I've been a fan of Japanese popular music for 40 years, and have managed to collect a lot of material during that time. So I decided I wanted to talk about Showa Era music with like-minded fans. My particular era is the 70s and 80s (thus the "kayo kyoku"). The plus part includes a number of songs and artists from the last 30 years and also the early kayo. So, let's talk about New Music, aidoru, City Pop and enka.
Credits
I would like to give credit where credit is due. Videos are from YouTube and other sources such as NicoNico while Oricon rankings and other information are translated from the Japanese Wikipedia unless noted.
I don't consider myself a tried-and-true expert on the aidoru career of Mizue Takada（高田みづえ）but just from listening to her earlier material in the late 1970s, I've gotten the impression that at least melodically, she was getting some fairly galloping material to tackle.
Takada's debut single from March 1977 is the fondly remembered "Garasuzaka"（硝子坂）which provided some romantic sturm und drang thanks to lyricist Takemi Shima（島武実）, composer Ryudo Uzaki（宇崎竜童）and arranger Koji Makaino（馬飼野康二）. Well, her sophomore effort, "Dakedo..." (However...) from later in July continues some of the handwringing in love with Shima, Uzaki and Makaino helping out again to form out a fairly rollicking song. In fact, the overall rhythm reminds me of some of the drama from Hiromi Ohta's（太田裕美）"Saraba Siberia Tetsudo" (さらばシベリア鉄道）which wouldn't come out until a few years later in 1980.
"Dakedo..." was another Top 10 hit for the emerging 17-year-old singer as it hit No. 6. It finished the year as the 52nd-ranked single.
I heard this particular song on last night's episode of NHK's "Shin BS Nihon no Uta"（新・BS日本のうた）as performed by none other than bidanshi enka singer Keisuke Yamauchi（山内惠介）who really rocked one out and maybe scratched up his larynx in the process.
To be honest, I hadn't heard of Ulfuls'（ウルフルズ）"Ehh Nen" whose meaning is the Kansai dialectal variant for expressions like "Hey, it's OK", "No worries" and "We're good". It came out as the band's 25th single in November 2003 but also as a welcome back song to one of the original members of Ulfuls, bassist John B. Chopper, after he'd left the band in 1999 due to philosophical differences with the band's sound. I can imagine that the return was loud, joyful and boisterous with plenty of those ehh nen. Written and composed by vocalist Tortoise Matsumoto, the lyrics are basically letting listeners know that whatever the issue, no probs man!
Hey, I can imagine "Ehh Nen" being a popular choice at karaoke, especially if two good buddies in a company department, baseball team or neighbourhood association had gone through a sudden tiff followed by the making-up phase. Although "Ehh Nen" was a big hit in the Kansai region, overall, it "only" got up to No. 20 nationwide which nullified some plans to provide variations on the song through regional ways to say "Ehh Nen".
Up to now, I've posted two articles regarding the rock-n'-roll band Cools which has undergone a number of name and lineup changes since starting up in 1975. Thus far, I've been covering them during their time between 1977 and 1980 when they were known as Cools Rockabilly Club.
When I first started with them, it was for their September 1978 single"Sentimental New York"（センチメンタル・ニューヨーク）which was surprisingly quite City Pop in its arrangement. Then, a couple of years later, I posted their follow-up single from March 1979"Climax"（クライマックス）with its 1950s rock n' roll flair.
Today, I've got the B-side for the metropolitan "Sentimental New York", "Kaze ga Kawaru Mae ni"(Before the Wind Changes). Written by Keisuke Yamakawa（山川啓介）and composed by the band's guitarist James Fujiki（ジェームス藤木）, this has more of the "Climax"rock vibe while also bringing in horns that sound more like the contemporary 1970s. However, it's also got a nice laidback feeling and from that title, I get the impression that the lone motorcyclist is about to take off again for places unknown after spending a few weeks or months settling into one site.
I remember in the days of those PBS hard-sell campaigns for contributions on TV so that we could still get our episodes of "Doctor Who" and "Sesame Street". It was basically Goldie and Mike in Buffalo New York stating, "We love you all but no money, no Doctor, no Big Bird" and then they waited for the signups via phone.
In Japan, there were no special campaigns. You have a television, you live in Japan, you pay NHK monthly. No ifs, ands or buts. I know that things are different now, but when I was living in Ichikawa, there was always a fellow who came up to the apartment to collect that monthly NHK fee of 3,000 yen. To be honest, I have been viewing much more NHK here on TV Japan and now Jme over the past dozen years that I ever did in Japan. It was more of the private networks such as TBS and Fuji-TV that I was watching than NHK...NHK for me back then was the news and the weekly I-Go program, so you can imagine that I was somewhat grumbly about the NHK fee.
