This song plays a lot during the game, during quite a few boss battles and even some of the more bombastic scenes. It would take a lot of explaining and go into spoiler territory so I'm gonna put some space between this part of the message and the longer one. As to why the song is called Grandma (Destruction) but essentially the writer for this game, Yoko Taro, is some kind of mad genius who likes to play with a lot of different concepts in his writing. And Nier Automata is a game about the erosion of culture and context, and what it means to be human long after humans have stopped being the dominant force on the planet. It's a song from the previous game, Nier Replicant, simply titled Grandma, and the context for that one has to do with one of the characters being raised by her grandma and a monster comes along and kills said grandma then uses her voice to manipulate the character. The song plays when you face off against said monster and it's really seeped in a lot of bad feelings and is one of the more pivotal moments in the game. Of course Nier Automata takes place far far in the future when none of those characters are even a memory anymore and this version of the song is basically stripped of it's meaning and turned into a bombastic general theme since it was so important in the last game, which sort of gives it new meaning in this game.
"Grandma" is from Nier Replicant, and is hauntingly beautiful. "Grandma (Destruction)" is the Nier Automata version and is more epic but still beautiful.
I agree. It's as if Kainé is there with us again. As if her ghost is around with us. As if she is guiding us. She is still with us because A2 and 2B were modelled after her. Mainly, it's her combat skills that are modelled into them. I love the music in both.
As someone said, "Grandma" is from Nier: Replicant. Its based on the character Kaines grandmother, which is consideribly more mellow in that game. For us as Nier fans, seeing how they took the songs from the old game into automata was incredibly satisfying. This goes for Emil's despair and Song of the Ancients aswell. Nier: Automata soundtrack is incredible. Nothing short of amazing.
I absolutely MUST recommend "Torn from the Heavens/The Dark Colossus Destroys All (Medley)" from FFXIV. It perfectly meshes both the styles of FFXIV and Nier.
"Nier Automata is all over the place" and every place is a masterpiece, one of my fav soundtracks ever... Playing the game with this music is something that you can't explain. Really hope that you can give it a try someday and play it.
This is a fantastic song. I'll admit I didn't know about the song's relation to NieR: Replicant (it's tough to continue a first playthrough when I know-from NieR: Automata-how the NieR series takes your heart in its hand and crushes it). The entire arrangement is phenomenal, the choir is excellent, the orchestra is just so good (the xylophone progression and the strings' rapid chord falls [for lack of a better term] are simply *chef's kiss*). But I think the horns really stole the show. They are loud and prominent without being in your face, like how you described the percussion levels in the mix. Both Yoko Taro (game director) and Keiichi Okabe (composer and arranger) are mad geniuses and I love it. Music like this is, I think, what makes life worth living. In an impossible-to-quantify kind of way, I know my life is unquestionably better for having experienced both the game and music of NieR: Automata.
Thanks Dennis for the Patreon request! Song mentioned in this video; Dimmu Borgir - Progenies Of The Great Apocalypse (must watch) ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-xlD5zePSzdQ.html
I think part of what makes this song work so well is it's *entirely* a tension-filled buildup all the way through, which for the context of what it means in the story? Perfect! It makes sense that it's just a tension buildup with *no release.* Because there's no release to the tension after the points where it plays, it just leaves you with an uneasy feeling that things aren't over yet. Edit: Just heard you say "It feels like I'm climbing a mountain" and I completely agree! That's a great way to get at the feeling. It's like you've just hit your stride on the mountain and are now feeling just how difficult it is to get to the top. Side note, this is another soundtrack with maaaaany good songs, but the original NieR is not one to overlook. It has a remastered soundtrack that isn't necessarily better or worse, but changed up the instrumentation a good bit, but the original still holds a special place in my heart. Thinking of a few tracks that truly stick out to me as to why I love the sound of the original NieR (Replicant or Gestalt, it's somewhat complicated, but long story short, the North American release originally had an older fatherly figure as the protagonist instead of a younger more traditional anime-style brotherly protagonist), so I'll give it a shot. First, The Wretched Automatons for a very unique song sound-wise. Next up is the song that hooked me on the series and got me interested in them in the first place: The Dark Colossus Destroys All, which plays at one of the most pivotal points of the game. It got a theme reprise in Automata as well in Dark Colossus - Kaiju. I'm not sure which of the two is better, both are great for different reasons, but the Kaiju version has more layers to the song and sounds much bigger and grander. However, if you listen to none of these, one I highly recommend for the uniqueness is from NieR Automata called Possessed by Disease. The way the vocals sound is incredibly unique among the sounds of the series in an excellent way, I cannot recommend it enough. There are too many other great songs to recommend but these will have to do for now.
