Hiroyuki Sawano is one of Japan's hottest composers with a career that spans over twenty years. His SawanoHiroyuki[nZk] project has spent the past decade delivering a variety of vocal music for many series, including Attack on Titan, Gundam, and Fate. This concert marks his first ever show in Los Angeles, and the first proper SawanoHiroyuki[nZk] concert in America, bringing fans the complete experience with numerous vocalists and a full band. Sawano has only performed outside of Japan a handful of times, with his last stateside appearance being at Anime NYC 2023 alongside SennaRin, making this a special treat for fans in the United States. As you may have seen, we also published an interview with him about his career, which you can check out here.

All concert photo credits: Taichi Nishimaki
Article: Brian Lee

I've wanted to see him for the longest time, going as far as to travel to Japan for both his [nZk008] concert in 2024 and [nZk] 10th Anniversary concert in 2025. That's five thousand miles from America to Japan just for the chance to see him live, and both trips were specifically for those concerts with no other events planned. This time, I did the reverse: traveling the same five thousand miles, but this time from Japan to Los Angeles. Earlier in the week, I had flown to Japan to see superstar singer Ado at her Tokyo Dome concerts, spending a scant three days there, before flying out on Friday, just in time for Sawano's concert.

Unfortunately for me, I had gone from Tokyo's clear skies straight into a Los Angeles deluge. Like many others, I stood in the rain patiently waiting to get inside the Peacock Theater in downtown Los Angeles. The venue is one I have a long history with, having attended shows there since 2010. I've seen a lot of artists on that stage: Ado, YOASOBI, May’n, Atarashii Gakkou, Togenashi Togeari, AKB48, Love Live! Aqours, TM Revolution, and many more. The crowd was mixed, with some being in plainclothes like myself, some in cosplay, and some even in fancy dress. To llustrate this, one thing I noticed in line ahead of me was a squad of Survey Corps members from Attack on Titan followed closely by a man and woman in tuxedo and evening gown. It's that kind of night.

The original start time was slated for 8:00 PM, but slow entry processing pushed it to 8:30. I barely made it into the theater just as the dimming lights signaled the beginning of the show and quickly headed to my seat. Thankfully, after so many concerts here, I knew exactly where to go.

The American concert ended up being quite different from the two live performances I have seen in Japan. His Japanese concerts tend to be vocalist-focused, where each singer performs a few songs before switching out. For the Los Angeles concert, the format flipped, and the setlist was arranged more by series. Songs were grouped from the same franchise or series together. Another thing that Sawano likes to do is chat with the vocalists. Since Sawano is not fluent in English, and neither are most of the vocalists, there was much less of that. This did mean that the concert moved at a rapid pace, as Sawano and company hammered out almost two dozen songs in just 90 minutes.

Eliana

mpi

The first song (or songs, as it might be) was a rapid-fire medley of music from Attack on Titan, including “ətˈæk 0N tάɪtn,” “Before Lights Out,” “T:T,” and “Apple Seed.” Eliana, Laco, and mpi handled vocals, with mpi staying onstage for full versions of “The Reluctant Heroes,” “Call your name,” and a duet with SennaRin for “Barricades.” SennaRin closed out the Titan block with “Bauklötze” and “Call of Silence.”

Given that Attack on Titan is one of Sawano’s biggest global hits, starting with it made perfect sense. In our interview, he mentioned choosing songs with strong overseas popularity, and this opening run did exactly that.

Breaking from Attack on Titan, Laco returned on stage for "Zero Eclipse" from Vinland Saga (or Farmland Saga, for those of you old enough to remember the memes) followed by "FAKEit" from Fate/strange Fake and "Hands Up to the Sky" from EightySix.

(On that note: episodes 1–4 of Fate/strange Fake will be screening at select Alamo Drafthouses across the U.S., including Los Angeles and the San Francisco Bay Area/San Jose - on December 9. Tickets for the screenings are now available on the Alamo Drafthouse website. They are limited, so be quick!)

Laco

We had another change of vocalist, this time to mizuki, who sang "Avid" and "Lilas," both from EightySix.

And finally, it was time for my song.

Everyone has a personal favorite from a singer or composer, and for me, it’s “aLIEz” from Aldnoah.Zero. Seeing it live is one of the biggest reasons I’ve always wanted to attend a Hiroyuki Sawano concert. I had to wait until the 10th Anniversary show earlier this year to see it performed, and now I was getting to experience it again. It was glorious. mizuki hyped up the crowd, motioning for everyone to stand, and they immediately did. She clearly felt the audience’s energy on both this song and its companion, “Keep on keeping on.”

