Did you miss the Masayoshi Takanaka concert last week? You and half of Los Angeles!
For two nights only at the Hollywood Palladium, a room full of people who somehow got tickets in under 30 seconds, and a 73-year-old legend who waited over four decades to come back and remind everyone why he mattered so much in the first place.
The kind of show that instantly turns into “you had to be there” kind of vibe – except this time, you actually don’t.
Because while the crowd spilled out onto Sunset still buzzing about it, the rest of us get a second shot.
Transport to 70’s Tokyo
Masayoshi Takanaka’s L.A. stop on his SUPER WORLD LIVE 2026 tour, with equal parts nostalgia trip and technical flex, was captured in full.
The surfboard guitar made its return, the solos stretched into that warm, sunlit fusion he basically helped invent, and the whole thing felt less like a concert and more like stepping into a perfectly preserved version of late-’70s Tokyo nightlife… just transplanted into modern L.A.
And now it’s coming to your screen at home.
How to watch at home
Streaming on WOWOW this June, the broadcast drops you right into that sold-out room with the lights, the tone, the effortless way Takanaka moves between playful and precise. It’s the closest thing to actually being there – minus the ticket stress and resale prices that probably made you close the app.
Even better: it’s not a one-and-done situation. After the initial broadcast, the show sticks around on WOWOW On Demand for a full month. So whether you want to casually check it out or fully immerse yourself at 1 a.m. with headphones on, that option’s there for all of June.
There’s something fitting about it, too. A guitarist whose global audience grew quietly for decades, through vinyl, YouTube algorithms, and the slow resurgence of city pop, finally does a world tour… and then brings it right back to the people who missed out.
So even though you didn’t make it to the Palladium, you can still immerse yourself in the cool jazzy magic.