There is one lyrical song in this OST that has a version in English, & in Japanese, as well as the fictitious Chaos language, & it is the ending credits song, Weight of the World. You are also correct that because not only is this a boss battle theme, but combat in this game is war-themed, the consistent tempo, but the theme giving "breathing space" is to partially simulate that moment of the fighting stopping, & them surveying the aftermath, before say, a next wave. Chaos is indeed rampant in the music & story theming.
The way you described the drums being like far away and echoing made me think of the stuff I know about these songs and it's super interesting... Back when the original Grandma was composed, NieR was a very different game, and it was supposed to be about a grandma trying to save her granddaughter in a time of war. The theme had military sounding drums to encapsulate the feeling of being a commoner trying to survive with soldiers all around you. Of course the game changed a lot and you've already read the reason in-game it's called Grandma. But it could be that they use drums this way here as an "echo" of that old meaning. Lots of ideas of that original NieR went into NieR Automata, specially the commentary on war and destruction and endless conflicts. The idea of having war drums in the background as a faint echo seems fitting.
A reminder if you go looking for Replicant/Gestalt versions of songs, they're the same game with a differently aged protagonist so no need to look for a specific version between the two
While that may have been the case for a while, most things that are labeled with Replicant now are generally from the recent remake which *does* have a new soundtrack. If you specifically want the original pieces, searching for the Gestalt OST is the way to go.
On the Nier soundtracks, there is one masterpiece in my opinion, that is the whole orchestral arranged version (for nier replicant/automata). It is incredibly skilled musically and in composition alone. It really carries those original video game themes and sublimes them into something else entirely like it's from a movie score or a symphony. Probably one of its best themes is the re arranged Amusement Park piece.
Oh dude, "Grandma (Destruction)" hits like a freight train, after seeing a trailer of the game with that song playing in the background? I knew I had to get it. Bought the Game of the Yorha Edition on PS4 the next day, and now? I got the End of the Yorha Edition for my Switch.
Lyrics of Nier Automata(even Replicant) OSTs is nearly complete made up. The composer Keiichi Okabe and Vocalist Emi Evans actually created 3 new languages imagining what languages will be like after thousands of years, which is fitting with the backstory of the two games. I recommend checking out both versions of Song of Ancient - Fate, one from Replicant and one from Automata
Originally "Grandma" is OST from NieR (Replicant) Important song of character "Kainé" "Destruction" is version Remix from NieR A. (fews Bosses Fight) Many song are sung by Emi Evans (mainly writter lyrics songs, Chaos Language )
It's called Grandma (Destruction) because it's a remix of a song from the first game called Grandma, one of the main char's grandma is a significantly major character in their life. Automata remixed a lot of the RepliCant songs. I highly recommend my two favourite NieR Automata songs, Possessed by a Disease and Bipolar Nightmare. Both are great combat songs. As far as I am aware the only songs that have lyrics are Weight of the World (ending credit song) and Emil's Theme, which he sings in game so is either English or Japanese depending on language settings. The English version is hilarious.
Didn't give this a proper hearing the first time around as I was in a rush but came back to it now and after giving it the attention , yep definitely made its way on the playlist. The choir sound awesome but I especially love the moments of silence where the drums and the strings get to shine
Interesting that you mention the heartbeat, as some others have mentioned, this song shows up multiple times. Possibly because it has a tendency to be used during segments when your heart would be racing per se.
I know you’ve said many times how much you love piano, so the original Grandma from Nier Replicant, the song that this was based on, is absolutely a must-listen. As a fellow piano lover, it’s one of my favorite piano pieces of all time. Another personal recommendation would be Weight of the World - Nier Automata. I know many people have already requested this, but I wanna share that there are multiple versions of the song that are all absolutely fantastic in their own right. My personal favorite is the Japanese version, but the English and French versions are also amazing. And then after you’ve experienced Weight of the World, I would highly recommend checking out Weight of the World (Prelude Version) from Nier’s collaboration with FFXIV, as it’s my personal favorite orchestral piece of all time, and I still choke up every time I listen to it, hundreds of listens later. Finally, I’d like to thank you for these videos, as it has been great to see your reactions/analysis of some my favorite music. Keep up the good work, and your continued success will come with it!
