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You have to make one (or more) of your band members practice the writing command, which fills the small bar below their writing skill. Once the bar is full, you gain a new song that you can then record at the recording studio. It takes a while to write a song when their skill is low, but once they get better you can churn them out in no time at all.

[Copy of my Steam review]

After I beat Act II, I had to sit back for a bit and reflect on the events that had transpired. My hands were shaking and had been for the last hour and a half of reading. I never felt so distraught reading anything in my entire life, to the point where it left me feeling emotionally drained for an entire day afterwards.

And yet, I have a hard time calling the whole experience anything but beautiful.

If you came here to check out the reviews for Act II, chances are that you already played the first and want to know how this one compares. Or you want to know if this one addresses some of the complaints raised in Act I reviews before jumping in at all. So here you are:

Length:
I saw some complaints about Act I being too short for the price tag. My first playthrough of Act II took me probably 20 hours in total, but I am a very slow reader and a non-native speaker who looks up words I don't know. A faster reader should probably still get a good eight to ten hours out of it, which I think is more than fair even just talking about quantity here and leaving the (very high) quality of the writing out of the equation.

Plot & Writing:
Now that Elfriede is in the thick of the war herself, don't expect any moments of upbeat jubilation like the first half of Act I. If you thought the second half was too grim, this part does have it's moments of levity, it's not really going to get better. So be prepared for that and stay clear if you don't think you can deal with it right now. The game does have it's share of humorous quips from our colorful cast, which does lighten the mood somewhat.
I'm being deliberately obtuse, because spoilers for experiences like this are the worst. 
If you think you can handle it, personally I consider this VN to be must read, because this is the part where the game truly shines. The writing is still skillfully evocative and makes you care about its characters, even the ones you want to punch for their shortsighted selfishness. And I'll always be impressed how well this game handles character voice (making different characters sound like different people in the way they are written), something most visual novels I read either struggled with or didn't even try.

tldr: If you enjoyed the prose of the first part, you won't be disappointed by a sudden dip in quality or lack of humor. Game's still really dark, though.

CGs:
The CG artist is still the same as Act I, but their skills are improving. I actually really liked the portrait shots of Elfriede's comrades, they actually resemble their sprite remarkably well for being in a different art style, unlike in the last scene of the previous chapter. The others can still be hit or miss.

I'll leave it here, this is too long as it is. If you can deal with dark stories about war, this is a must read. If you can't, maybe come back when you need a good reason to cry.

[A copy of my Steam review, written before the release of Act II]

A well written and engaging visual novel with a fictionalised historical backdrop.

I originally played the demo of this game (basically the first chapter with far less polish) a few years back, looking for otome games that went deeper than just pursuing your crush of choice and then living happily ever after.
And all I can say is that this game delivered that, and delivered it in such a way that I've been loyally following the development ever since.

As stated before, this is a more polished release than the one I played before, and I think it is worth the money asked. Act I is a bit on the short side, with the promise by Studio Elfriede that future chapters will be longer.
I must admit to missing the old CG art, but the new art is still serviceable. The backgrounds are simple and drab, which works well with the bleakness of the war.

The writing is where this game shines. Varied characters with different reasons for signing up for the war (or not doing so, as the case may be), not all of them necessarily likeable. I notably like Elfriede, our protagonist, a lot. She actually has a better idea about how the whole thing will turn out than most of the people in her home town, but assumes that she must be overthinking things when almost everyone else is so excited for the war. She has her funny quips (mostly in her internal monologues) early on, but doesn't force them into the later, more sombre scenes, where they would feel out of place. I do hope that her sense of humour comes back in future acts, though, to alleviate some of the heavy mood once she gets more used to the general atmosphere in the trenches.

I wholeheartedly recommend this game (though if you hate episodic releases, you should probably hold out until it is finished), as long as you can handle a story where your favourite love interest might not make it to the end.