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.
Thursday, November 29, 2012
Ann Lewis/Mariya Takeuchi -- Linda
Ann Lewis（アン・ルイス） and Mariya Takeuchi（竹内まりや）are good buddies. In fact, they hit it off so well that in August 1980, Takeuchi created this ode to her friend and named it with Lewis' middle name. Probably one reason for the special present was that Lewis was getting married that year. Since it was early in Takeuchi's career, "Linda", Lewis' 19th single, has that 50s bobbysoxer ballad lilt to it. I can imagine Olivia Newton-John tackling this one.
(karaoke version)
A year later, Takeuchi did her own cover of "Linda" on her 4th album, "Portrait". For a while, the song was a popular one to play at weddings inJapan; just imagine anyone named Linda getting married there. Just my personal opinion, but I prefer Takeuchi's take on it just because her voice has that timbre to it. Neither version particularly leaped up the Oricon charts but that's OK; it was a personal message of love, after all.
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Feel free to provide any comments (pro or con). Just be civil about it.