Singer-songwriter Keisuke Kuwata（桑田佳祐）and his Southern All Stars（サザンオールスターズ）had their own axe to grind with the quasi-governmental TV network for many years. It was in the first year of "Kayo Kyoku Plus" when I posted the band's "Chako no Kaigan Monogatari"（チャコの海岸物語）that I mentioned the feud that had exploded between them and NHK which lasted for many years with the cold war even including counterprogramming by SAS against the New Year's Eve special, the Kohaku Utagassen.
But starting from a few years ago, it looks like hatchets have been buried and the Southern All Stars did pop up on the Kohaku again. And certainly, I couldn't have imagined this happening in the 1980s or 1990s, but the band actually showed up to do a special with one of the major announcers of the network to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the network. I saw the special on Friday night and it was rather weird to see Kuwata dressed up like an old Showa era guy in a Showa era living room including an old-fashioned dial and knob television set humbly giving accolades to NHK for providing the kayo kyoku and J-Pop over the decades which also included footage of just about every single that SAS had performed on the network's music programs. Talk about mellowing out. But it was pretty much "You scratch my back, I'll scratch yours" with SAS coming on board the network celebrations while being able to show off the tracks from their 16th and latest album"Thank You So Much" which was released on March 19th.
So far, the track that has stood out to me is "Kamisama kara no Okurimono"(A Gift from God) which is being used as the theme song for the 100th anniversary of NHK events. It, like the album, is a reflection of Kuwata's appreciation for all of the songs and singers who have come before to influence his own works and how much he loves Japan. For me, it's a very upbeat and nostalgic-sounding tune that seems to have plugged into the early 1970s Motown soul sound. I've got a feeling that Keisuke and the gang will be showing up on the 76th edition of the Kohaku later this year...it's just too tempting, unless SAS decides to flip the script (among other things) again.
Last month, I made a discovery within Hideki Saijo's（西城秀樹） long discography that hadn't quite surfaced although it earned the late singer a Gold Prize at the Japan Record Awards in 1981. His September 1981 39th single"Sentimental Girl"（センチメンタルガール）was a very pleasant old-fashioned rock-n'-roll and pop tune that fit the man like him and denim.
The B-side to "Sentimental Girl", "Moonlight Party", especially with City Pop maestro Tetsuji Hayashi（林哲司）behind the music and arrangement and Masako Arikawa（有川正沙子）as the lyricist and that title itself, might hit the eyes and brain as an urban contemporary number to contrast with the the feeling of the A-side. However, that's a definite no. "Moonlight Party" continues the good ol' rock-n'-roll and doo-wop times with some twangy country thrown in for good measure. And once again, my head was doing a nice little nodding here and there as it did its three minutes and change.
The singer and tarento Marico（真璃子）is someone that I had never heard about during my early years appreciating Japanese popular music. Actually, I first heard about Mariko Koga（古賀真里子）through my work on the blog over the years. During her initial run as a singer between 1984 and 1995, she had started out as an aidoru for songs such as "Nijuu-ni Shoku no Heart"（22色のハート）but by the early 1990s, she was probably considered more as a pop chanteuse covering ballads including "Anata no Umi ni Naritai"（あなたの海になりたい）.
Marico's transition happened halfway somewhere but I can't really make that distinction even with her 5th single "Kanashimi no Festa" (Festival of Sorrow) which was released in March 1987. So, I'll just throw in the appropriate Labels. In any case, despite a thumpy synthpop intro, "Kanashimi no Festa" quickly becomes a dramatic Latin funk fest along the same lines as Akemi Ishii's（石井明美）"Cha-Cha-Cha" although without the Eurobeat tropes. Words and music were provided by Toshihiko Takamizawa（高見沢俊彦）from ALFEE fame with Satoshi Takebe（武部聡志）handling the arrangement.
Well, my previous article's song was something which I likened to a fine theme for a Nike commercial, so why not finish up tonight's Urban Contemporary Friday with something that could be great for a beer ad?
Yup, there's plenty of luscious beer in the video for singer-songwriter Galali's July 2024 single"Party Tune" and the song is definitely short-and-sweet at barely over two minutes. However, it's got plenty of that Galali fun and bop about a fellow who's having his own little party by himself for himself. The drink du nuit is pretty obvious. Still, it looks like the video has included a lot of Galali's character buddies from previous videos.
Man, you suds fans are really going to like this song. "Party Tune" was used as the opening theme song for the third season of TV Tokyo's 2024 late-night drama "Banshaku no Ryuugi"（晩酌の流儀...The Art of Drinking in the Evening）. Yup, that is indeed actress Chiaki Kuriyama（栗山千明）from "Kill Bill" as the star. Cheers!🍻
