[Review] Girl's Day - Female President (Revisited)

The way I've done these revisits is simple: I go and watch the original MV followed by a live performance (usually the one linked in post). Then I bring up the original review and write my reactions or adjustments accordingly. With Girl's Day's anniversary recently passing by, let's take a look back at "Female President," which was conveniently reviewed a little over seven years ago. Back then I still did categories, so maybe for the next revisit I'll pick one that is more recent.

• I love the high notes and energy that the chorus (I guess that is mainly a mixture of rapping and singing) provides. Unfortunately that’s really all there is to the vocals. Minah and Sojin doing excellent work, while Yura and Hyeri with support roles.

Right off the bat my old self surprises me because I did not enjoy the chorus at all. The vocals are strained leading in and the lines themselves are boring and repetitive. This was 2013 Girl's Day, so the rift in vocal talent between Sojin, Minah and Hyeri, Yura was huge. I still remember their cover of "Someone Like You" on some show where Yura and Hyeri just got to sit there awkwardly while Minah and Sojin sang their hearts out. Anyway, I didn't say much on the vocals besides that. Oh and I claimed Yura's second verse opening was comparable to Sojin, which is fucking hilarious in retrospect.

• Okay. Here is what I liked about the looks: the pink outfits. Those were really nicely done, and even some of the other outfits (the blue ones notably) were really nice. However, that clear see-through-esque whatever-it-is that Yura had in her first solo appearance is…beyond words, and not in a good way.

Those pink outfits were really good. Those shots of Yura under the umbrella were breathtaking. All these years later and I'm still not convinced that Yura was supposedly wearing full body tights for that car scene. And it's still as uncomfortable as ever.

• Sojin’s hair is iffy, it frames her face a little awkwardly, and unfortunately for me Hyeri has Jiyeon syndrome more than ever and it’s quite frightening, to be honest. Minah’s still got those killer eye smiles going and that’s a pleasant sight amongst the more mature image.

Still agree with the mentions that Sojin and Hyeri weren't at their best visually speaking. I don't think Girl's Day peaked in group visuals under the next year with "Something." They may have evolved both their sound and image over time but one thing remains constant and that is Minah's eye smiles. God Bless.

• A butt shaking dance? Really? This isn’t even a good butt shaking dance no less. Leave the butt dances to KARA and Sistar, Girl’s Day, you need something different, something else. It’s just so…bad. Like with the rest of the song, it just seemed like everything was rushed so management said “Hey let’s just throw this dance on for kicks”.

While I don't think anything about the song it rushed, the fact that they put such a blatantly weak dance moment with the butt-shaking is super lazy.

• Ugh. I thought the rapping in “Expectation” was mediocre. This is…awful.

And that is all I have to copy or say because 2013 me was absolutely right and still is. Yura has had some good raps later in her career. This was undoubtedly one of her worst.

• “Expectation” really drew me into Girl’s Day, but I certainly expected better than this. It’s very powerful and the vocals support that, but the sequence of rapping thrown in and some of the chanting just seems awkward and out of place, and ultimately sounds rushed as a whole song.

As far as sophomore releases go (in terms of discovering a group), "Female President" was extremely underwhelming and mediocre. Looking back at Girl's Day's legendary run, this song stands out in a bad way amongst the superstar tracks like "Expectation, "Something," and "Darling." It's the black sheep of the group, punctuated by a uninspiring choreography and pathetic rap sequence. Good thing they ditched most of that stuff for their following comebacks.