Rainbow Over The Rainbow Special Edition - Album Review (Limited Edition C 2CD)
The next music review on Marzipan Wonderland is from a group I haven't reviewed on this blog. It's one of my favourite second generation K-Pop groups Rainbow! I was pretty late to getting into Rainbow and by that I mean they were no longer active when I discovered them. So far I've only got two releases from the group in my collection and one of those is their Japanese album Over The Rainbow which I'll be reviewing today!
Over The Rainbow Special Edition is the re-release of Rainbow's first and only Japanese album. It was released in December 2012 and comes in three editions: Limited Edition A CD+DVD, Limited Edition B CD+DVD and Limited Edition C 2CD. I've got both Limited Edition B and Limited Edition C in my collection and I brought both of them from Yahoo Auctions. Limited Edition C of Over The Rainbow Special Edition has the following contents:
2CD - Two discs containing both Japanese and Korean releases
Lyrics booklet
Jewel case
Promotional flyer
The front and back cover are very on point for a group called Rainbow. Both sides feature photos of the group members in their corresponding rainbow colours. The background features some rainbow stripes and even the group logo is colourful. It's like a rainbow overload! I love the lettering of the 'special edition' title and it stands out well from all the rainbow. The back cover contains the track listing for the two discs along with production information. This CD is a tad confusing as the print notes it as a compilation however online stores and information sites list it as a album. The special edition releases were counted as additional versions of the original Over The Rainbow album therefore they did not chart on Oricon.
The CD design is exquisite for a plain design and catches your eye. I'm usually not a fan of plain looking CD's that are just the disc surface but this one I can appreciate. The giant Rainbow draws your attention and jumps right at you when you open the case. The Japanese side of the album has a dark red/pink tone whilst the Korean side has a elegant blue colour. The track listing and credits for the Korean tracks found on disc 2 are listed on the page behind the CD casing.
Onto the lyrics booklet for this edition and it's your basic Japanese lyrics booklet. There is a lovely photo of the group at the beginning of the booklet and this photo features the girls in the same concept outfits as the Regular Edition of the original Over The Rainbow album. All the track listings are printed on the left side of this page. Most of the lyrics booklet is made up of lyrics of course! These include the Japanese lyrics for all the songs included on disc 1. The last two pages contain production credits and another set of member photos. The copy I brought of the CD came with a promotional flyer about the release and if you originally got the first press of the album, there was a application ticket included from various stores. My copy didn't come with an OBI and I'm not sure if there is one as I haven't seen a photo of the CD with one yet. Edition B definitely doesn't have an OBI as I've never seen one available for sale.
The main draw card to this edition of Over The Rainbow Special Edition is that is comes with a second CD containing the group's Korean hits. I decided to buy this edition first as I didn't have any of the group's Korean songs and it's a great deal to get them along with the Japanese tracks. The first disc contains all the group's three previously released Japanese singles and the b-sides that appear on the singles along with four new songs. A few tracks on the CD are just Japanese versions of the Korean songs which is the usual thing with Korean groups Japanese releases. I quite like the Japanese versions of A and Gossip Girl and listen to them over the Korean versions. Gossip Girl is my songs I like to play that other people find annoy, I don't get it as it's super catchy and great to listen to! The second disc contains a selection of the group's Korean releases, mainly title tracks. Rainbow's first Japanese digital single CANDY GIRLS! is also included on the second disc. Over The Rainbow is a nice album to listen to in full and my favourite tracks would be the Japanese version of Gossip Girl and ガナガナGO! on the first disc and To Me and MACH on the second disc. The track listing for Limited Edition C is as follows:
Disc 1 - Japanese Best
エー A [Japanese Ver.]
マッハ MACH [Japanese Ver.]
ガナガナGO! Gonna Gonna GO!
Kiss! Kiss! Disco!
Touch me, Feel me, Love me
Alright
ノット ユア ガール Not Your Girl [Japanese Ver.]
Energy
Hello
ゴシップガール Gossip Girl [Japanese Ver.]
Disc 2 - Korea Best
Not Your Girl
Gossip Girl
I Believe
Kiss
A
Mach
To Me
Sweet Dream
ボーナストラック CANDY GIRLS!
Over The Rainbow Special Edition comes in two other editions - Limited Edition A and Limited Edition B. Edition A is known as the 'Complete Music Video Edition' and along with the standard Japanese songs CD, it comes with a DVD containing both Korean and Japanese MV's. Edition B is known as the 'KBS2 Music Bank Performance Edition' and has the standard Japanese songs CD and a DVD containing the group's performances of six songs on the Korean show Music Bank. Both of these edition are in a DVD style case whereas edition C is in a standard jewel case.
Over The Rainbow Limited Edition A - CD+DVD (Complete Music Video Edition)
Over The Rainbow Limited Edition B - CD+DVD (KBS2 Music Bank Performances)
I thought at first this review would be quite short as I didn't have that many photos, but I actually wrote a lot about the album! I will post a review of Limited Edition B soon as the follow up to this post. Here are some videos of the main songs on the album, I don't think the official uploads of the MV's are available so I just grabbed the closest things which are some performances or dance versions. Ah the joys of trying to watch Japanese MV's outside of Japan and without owning the DVD versions of singles or albums.
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