Koyuki’s disappointed in himself for not playing up to par with the other members in his first live performance together with the other members of Beck, but he redeems himself after volunteering his voice to sing their latest song titled “Face” during practice. Since it’s Ryuusuke’s song written specifically for Maho, Koyuki has no problem expressing his feelings for her in the vocals. It’s such a beautiful scene listening to him sing while we see glimpses of Maho in her sweetest moments with Koyuki. He impresses both Chiba and Taira to the point where they’re in full support of him being an integral part of the band, and Ryuusuke announces both Koyuki and Saku as official members of Beck.
Hyoudou catches Koyuki playing the guitar to the tune of Dying Breed’s new song titled “I Call You Love,” but he surprisingly leaves him alone as he and Saku walk out of the music room together. Could it be that Hyoudou’s shocked that Koyuki actually listens to rock music, or could it be that he’s finally giving him a little respect after last week’s amazing phenomenon with Koyuki winning first place in the swimming tournament? Whatever the case, it’s nice to see that he’s not being such a jerk in this episode.
Saitou-san absolutely cracks me up in every episode. Koyuki begs him to watch him sing at the next live performance, but Saitou-san’s dead-set on not going because he’s not into that kind of music. So, Koyuki ingeniously mentions Momoko-sensei, and Saitou-san immediately changes his tune and decides to attend as long as he gets to see Momo-chan. (Heh, Saitou-san is so easy to manipulate as long as there’s a younger woman involved… :grin:)
Koyuki’s on his way to band practice when he accidentally bumps shoulders with Rikia, and it looks like he’s in for some bad luck. He tries to get out of it by explaining that he’s going to be late for practice, but Rikia’s a jerk and doesn’t give a crap about his plans, so he takes Koyuki’s necklace and bends the guitar pick in half to show his total disregard and disdain for Koyuki and his existence. It’s one thing to pick on him, but he gets enraged after destroying something important that Maho had to given to him. He courageously tries to fight Rikia, but he quickly gets tossed to the ground like a toy, and it looks like he’s about to get his butt kicked. However, Chiba comes to his rescue and beats the crap out of Rikia. He admires Koyuki for having the guts to stand up for himself, and he admonishes Rikia for picking on someone weaker than him. Koyuki’s surprised to find out that Chiba was just like him when he was little until he decided to take it upon himself to learn karate and defend himself against bullies like Hyoudou and Rikia. Another surprise comes from Rikia when he recognizes Ryuusuke as the guitarist from Serial Momma and compliments his guitar playing to that of Jimmy Paige, but it’s a little too late for him to try swooning anyone at this point. I’m looking forward to the next episode when Koyuki gets to sing in front of a live audience. 
I really enjoyed the music featured in this episode, so I’ve included the small clips of “Face” and “I Call You Love” here. Hope you enjoy it.
Hyoudou and his buddies decide to make Koyuki’s life even harder by signing him up for the toughest swimming matches at the school’s 40th anniversary swimming tournament just to make him look like a bumbling idiot in front of the entire school. What they don’t realize, however, is that Saitou-san is the best swimming coach around, and he’s done wonders to improve Koyuki’s swimming skills. The rest of his classmates are apparently just as stupid as Hyoudou and his “posse” because of their mean-spirited laughter geared toward Koyuki and his loser reputation. However, Koyuki gets to have the last laugh when he ends up doing much better than expected at the tournament. Saitou-san tries to get him to practice before the start of the 100 meter backstroke, but he collapses from pure exhaustion until Maho shows up in a surprisingly skimpy bikini. His energy is immediately re-invigorated at the sight of Maho in her swimsuit, and she gives him a thorough bodily stretching session to relax his muscles in preparation for the next match (no, it’s not that type of stretching…:wink:). While she’s giving him a nice leg stretch, Saitou-san gets a Naruto-esque bloody nose from the sight of watching Maho moving around in her bathing suit (Jiraiya comes to mind…). She even agrees to do whatever he wants if he wins. Of course, that fuels his energy and incentive to win, and he’s so determined to beat Kuroki that he ends up smashing his head into the wall. After hearing the results of Koyuki winning first place, Hyoudou walks away from the pool in anger, shamefully defeated by Koyuki (along with the fact that he doesn’t have a hot chick by his side).
