JAPANESE BREAKFAST AT PAPER TIGER IN SAN ANTONIO
The Paper Tiger in San Antonio, Texas is a unique venue to Japanese Breakfast for a few reasons: Early in the band’s career, it was, “one of their only successful shows”, according to singer Michelle Zauner. It was also the last show they played for over a year and a half thanks to the pandemic.
On Monday, Nov. 1, Japanese Breakfast was finally back in San Antonio almost two years later to give fans another epic performance, this time riding off the momentum of their summer 2021 release, Jubilee.
Los Angeles-based, experimental artist Sasami got the crowd warmed up before Japanese Breakfast took the stage. Despite some technical difficulties at the start of the set, fans were engaged and had their eyes glued to the stage. Everyone was particularly excited to hear the band bust out a cover of System of a Down’s “Toxicity”.
Japanese Breakfast then took the stage and the fans went wild. The band opened up with “Paprika”, the leading track on the latest album. With a mallet in one hand and a microphone in the other, Zauner walked the stage from side to side, belting out the lyrics and emphatically hitting a gong placed on the center of the stage.
The band then went right into their popular single, “Be Sweet” as the crowd danced and sang along to every word.
They kept the energy going throughout the entire set. The band went into song after song, giving fans quite a bit of new material, while of course playing some older favorites like “Road Head” and “Everyone wants to Love You”.
The night came to an end with an encore performance of “Posing for Cars” and “Diving Woman”, in which the band extended the ending and had the crowd moving to the beat while they jammed on and on.
Although it felt like the show had flown by, I was still in awe of the performance. From the flow of the setlist, to the lighting, and everything in between, Japanese Breakfast delivered an extraordinary performance that you don’t want to miss.