I do agree that the Japanese version of weight of the world slap! The "French" version is in chaos language, what they call nouveau-fr wich is ofc inspired by French :) .
@@zozozelollipop Thanks for the correction, I recognized what sounded like French in the song as well as the “Nouveau” in the name. I don’t really know any French so I made the assumption it was in French, but I did know Chaos language definitely had some heavy French inspiration, as well as Japanese, English, and even German to my understanding! Cheers friend!
Nier ost is quite the complete package! It is tailored to fit the gameplay. A lot of the songs exist in different version to fit the tempo, so you'll have an epic version next to a calmer one etc. They also did 8 bit version of a lot of those song for when you hack (wich is an 8bit shooter game). What this give you is a smooth and awesome music experience while playing as it will adapt constantly to the tempo of your gameplay. For the language some have English and Japanese version but they are all in what they call, as you surely know, the chaos language. But each song doesn't have the same language inspiration. The direction of nier for the ost wanted a lot of vocals but did not want the focus to be on the lyrics and more on the emotion it conveys. They also wanted something "futuristic" and what's better than a new language ^_^. For that they asked Emi Evans to write her own lyrics. She was given prototypes of the song with the style they wanted it to be and was told to follow the language styles of French, Scottish, Gaelic, Portuguese, Spanish, Italian, English, Japanese. The chaos language was born :D. What's impressive is how she managed to keep the intonation of the inspired language. I'm french and the first time I heard Voice of no return (wich is based on French) it was infuriating as I was convinced it was french that I simply did not understand. Re-reading myself this is quite the long comment. Sorry. Overall Nier automata well deserve its title of best video game soundtrack in 2017 but I might be biased 😅. Peace!
Just hearing that. Interesting that you pictured purple and a lot of people. Usually when you hear this song (Seems like you've played automata already) there IS a lot of purple... but those are bullets! Very interesting
I also don't know the context of the song and why its called that way. But I do just love it. It will be amazing when I some day play it. Very interesting recommendation from Dimmu Bogir.
Yeah nier! Even though I prefer grandma over the destruction version as it's a lot more emotional imo, Destruction is just EPIC. I love those videos, keep them coming!
Dude been checking on your channel since the ff14 music u reacted, i love ur reactions man , i would love to see any cover of these songs man like ANY song really
OOOOHHHHH! ive got a good ass song for you, its one ive been obsessed with lately and its from monster hunter world:iceborne and its the theme medley of safi'jiiva, its soooo damn good
Since you also did a lot of FF14 Reactions. It has a Collab Raidseries Based on the Nier/Drakengard Storyline with Music from it.Remixed by Masayoshi Soken. You should Watch "Kainé (Salvation)" i think the FF14 Version is the Best out of all 3 (but the others are also amazing)
Ooo if we’re going through nier now, may I recommend song of ancients fate, emil despair, birth of a wish, a beautiful song, and weight of the world (maybe the prelude version from FFXIV too) :O
A little sad this is the Automata version but I get it, I still love this version but I prefer the Gestalt one as it's much smaller and feels more personal. If you get a chance give it a listen and compare it, you'll see what I mean.
You should react to shadowlord from nier replicant/gestalt. It's my fav song from the series and that is saying a lot and for context it plays during a very big moment.
Dude what if you make a vote that most 3 song people want you to try out. The vote stuff on RU-vid. The reason why I want you to try E ending weigh of the world (the end of yorha) more then the normal one. It’s because E ending has a special one. But I don’t wanna spoil it I can’t really tell. It’s a masterpiece
I've only been doing reactions a month and still trying new stuff! As of now im doing the patreon backlog, but I'm open to trying new things. For example, the DOOM video tonight is from popular youtube comments, so you never know!
yea about the made up lyric i believe the director/music producer wants people enjoy the story without getting distracted by music/lyric, but without music the player wont get emotional, so what they do is that they just make all the soundtrack in the game using chaos language
"No one has sent me a bad request yet" OK, it's not really bad since it accomplishes its goal but... I'd love to see you react to some Drakengard music (Growing wings comes to mind as one of the nicest tracks). Drakengard is by the same creator as Nier but the tone is WILDLY different and I'd love to see your reaction to some of the musical "tricks" used in its tracks 🤔
The shade doesn't act as her grandma. (Spoilers) it killed her grandma. The song grandma from replicant is either the song used for mourning her grandmother. Or it's the lullaby that the grandmother used to sing to the granddaughter.
