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.

Monday, November 4, 2013

Shizuka Kudo -- FU-JI-TSU


I'd always wondered about what the deal was with the hyphens between each syllable in the title "FU-JI-TSU" for Shizuka Kudo's(工藤静香) 4th single. Apparently the story goes that Kudo and company didn't want the fans to mistake the aidoru for necessarily endorsing the electronics manufacturer, Fujitsu, so in went the hyphens. Yeah, like the hyphens really helped. I was kinda wondering if her apartment had been filled with the company's products.

Anyways, "FU-JI-TSU" kept on the tradition of maintaining that urgent beat which characterized Kudo's early singles right from her debut, "Kindan no Telepathy" (禁断のテレパシー). Released in June 1988, the song was Miyuki Nakajima's(中島みゆき) first contribution to the Kudo discography, and apparently the title itself came from an essay in one of Nakajima's written works titled "Ai wa Suki desu II"(愛は好きですII....I Love LOVE 2). The galloping melody was provided by Tsugutoshi Goto(後藤次利).

It had been a while since I heard this one, but today, I came across an old audiotape which contains her 1st BEST album, "Gradation" which has the A and B sides for her first five singles. "FU-JI-TSU" hit the top spot on Oricon and was the 23rd-ranked song for 1988, selling more than a quarter of a million copies.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8TDAndBFT5E

The video above has what looks like a whole bevy of male and female aidoru, including Shizuka-chan talking about the meaning of fujitsu (不実...insincerity) and then trying to make a calligraphy session of it before she goes on stage to perform the titular song.

Now, just to make sure that no one reading this has the impression that the manufacturer Fujitsu was trying to shoot itself in the foot by picking that name, the company actually started corporate life as Fuji Tsushinki Seizo(富士通信機製造), or Fuji Telecommunications Equipment Manufacturing. As have a lot of Japanese firms, the company simply shortened the name.

5 comments:

  1. thank you for this post
    it is so intresting reading your posts
    did you hear her knew song ,will its not new it was in 2012
    the song called( Kimi ga Kureta Mono).
    check it out its realy a good song
    thank you again you are a boom

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    Replies
    1. Thanks very much for your comments. I haven't heard any of Shizuka's recent songs, so this is the first time I heard "Kimi ga Kureta Mono". It's good to know that she's still pretty active. By the way, I'm just a little curious, but are you commenting from Japan?

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    2. No,I am not
      but I am a fan of hers and of japanes music so I am quite familiar with it and I follow her updats and I knew her new somgs
      I am a bit surprise that you know so much about her but you dont realy know that she have a number of new songs .
      so what are your thougts about the song ?

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    3. Hi again,

      "Kimi ga Kureta Mono" is a very nice ballad, especially since it was written and composed by Ayaka who had come up with that huge hit, "Mikazuki" several years ago. And I can easily imagine Ayaka covering it as well to good effect.

      To be honest, I'm not a die-hard fan of Shizuka but have enjoyed the songs that I've put up so far about her. Most of the knowledge that I put down just came from what I found on J-Wiki. Basically, my knowledge about her is really during her early period in the late 1980s.

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  2. this is the link of the song
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hKSWQRBFUnM

    ReplyDelete

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