Finally watched Grace -Opus II- last night!! I seriously had goosebumps throughout most of it. So many beautiful arrangements! I think it was actually slightly better than the first LIVE GRACE, if only because I felt like the arrangements were much more varied (whereas GRACE, with only a couple exceptions, had the songs all sound as they usually did, just played by a live orchestra).
Some standouts:
Zankou no Gaia - They totally breathed new life into this song. There were so many parts of the composition that came out so much stronger with an orchestra!
Juliet - Same as above, and I loved Nana's vocals here. I'm glad she didn't go for purely cutesy/girly vocals and instead sounded really elegant and lovely.
Replay Machine - Asdhfjksdhgkj. This performance broke my brain with how epic it was. The new arrangement was INCREDIBLE.
Risouron - This performance really made me appreciate this song. I always liked it, but the orchestra made it feel a lot less "thin", if you will, and it was a world of difference.
Hoshikuzu Symphony - I've been ignoring this song a lot lately (since it's, well, summer xD) but this performance just reminded me how gorgeous it is. Definitely one of my favourite tracks from RockNei and I was totally reminded as to why
DISCOTHEQUE - Super cute. The video had more of a story than any of Nana's actual PVs, though :XD
BRAVE PHOENIX - The choir in the back really added to this song in particular. It sounded so gorgeous.
Yume no Tsuzuki - Ahhh <3 It's so hard not to love Nana in this performance. She sounded beautiful and the part where she had to stop and start again was too cute.
Other comments:
- I wasn't a huge fan of the Darling Plastic arrangement - it was good, but it sounded a bit too empty compared to the real thing.
- Also, Lovely Fruit seemed a little out of place. Cute, definitely, but out of place, haha.
- And I still can't believe she passed up the opportunity to do STAR ROAD!
- I didn't realize it until actually watching it, but BRAVE PHOENIX and Pray, which were done right after the other, were the first two Nana songs I ever heard :XD
- I was totally hoping Nana would come out at the end of Jupiter and do a solo version of the Ayaka Hirahara song
- The costumes, save for the white Avalon no Oukan outfit, were honestly pretty bad, haha.
- The concert followed almost the exact same formula as the first! Which would bother me normally, but I was way too entranced in the music <3
So yeah, amazing concert, certainly lived up to my expectations, and I will most likely die if I don't find MP3 rips of it soon xD