[Raleigh]

Here's my mini-review:

The first video was really really neat. I liked the offshots a lot. They really made it look epic and very professional. I liked it a lot. The intro for GREEN looks low a bit low budget but it was a good job from her backup dancers. The dragons were pretty neat. I enjoyed the performance for both GREEN and Will. The fact that she still danced a little and put in effort was a good thing. However I would've preferred Will to be sung in a kimono, even if she used the same one from GREEN.

The pink outfit for vogue was out of place. Even the backup singers had a more appropriate outfit... It's supposed to be an oriental/Asiatic song. The mini-choreography was nice but if they used the fans again it would've been so much nicer. I'm guessing they didn't want to include an interlude or something so she changed her outfit before. HONEY was pretty cute and fun to watch. She looked like she was enjoying it so much. ANGEL'S SONG left me with no words. First I saw Ayu's outfit and wondered if she borrowed Kumi's stylist. Because that was ...tacky. Well, a fashion disaster once in a while is acceptable. The whole performance was chaotic and err... it seemed that whoever designed this was on drugs.

END OF THE WORLD was pretty good. Kinda like Decision last year. Anyway I liked the simplistic style and the dramatic performance. Also she looks so good in that outfit. Heartplace was good too though she struggled with some notes. But I enjoyed that a lot, made it feel more raw and emotional. The fact that they even got a small orchestra was really neat.

Real me was quite good. I liked the outfits, reminded me of her Rainbow era. The choreography was a bit mellow though. Naturally + and then were a nice trip to the past. The choreography for Naturally was pretty neat. Nothing spectacular but quite solid. In the Corner is one of my favourite songs. It's a shame she didn't choose a lovely gown for this song. But the choreography was not so shabby. I felt it was a bit unmemorable though.

POWDER SNOW had a nice intro though I'm not too crazy about seeing Shuya dance again... Ayu's outfit was really nice. Is it a modification of her Happy Xmas live? Ayu pulled off a very nice performance on this one, especially since it's such an old song. Someone mentioned they should've included snow.. I think that would've been nice. HOPE or PAIN was okay but I'm wondering if they recycled yet another gown of Ayu's. It was another nice performance but Shuya's dancing was.. oh well. Over was yet another solid performance. I liked the fact that Ayu was alone. SCAR sounded good. Liked the idea of a choir. Overall she pulled a very basic but classy performance.

SIGNAL-HANA-TOO LATE were also quite well performed. The choreography was good, the vocals were sold and Ayu looked quite good. The whole 90's outfit was sooo cool! I was surprised that she was still full of energy and looked like she was enjoying herself so much. I think this part was one of her best parts. UNITE is a song that has been performed over and over so there's nothing much to say. It's quite good as the other UNITE performances. Same goes for SURREAL/evolution.

The 10 years clip was nice. I liked the highlights of her career. Really showed how much she loves performing for her fans. Who.. was a nice song for the countdown. However the outfit was sooo bad. Trauma is always a fun song to dance too. The audience looked like they were having fun too! independent is one of my favourite concert songs. I'm a bit disappointed that Ayu looked a bit tired and didn't dance so much in this one. everywhere nowhere had a cool arrangement

Finally Mirrorcle World sounded good. Nothing else to say here either. It was good, the outfit looked cool and the choreography was good.

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Also I will never get tired of saying this but her backup singers are not really good. Their voices grate, it's as if they are wailing. I know they're her close friends but I always get SO irritated when I hear a solo by them. I was so angry when I heard Peco wailing at Heartplace!!!

Overall, I think this is one of her best Countdown lives. The fact that so many underrated songs got sung was awesome. Also it was amazing how Ayu pulled such a performance when she had just injured her hand. I can't wait to see this on DVD on a higher quality!