Live Report of Y.B. in London

While it's a rare occurrence for Korean bands to venture into Europe, it's even more unusual for one of Korea's most popular bands to opt to perform at a medium-sized venue in the suburbs of London. While Kingston may not appear to the be the obvious choice as a location, it certainly worked in the band's favour as the area is home to the largest percentage of South Koreans outside of Korea itself.

Many fans drifted into the venue's grounds throughout the day in hopes of meeting their idols and were not left disappointed. One fan in particular was especially dedicated to the vocalist of Y.B. and had made his own banner for the occasion. Sporting Korean writing with Do Hyun's name in colourful bubble writing, accompanied by a cartoon-styled drawing of a DJ, the vocalist's reaction to the banner seemed quietly pleased.

After two fantastic opening acts in the form of TOMIKITA and the London punk band Steranko (recommended as long as the audience are not afraid of becoming an integral part of their stage show), Y.B. took to the stage and received a more than warm response from the audience.

The band kicked off the show with Dambaegage agassi, a song that guaranteed a positive start to the show. The crowd remained frantic throughout the performance, some members of the audience jumping up-and-down, whilst others chose to simply sing along. This song was quickly followed by Hollywood, one of their solely English language tracks. The song carried on to the positive atmosphere flooding the room, although it wasn't until the first chords of It Burns echoed through the venue that the concert truly began.

The set continued with Keun byeomen eopseo, which proved to be the most popular song of the set so far (this could be considered quite an achievement gathering the crowd response so far). Meoriapa opened with Do Hyun screaming "We love rock 'n' roll!", a sentiment which fitted the song perfectly and wasn't let down by the performance. Midway through the song, Do Hyun shifted to one side to allow guitarist Jun to perform a flawless solo before returning to centre stage to perform a solo of his own on the harmonica.

The main set concluded with the Korean classic, Arirang, which the audience happily sang along with. At the end of the song, Do Hyun came to the edge of the stage and proceeded to shake hands with several members of the audience. In some cases even taking hands and offering hand shakes to fans who didn’t have their hands up!

The first encore kicked off with Neoreul bonaego. This ballad was one of the best-received songs of the evening, with fans swaying and swinging along in time with the beat. Towards the end of the song, Do Hyun paused between each line in the song, suggesting that the crowd took the initiative and sung the remainder of the line. With some eager fans taking the lead, Do Hyun joked with the audience that they begun singing too soon.

The second song of the encore was Dolgo Dolgo Dolgo. The band requested that the song be played without the stage lights on, meaning that the first section of the song was performed in complete darkness apart from some blue light s on the neck of Tae-hee's bass. The lights were then bought up to finish the song, which served as the official end of the concert.

Luckily, the crowd were not satisfied and started begging the band for one more song. Do Hyun called for Lee (or "Tall Lee" as he called him), who is the singer in Steranko, to come to stage to join the band. He did and provided one of the most energetic performances of the night. Needless to say, the crowd were thrilled with the performance and as the band left the stage they were still asking for more…

After several minutes, Do Hyun returned to the stage with Steranko to perform a song, which was followed by another song with Tae-hee taking part on bass. Needless to say, in typical Steranko style, the performances were nothing short of entertaining and high-energy.

Set-list:

Dambaegage agassi
Hollywood
It burns
Naneun nabi
Keun byeoreun eopseo
Meoriapa
Arirang

Encore 1:
Neoreul bonaego
Dolgo dolgo dolgo