Anri/Toshiki Kadomatsu -- Fly By Day

Had my lesson with my student tonight and found out from him that it's pretty much impossible now to get any tickets outbound for vacation during Golden Week. Mind you, this Golden Week is looking like an uber-Golden Week since this year with the transition of Emperors in Japan from May, a whopping ten days will be given out for holidays. For Japanese tourists who love their international travel, this is manna from heaven. I think at this point, folks who haven't gotten their tickets may have to face a stay-cation instead.

My time in Japan never had me traveling during the Golden Week holidays since I simply wasn't interested in being tied up for hours on a highway, a plane or a train. I was quite happy being in a far emptier Tokyo for those several days. Heck, listening to music and vicariously living the jet set life was good enough. One good example is Anri's（杏里）"Fly By Day" from her "Heaven Beach" album of 1982.

Written and composed by Toshiki Kadomatsu（角松敏生）, those keyboards, that horn section and Anri's inviting voice provide that fine tour that starts overseas on that faraway California coast. Probably many an office worker sighed and wished for more exotic climes when they listened to this sunny City Pop tune.

Kadomatsu did his own cover of "Fly By Day" as a track from his 1983 12-inch single "Do You Wanna Dance". It's a funkier and perhaps even more celebratory version of the Anri original. I can even imagine doing a conga line to this song.

One commenter took a look at that cover above and remarked that that was Vaporwave years before Vaporwave. Indeed, it looks quite distinctive and a bit spooky at the same, to be honest.