours from MCs alone
We went a bit off topic here but oversea tours are an intresting topic, which could be worth an own thread, no?
Just slapping this short in here, @CervaCannibale had the exact same thought i had last night, the whole jiluka tour talk derailed a little and should get turned into its own thread. So here we go
XodiacK really was the unluckiest band concerning overseas promotion and touring the EU back then lol
The XodiacK concert that had been scheduled for May 21 [2011] in Munich, Germany has been cancelled due to the circumstances of the sponsor. The band agreed to hold a concert in Munich after receiving an offer from the sponsor, Sabrina Kissenberth, but it was found that after the announcement of the concert, she failed to uphold any of the duties she was responsible for as a sponsor including promotion, arranging the venue, and financing the tour. Neither the band nor the label has received any contact from Sabrina Kissenberth since February, leaving us with no means of communication and no other option but to cancel the concert. Unfortunately, since Sabrina Kissenberth did not give us any information regarding the means by which tickets were sold, we are unable to offer refunds to those who have already purchased tickets. We will update in the near future with the full name and email address of the sponsor for those who wish to request a refund. We apologize for the inconvenience, but please try contacting her directly for reimbursement. Both the band and the label regret that this appearance had to be cancelled due to the sponsor’s incompetence. We hope to find a new sponsor and organize another tour in the future. Please continue to support the activities of XodiacK despite this unfortunate cancellation.
Woa, did people get back their ticket money? Does not sound likely…
I can’t specifically speak about Europe, but if someone is flying regularly across the US, or from Canada to the US, then Japan isn’t really that much of a stretch, especially considering the weakened yen.
Yeah, I meant to say it is diffrent for Europe and the tour has more european dates and people complained about the europe ticket prices in particular.
I know it’s diffrent for the us. So i mentioned it to put it into perspective as people from the us tend to think traveling across europe is as expensive as traveling in the us.
Let’s look at some examples: Jiluka is playing in Warsaw ,Bratislava, Paris.
If I booked the cheapest bus from Berlin (Germany) to Bratislava (Slovakia) and back that would cost me in total 60€.
If I booked a direct train from Berlin to Warsaw (Poland) and back cheapest timeslot 60 €. Cheapest hostel (that still has at least 8/10 in reviews) is 54 € for 3 nights over a weekend (shared bedroom). If I want my own room it’s112 € but would be cheaper if I travel with a friend and get a double room. Which I usually do.
A flight to Paris and back in June is 107 € to Airport Orly (it is a bit further away from the city) and 165 € to CDG Airport.
Not sure, but it was a mess haha it was literally just a fan “organizing” the concert. I think tickets were sold on eventim, so I assume people got refunded through the platform
This is the exact reason why I don’t like it when other people leak active vkei band releases everywhere. It loses the band money and basically minimizes the bands hard work that they put in to the music, visuals and content creation etc… If the band is disbanded for a while that’s one thing but if they are active nothing like similar to this should have been leaked in my opinion.
To add to this point, I do agree that they should have went a different route prob should have spent that 10k on touring internationally then released the CD as limited live if they wanted international attention. Would have probably made more money back. Additionally, if this is the case that they spent a lot of money to promote thier release then, they must have spent even more money cuz XodiacK is also the same band which their only pv looks like PS1 graphics or CGI stuff that would most likely cost a pretty penny to during that year.
Basically stuff like this:
and yeah, that is fully free, it only costs the band some time to sit on the laptop and answer fan questions.
Same goes for interviews. If it is free, then take that free promo.
And if someone tells me now “but that is in english”, yeah well, you wont get far promoting in japanese for europe or the US
There went a lot wrong here, didn’t it? Had the fan any credentials? Feels a bit naive on the bands side?
How to plan a european tour the correct way. Exhibit A:
Seems like they really used the data they got from the survey to calculate the demand, pick venue sizes and maybe also which albums to tour with.
But in the end they are relatively consitent anyway with touring europe. Before the pandemic they toured every second year and theoretically they only skipped 2022 because of it.
Do they really hate overseas as much as people like to claim? 
While I think Jiluka is very poorly handled and that their current promoters might be the difference between them growing a real following abroad vs just playing to some weebs in a couple small one off tours, you can’t really compare Dir to other bands. Thet have a big label backing them, an even bigger audience and a ton of overseas experience.
You can definitely compare the two. The organisers of the Jiluka tour are NOT doing what the organisers of the Dir tour have and it shows. I think it’s funny you say you cant compare these two situations as the Jiluka organisers are 100% trying to do what much bigger bands are doing with a much smaller band and not half the same knowledge as everyone involved who have been doing this for far longer. The basic thing with playing shows/touring is that you manage it based on where the artist stands in the local scene and this is far from evident anything like this has been taken into consideration here. Its a shame because i feel like the vision is there to do something great for the band but just the execution has been blown way out of proportion for what the band is actually capable of overseas.