[poker face]

01. poker face
I don't really think this is one of Ayumi's best songs, but it isn't one of her worst either. It's an okay song for a debut single, I'm not really expecting her to come up with hits right away. This is your basic cute, pop song which is what most of her first album A Song for XX is. It's all right, especially since I kind of like it and I'm not really into cute pop songs...

02. FRIEND
I don't like this song as much as poker face but it's all right. I don't think it would make a very good song to release by itself as a single but as the c/w song it's okay. I kind of have the same opinion of all of Ayumi's A Song for XX songs, that they're all kind of 'average'.

03. poker face [Instrumental]
This is the 'karaoke' or 'instrumental' version of poker face and it sounds weird, but I like this track better than the regular version. Ayumi's voice on the regular version is too loud, and it hides the cool instrumental music that you hear here.

04. FRIEND [Instrumental]
This is the 'karaoke' or 'instrumental' version of FRIEND. It has a good melody, but not nearly as good as poker face. I don't like the song FRIEND much to begin with, and I wouldn't regularly listen to this instrumental track.

[overall rating 7 out of 10]
It's an okay debut single, but not really, really good or anything like that. As far as the cover art, nothing special there, either, like the rest of the CD it's just average. The two original versions of poker face and FRIEND are on the A Song for XX album, so unless you're really interested in the instrumental versions or you're a really big Ayumi collector I don't think you would really have to buy this CD.