July 8, 2015

[Review] Girl's Day - Ring My Bell

The leading girl group heading into 2015 is back! Girl's Day had an extremely strong 2014 and is looking to carry their momentum forward with joining the summer army of comebacks. "Ring My Bell" has a plethora of options to compare to and compete with. Girl's Day went "back to sexy" as some people like to say. Most people cheered at this prospect, while the haters groaned in agony. But who cares, let's look at the song.

Like a proper summer release, "Ring My Bell" has high levels of energy and the song is pretty fast. Both the choruses and verses seem to fly by. The catchy hook also speeds past, which in hindsight is good because it prevents the song from being too repetitive. Repetition is a warning sign for boredom so it's good to see Girl's Day has dodged this matter in a simple way. Minah and Sojin continue to shine and this song plays more to Sojin's strengths in my opinion, though Minah's work at the end of the song is excellent. As far as the summer comebacks are concerned, Minah is a definite 2nd place vocalist, right behind Choa from AOA. It's a damn shame Yura didn't get more singing lines than she did because...

Yura got a 4 second rap. Are you kidding me? That's beyond pitiful, DreamTea. Yura was actually making some important improvement off the rapping in "Darling" and "I Miss You." Now you completely screw her over. I suppose with bad rappers it may be best to play it safe and not risk a terrible rap. Still, Girl's Day has had fair line distribution for over a year now, so it's really disappointing to see this happen.

This dance is a little awkward. In fact, I would go as far as saying that the awkwardness actually works for the song because it makes the choreography less sexy. Of course, there are still some very clear moves, like the bouncing in the opening that looks like it was ripped straight from "Expectation." Otherwise it's a fun dance and keeps pace with the song. I did like the part where Hyeri says "get out my way" (psst there should be an "of" in there), the other girls and backup dancers literally move off to the side rather obviously. Cute little points like that are seldom seen nowadays. Or at least if they are more common then I haven't been paying enough attention.

Is there a "summer 2015 hair formula" code for girl groups that they have to abide by or something? Someone is bleach blonde, someone is crimson red, someone is jet black. This has happened enough times for it not to be coincidence. The bleach blonde is particularly suspect because not many of the girls (or any girls, really) can look good with it. Unfortunately Sojin you are not an exception here. Hyeri is without a doubt the lead visual, as her long hair combined with black colour crushes the competition. As flawless as Yura makes the bright red look, it's not really that close.

What is the reason of having some random black dude in the video. He contributes absolutely nothing. There are plenty of songs that have "outside" vocals or parts that don't have or require cameos / actors and this song should have followed those by example. Hell, the intro of "Darling" proves they could have not had this guy. We have songs with features where said feature doesn't show up in the video. Why is this guy the opposite. Instead we have an awkward afro man at essentially random spots throughout the video doing nothing but spazzing out. As for the token foreigner role, he's not doing that very well either, since there's no plot. At least Sistar used one to some extent. I just don't understand why he's included. If this guy doesn't show up on live performances (he doesn't), get him the fuck outta here. Outside of my gripe with the pointless insertion of that guy, the rest of the video is a stereotypical box MV. Girl's Day look good and they'll prove it. The black and white outfits (and background) are rather questionable, it's like they're deliberately trying to give you a headache (though still not as bad as T-ARA videos). The other outfits are on point though, even the funky ones with various colours (what's that called again, tie-dye?). I noticed the darts from "Darling" are back, though I can't tell if the girls have gotten any better at it since then, heh. Pretty standard MV, but like I said, really don't like the useless token black guy.

Girl's Day definitely have a catchy song on their hands and in our ears. They look good and sound good, albeit while ruining Yura's exposure to the spotlight. If this was the old structure of reviews from past times the MV score would have tanked the overall score but ever since I decided to score based on how I feel about the song (and primarily the sounds) Girl's Day manages to slip by my complaints.

[ Overall: 88 / 100 ]

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