After finding out that he’s won first place in the tournament, Koyuki goes to thank Saitou-san for all of his lessons and finds him in the pool with Momo-chan. Apparently, she had asked him to teach her how to swim, and he gladly offered to provide her with lessons in hopes of getting to know her better. He tries to impress her by demonstrating how to properly kick in the water, but he ends up splashing a head-full of water at her instead.
With Toudou’s decision to quit the band in order to spend more time on helping his family, Ryuusuke calls it quits for the band until he notices Saku reading a book on drums and decides to take a chance with him during practice. He’s surprisingly really good, and Ryuusuke recruits both him and Koyuki to join as support members for the band. Taira has doubts about Koyuki’s skill level on the guitar, but Ryuusuke tells him that good chemistry between band members is more important than technique. Looks like we’ll be seeing Koyuki and Saku in their first live performance in next week’s episode, and I can’t wait to see what happens. Will Koyuki do well, or will he mess up because of stage fright? This is definitely my favorite series of the season.
Koyuki sends a prayer to the gods in hopes of getting into a different class from Hyoudou, but things go terribly wrong for him from the get go. Not only does he end up in the same class as Hyoudou, but he also has to shell out 50,000 Yen (equivalent to $480) to Hyoudou in a matter of three days to supposedly pay for the damage he caused to Rikia’s guitar. Koyuki’s life does begin to look brighter as the day progresses, though. Saitou-san lets him borrow his beautiful White Falcon guitar indefinitely as a present for working so diligently, and it’s also in exchange to get Koyuki to help him see Momoko-sensei (Momo-chan) again. He also runs into Ryuusuke later that day and gets to play the White Falcon during the band’s practice session. Ryuusuke and another band mate takes notice of Koyuki’s guitar playing and acknowledges that he must’ve been practicing a hell of a lot because it’s much better than someone who’s only been playing for a year.
Koyuki hands the 46,500 Yen over to Hyoudou after selling Saitou-san’s vast collection of porn magazines, but it’s still not enough to cover the damage expenses for Rikiya’s (or is it Rikia’s?) damaged guitar. Hyoudou stashes the money in his jacket pocket and walks away with a satisfied look on his face, but Koyuki begins to suspect that something’s wrong with that scenario later on that day as he’s walking home from school. His day progressively gets worse after finding out that Izumi is asked out by a fellow classmate, and he realizes at that moment that nothing will change in his life unless he takes the initiative to do something about it. The next day at school, he decides to play Dying Breed’s Fifty Cent Wisdom on the school’s PA system and is befriended Sakurai Yuuji, the new transfer student who’s also a big fan of Dying Breed. Koyuki invites him to the band’s practice session, and we find out that Ryuusuke plans to add Koyuki as a member of Beck. Looking forward to the next episode!
I don’t understand how Koyuki can handle the constant bullying from Hyoudou and his idiotic sidekicks and not tell anyone about it. I’m glad that he’s finally starting to stand up to them, but he gets beaten up in the process and receives his first complaint from Momo-chan who’s upset and disappointed in his lackluster attendance at the soft music club. He finally gets Ryuusuke’s guitar back in one piece, but it ends up getting smashed into broken pieces just hours later after being confronted by Hyoudou and Rikiya on his way to Ryuusuke’s place. Fortunately, Maho finds the real guitar that Eddie had given to Ryuusuke, so the guitar he gave to Koyuki is actually a fake that he bought in Queens. Koyuki doesn’t know this, though, so he’s completely devastated about the jaded guitar and ends up running away after seeing Ryuusuke again for the first time since their last confrontation.
This episode was exciting as usual. We finally get to see two live performances from Beck with Chiba as the lead singer and Ryuusuke and Taira on the guitars. Koyuki shows up to both performances wearing his winter jacket and sunglasses in hopes of Ryuusuke not noticing him, but he ends up standing out like a sore thumb because of his odd-looking disguise. Eiji shows up to the second performance, but it’s obvious that he has something up his sleeve.
While I’m glad that Ryuusuke’s over his grudge with Koyuki, I really want to see them talking to each other again by the next episode. Kudos to Anime Empire for releasing #7 and #8 on the same day! Thank you.
If any of you are interested in listening to the Engrish-only version of “Full Moon Sway” featured in Beck, please download it here. The very last part of the song unfortunately had to be cut because it was recorded during the show, and I didn’t want to include any of the dialogue. I hope you enjoy listening to it!
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