Taeko Nishino -- Ame no Ki（雨の木）

Urk! Quite the rain to start off this week. Glad that things are going to clear out by tomorrow. Pretty darn cool today as well, although by the weekend, things will be getting pretty hot again.

Now and then, the name Taeko Nishino（西野妙子）has popped up here and there although I never got to know her until now. She is a former aidoru before turning into a pop singer, actress and tarento with her debut in 1989. What I hadn't realized was that she was also a member of the R&B trio produced by Tetsuya Komuro（小室哲哉）, dos, later in 1996. dance of sound was one of the creations during the Komuro Boom of the 1990s that I remember along with trf, Tomomi Kahala（華原朋美）and globe. During her time with dos, she was known as taeco.

But in 1992, Nishino released her 3rd album "Hatsuba Yoteibi"（発売予定日...Scheduled Date of Sale）which contained this track called "Ame no Ki" (Tree of Rain). I'm not quite sure whether this and the album belonged in her aidoru period, but the relatively down-to-earth melody (especially like the keyboard work) by Masayuki Kishi（岸正之）and Nishino's own vocals has persuaded me to put this in the pop category. Kanata Asamizu（朝水彼方）provided the lyrics.

Nishino released a total of 12 singles and 5 albums as a solo artist. I will have to write about dos sometime pretty soon.