You've probably all read or heard how well Anastacia and Natalia get along. Of course that is  promo bullshit. Who looks with a critical eye and a more sober look at Natalia meets Anastacia it reveals two worlds that are opposites. Natalia brings her soul mainly in a cabaret kind of way, partly to serve her gay fans while Anastacia and her musical director Orefo chose a more basic approach than we're used to from her. "Soul" is gathering momentum when it’s been sung with passion and brought from the belly. Anastacia chose them and the audience - quite rightly too – was on her side during the second show of this concert. Natalia was apparently despondent and cried very aggressive to the public during Higher Than The Sun: "You will sing along. I swear. Even if I have pull it out of you, even up there! Give me this moment. "

The major difference between these "Natalia meets" and previous editions is that in the previous editions only performers were on stage. Likeminded so. Now that is not the case. The audience was much more homogeneous. Now you have outspoken Anastacia Fans at the Front the stage with the flag of their country fluttering alongside the Natalia Fans. Anastacia is a singer-songwriter, and wrote her own music, while Natalia got everything  presented on a plate. The complete opposite musical approach of the artists increased the gap between them. Anastacia throws in all of her emotions, all her wisdom and life experience into her songs so even lesser-known songs like "Underground Army" and "Heavy on my heart" stand like a house. Hits like " Paid my dues "that she brings with Natalia, brought the first flawless vocals of the evening on behalf of the U.S. singer. She is rewarded with a thunderous applause and stamping gallery. Later when Anastacia sings "Left Outside Alone", supported by visuals and a forest full moon, the stands shake. The simple natural vibe that Anastacia  brings on stage, works wonderfully. We saw a completely different artist than we did in 2009 when the Lotto Arena only held 3500 people.
It was mainly a negative memory as we saw a 40 year old giggling on a sofa. This Anastacia sounded and looked more mature than ever. Her humor was contagious. She named the area between the stage and the catwalks “The Moshpit”. "You catch me when I jump huh." She said laughing. But the crowd surfing and possibly moshpublic sat a few kilometers away in the AB at Channel Zero.
 "Welcome to my own little palace. We offer you top notch entertainment, and if you need anything just call me.” Natalia told the audience at the start of the concert. "Credibility" We wanted to yell several times. During "Wise Girl" we heard horns but they could hardly be seen in the Sportpaleis. In "Gone to stay" Natalia was lifted by 4 dancers in a horizontal position to sing the song. Natalia served only two great songs during Part 1: "I want you back, which she let the audience sing a big part of and where Anastacia showed who had the strongest voice of the 2.

"Risin '", closes the first part. The enthusiastic audience made us hope that the two different worlds of the artists would lead to something beautiful in part 2. But that part and the encore proved just what we felt that Anastacia is the queen of the evening and Natalia had to make it to the role of princess. Fans of Anastacia got her big bouquets of flowers and chocolates while the hostess only got a small bouquet. Anastacia kicked off the second half very strongly. Drummer Steve Barney was the first on stage to beatbox. The rest of the band came one by one. The Sprock singer released "Not That Kind" on a bed of beatbox. Was then stopped to let it pass with guidance of the instruments. We would have preferred a more fluent transition. Tom Lodewyckx also draws on a strong solo at the opening of part two. We held our breath at the beginning of "Sick and tired" because during the premiere, on a  live broadcast of a commercial radio station, it showed that Natalia had a lot of  trouble holding her tone.

Even now she wasn’t quite there as well but she could recover faster than the day before. "Ridin 'by' was like many songs from Natalia visually supported by six dancers. The audience is mainly looking at the stage and the catwalks and is hardly participating. The value of the "love seat "where a couple is allowed to sit during "I belong to you" is completely missing. Both performers do very little with the couple so they are just sitting there. Natalia sang the Italian part of the song and did it quite well. Suart Trotman opened with the song at the piano and later on Leendert Hoeksma’s guitar can be heard. For the third time this evening, we notice stomping stands. Again with a number Anastacia.

The duo scored again with a beautiful version of the Cohen cover "Hallelujah" that is accompanied by classical guitar and the gospel choir REV22-21. On the screens we can see candles. A beautiful atmospeher is followed by a grandstand pounding. We're going deeper into the heavier emotions with "Heavy on my heart" that Anastacia brings acousticly, accompanied by cajon, acoustic and electric guitar. The song she finds difficult to sing because it goes about her cancer she overcame years ago that made her lose some power. By writing about she wanted to gain back the power, the love and life. A musical gem brought with much feeling. "Speechless" is in our notes. Anastacia provoked a standing ovation and a whistle from the audience.

It is also a mystery to us why Natalia wants to go into the same emotional direction with a life lesson from her side. She says breaking points in life do not mean that you must be broken. And self-pity is no good. After that she starts singing "Fragile". Her voice breaks during the song.  Then "I Feel Love" by Donna Summer where she seeks a connection with her gayfans and over to the beats of Usher "DJ got us falling in love." Drums and percussion will compete against each other when "I've been to fight" is used. During the final and encore the atmosphere in the concert hall peaks when the duo performs "One day in your life" and "I'm outta love". The latter song being supported by the choir while the 2 take a walk on the middle square. During the closing track "Glamorous" Anastacia is here presented as leader of the four dancers behind her. She does is but it’s not convincing. It was clearly forced on her.

So we never got this kind of confirmation that music from real emotions, lived through even brought in a huge hall as the Arena people can be moved. Who goes to Natalia meets Anastacia is, gets to see and hear the difference between a performer with weak entertainment skills and a singer-songwriter, the difference between a soulless show and spirited soul, between moderate score with lots of lalala and a lot of enthusiasm that comes from a more sober approach, the difference between a local artist and international artist with a lot more experience under her belt. And so we come to the first visual image of the show: the map of Belgium which is in sight. Natalia, Anastacia and their entourages thought of  a completely different show. So it was a mix with a bit of both. But that doesn’t bring a strong show as a whole. Look at our own country. The audience, which itself is more heterogeneous than usual, will be forced to take sides. On Saturday it was obvious they chose Anastacia. The title of this show, one of the contentious debate points Anastasia Camp eventually had to put down with should have been "Anastacia meets Natalia". Credit where credit is due: she was the star, the queen of the evening  which, after two previous disappointing concerts in Antwerp in the past,  pleasantly surprised us.

Thanks Suus