[Review] Rainbow - To Me (Throwback)

Oh man, remember Rainbow? Those were good times when all these girls groups I followed actually existed. This will only be the third time I've reviewed one of their songs, as my blog started after their glory days of "A" and "Mach," with this track coming directly after. I kinda forgot this song existed but stumbled upon it almost by chance when digging around for some old-school hits. Let's see where "To Me" stands in Rainbow's library.

Getting the MV discussion out of the way immediately: it's bland. Stereotypically bland. My interest in the world of music videos was highest during this era and I still think I'd have been bored. The girls look great and always have been: Rainbow were consistently a top tier visual threat from head to toe, from leader to maknae. Jaekyung's beauty is eternal and she'll always be my favorite.

"To Me" fails where "A" and "Mach" succeeded in that the repetition in the chorus really hurts this song compared to the latter two. They sound like a malfunctioning fire truck siren and them spam "come to me" more than Among Us players spam the report button. Such a chorus is very barren and while the instrumental is very solid, it's not good enough to cover up that flaw. Unfortunately, the rest of the song doesn't fare that much better. The verses are average despite the pretty vocals coming out of Hyunyoung, Jaekyung, and Jisook. In the same way that they've always been regularly standout in appearance, Rainbow have constantly been middle-of-the-pack in terms of singing talent. Not to mention that this was only the beginning of their third year together so they had yet to hit their stride.

Woori is actually the peak of this song with her rap break. Is it the greatest girl group rap of 2011? Hardly. It's not even the best in her career. But she has solid delivery and utilizes her voice well. Honestly she reminded me a lot of Miryo, and that is always a good thing. The cringe English at the end is slightly more excusable given this was released in early 2011 and not the modern day. It's still awful but they get a pass for it.

Rainbow's career path is ironically more of an inverted rainbow when you think about it. They popped off early with superstar hits like "A" and "Mach," and then in the twilight of their group's existence had songs like "Black Swan" and "Whoo." Then in the middle there was a bunch of...stuff. And "To Me" was one such stuff. A good instrumental and rap that cannot make up for the lackluster verses and dull chorus.