The rock group Glay is huge by any measure (except that of its actual size). A perusal of its Wikipedia page reveals a wealth of superlatives: One of the top 10 best-selling artists of all time in Japan; headliners of the most expensive concert ever staged in China; Guinness World Record-holders for the “largest ticketed concert ever held by a single act.”
This focus on scale has been commodified into an event called Glay Expo, which takes the idea of a concert tour to the next level by incorporating shows into a larger conceptual presentation of the band’s outlook and interests, whether it be festival-like gatherings with artists that Glay members admire or performances powered by solar energy. That aforementioned Guinness record-holding concert was, in fact, a Glay Expo event in 1999.
“The idea of the Glay Expo is pretty simple,” says the group’s guitarist, Takuro Kubo (who goes by his first name), during a remote online interview from his home in Los Angeles. “It’s more than a tour. We’ll do more TV and radio. Sometimes, we’ll serve food from our hometown in Hokkaido Prefecture. We just want to entertain our fans.”