[AJFmzk]

^ I don’t remember the exact interview, possibly it was one of the Finally documentaries, but Namie said that her voice got destroyed during Play Tour and Best Fiction Tour and it was never the same after that. Best fiction tour was originally filmed in Japan, but Namie was sick and actually apologized to the audience for her poor performance, so they re filmed it in Taiwan.

It’s not just a Japanese work ethic thing, though I’m sure it contributes. Cancelling tour dates is a big deal. It costs a lot to rent these halls/arenas for a tour. When everything goes well, you hopefully have good returns on the investment. When you have to cancel shows, the venue, promoter, label/artist all lose a ton of money. And not just that, cancelling actually makes venues and promoters think you could be “unreliable”, cancelling for whatever reason even if it’s not your fault or necessary for health reasons. Once you cancel once for any reason, it gets people at the venue/promoters worried that you may cancel again. So everyone tries to avoid cancelling as much as possible.