That's actually another point of contention between American and Japanese concerts. Americans seem to prefer to just sit if there's a seat available, and sometimes will even chastise others for standing. I've seen American crowds described as being "dead" for not getting on their feet. I've seen this multiple times this year alone during Ado's Hibana tour, Babymetal's show at Intuit Dome, and now here. In Japan, seats mostly exist to mark your spot; otherwise, the crowd generally stand throughout the actual performance unless you're in a designated seated area where you have agreed to sit for the entirety of the show (like what I saw at Perfume's final pre-hiatus live in September.)

XAI

At this point, we made a break from the series-centric portion of the set with a flurry of different songs, including Eliana singing Kill la Kill's "Before my body is dry," SennaRin singing "Saihate" from Bleach: Thousand-Year Blood War, XAI singing "time" from Seven Deadly Sins, and continuing on with "X.U." from Seraph of the End. XAI has such a killer voice, and she really put it on display with the following song, "DARK ARIA."

This also marked the beginning of the Solo Leveling block, which is one of Sawano's most recent works. Songs from both season one and two were featured, including "SHADOWBORN," "REVIVER," and "HOWL." The final song of the main set would be "Perfect Time" from Seven Deadly Sins sung by mpi and Laco.  All the vocalists, performers, and Sawano himself posed for a photo with the crowd.

SennaRin would take up the duty of the very last song of the night with her rendition of "So ist es immer" from Attack on Titan, accompanied by Sawano on piano.

SennaRin

As I finish writing this report, I’ve just arrived back in America by way of Japan, having just returned from Osaka and the two remaining shows of Ado’s Yodaka Dome series. I mention this to illustrate just how much Sawano’s music means to me: I willingly interrupted my Japan trip and added two extra transpacific flights (one to L.A. for this concert, and one back to Japan) just to see him live. That’s another 20 hours of travel (nevermind the unfortunate eight-hour delay before my flight to Osaka) and 11,000 additional miles in the air.

As for songs I wish had made the setlist? “scaPEGoat” from Seraph of the End, “Layers” from Re:CREATORS or anything else involving Aimee Blackschleger (“No differences” from Aldnoah.Zero comes to mind), and of course, something with Aimer, though understandably she has her own career to manage. I would also like to see "Tot Musica" from One Piece Film: Red as sung by Ado, but I'm sure any of the other vocalists could do it justice. That's my favorite Ado song, by the way, and unfortunately for me, one she doesn't seem to perform very much. It was part of the Wish and Hibana tours as well as the Matsuri special live earlier this year, so maybe it's just one that I am fated to only see during her foreign performances.

All in all, this was a fantastic concert, and I’m incredibly glad I was able to be there. One thing I always tell people: go to as many concerts as you can because you never know when you’ll get another chance.  I don't know when the next time we'll get to see Sawano in America but I hope it is soon.

Setlist as follows: 

1. Attack on Titan medley:
 attack ON titan <WMId> (Eliana)
 Before Lights Out (Laco)
 T:T (Eliana)
 Apple Seed (Laco and mpi)
2. The Reluctant Heroes (mpi) (Attack on Titan)
3. Call your name (mpi) (Attack on Titan)
4. arricades (mpi and SennaRin) (Attack on Titan)
5. Bauklötze (SennaRin) (Attack on Titan)
6. Call of Silence (SennaRin) (Attack on Titan)
7. Zero Eclipse (Laco) (Vinland Saga)
8. FAKEit (Laco) (Fate/strange Fake)
9. Hands Up to the Sky (Laco) (EightySix)
10. Avid (mizuki) (EightySix)
11. LilaS (mizuki) (EightySix)
12. aLIEz (mizuki) (Aldnoah.Zero)
13. Keep on keeping on (mizuki) (Aldnoah.Zero)
14. Before my body is dry (Eliana) (Kill la Kill)
15. Saihate (SennaRin) (Bleach: Thousand-Year Blood War)
16. time (XAI) (Seven Deadly Sins)
17. X.U. (XAI) (Seraph of the End)
18. DARK ARIA <LV2> (XAI) (Solo Leveling)
19. SHADOWBORN (mpi and XAI) (Solo Leveling)
20. REVIVER (SennaRin) (Solo Leveling)
21. HOWL (Eliana) (Solo Leveling)
22. Perfect Time (mpi and Laco) (Seven Deadly Sins)

Encore:
So ist es immer (SennaRin) (Attack on Titan)