STAYC (short for Star To A Young Culture) are High Up Entertainment's first ever girl group and they just debuted today with their title track SO BAD. Some amount of pre-debut hype was generated for this 6-member girl group and they've finally jumped into the ring to join many other girl groups that debuted this year. I didn't follow them pre-debut as closely as I did others like Weeekly or Cherry Bullet but STAYC were definitely on my radar, in large part due to their main vocalist Sieun, who many might recognise as a child actress, having starred in various dramas like Still 17 and Mystic Pop-up Bar. Also, I later on found out that maknae J's real name was Jang Ye-eun (which is exactly the same as CLC's main rapper and I thought that was really funny). In fact, most people probably picked up on the girl group because of her but now that they've debuted, we finally get to see them as a group with the very electronic and retro SO BAD.
Meaning: On the surface SO BAD is a song about burning love between two people and the girls sing about having someone "stuck in [their heads]" and how they want someone "so bad" hence the song's name. However, I think that on a deeper level, STAYC is singing to their fans, both present and future, and the lyrics make sense in that regard because they need their fans' love and they'll give their best for their fans. Ultimately, SO BAD is a love song, masked under a retro sound that is appearing a lot in many groups' recent comebacks.
MV: For a smaller company, Highup has really managed to put out a well-polished MV with lots of expensive-looking set pieces and good CGI. The MV is split between individual and group shots, more often than not the latter of which happens during dance sequences. The sets are also really beautiful, they're bright, colourful and yet, aren't too excessive where it distracts you from the girls themselves. Some of the sets are very reminiscent of other groups' MVs and again, it's not a bad thing, I just feel like it's an interesting comparison. For SO BAD's MV, when the girls are breaking into their chorus dance sequence, there is one set which reminds me (once again) a lot of EVERGLOW's DUN DUN. In fact, there are other shots that remind me of DUN DUN but I won't delve into them. Also, just wanted to point out that in leader Sumin's solo shots, the set is very similar to TWICE's MORE & MORE, very gorgeous set design.
Styling: Their styling is great, and the outfits really accentuate their visuals, which are absolutely popping. I totally love their black-and-silver outfits, it looks very elegant and yet super bling because of the intense glitter and shininess of the silver. In general, all their stylings and visuals are insane but I do have gripes, mostly with how lead vocal Yoon's hair has been styled. Those who know me well enough know that I like when idols have their hair down, generally they look better in my eyes and Yoon is no exception. However, in certain shots she's styled with high braided pigtails and that doesn't look as flattering on her. It also seems really cumbersome because her hair's really long and the tails are just swinging everywhere. Also, for whatever reason she wears a bright blue bobbed wig in many shots and I can't really figure out why the stylists would do that, other than to fit the particular set design (which is very pink). Then again, the other girls don't have weirdly-coloured wigs so I don't see why Yoon was styled that way.
I think the two members that stood out to me the most in terms of visuals are Sumin and sub-vocal Seeun, the former because I really think she looks like IZ*ONE's Eunbi and the latter because she looks so much like someone else but I can't put a name to the face, which is really frustrating (maybe it's Lee Sun-bin, I'm not sure). Anyway, just wanted to add, I'm seriously surprised with how much more mature Seeun looks than her age, like it's probably because of the makeup but she looks wayyyyyyy older than 17 years (which is honestly a little off-putting).
Song: SO BAD adopts a super catchy retro sound that's pretty easy on the ears but that being said, I felt like the start and end of the song could've gone a lot better. The song opens with Sumin and as one of the group's rappers, she sort of rap-sings part of the first verse, making the transition to Seeun's much softer and melodious vocals a little weird. The song's end was also a little abrupt and I feel that if they extended it a little, it would've ended way smoother. Enough on arrangement though, let's talk about their voices. While their vocals are great, I didn't really have any strong feelings about their voices until I heard J open her mouth. I cannot believe how low her voice is like my jaw genuinely dropped when I heard her voice. It's such a shock too because some of her lines come after fellow rapper Sumin's (and Sumin already has a pretty low voice for a female idol) but J tops that by going even lower. I daresay she has the lowest voice out of all the female idols, rivaling or even surpassing that of (G)I-DLE's Yuqi,. It's a super attractive tone though I'm not hating it at all. Female idols with lower voices always catch me off guard, especially when they come out of those very cute-looking ones like Yuqi or LOONA's Heejin (the same goes for J honestly, since she's the group's maknae).
Line distribution: Their line distribution is actually pretty fair for a new girl group. As expected, main vocal Sieun takes top honours here, with about 29% of the lines and the rest of the vocal line isn't that far behind, with Yoon at 22% and Isa at 13%. Sumin and Seeun also have a fair amount of lines, with J at the bottom with 9%. The disparity might seem big here but this distribution is fully understandable because the vocal line taking the most lines is almost a given in any K-Pop song. At the same time, I never felt like any member was being pushed way more than the rest. Even though J had far fewer lines for this song, she definitely stood out in her own way, especially with her voice. In fact, it's probably because of her voice that she gets the fewest lines, since it's better for her to sing fewer lines in her current vocal range rather than force herself to sing too high (looking at you JYP, if you know, you know).
Overall, SO BAD is a pretty strong debut for STAYC and I'm really looking forward to more of their content. I think this group is definitely hear to stay (ba dum tss). Please go check out this song because it's seriously a bop and I think they deserve to get big. Let's go girls!
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