Suzuka Nakahara -- Lampin'（ランピン'）

 

When we used to have those biweekly anime-and-food fests on Sunday, this particular song was one of the regulars during the anison hour. I used to hear it all the time without asking about it, mostly because I was dozing off in the chair in the middle of the warm room. The other day, when a whole bunch of us got together for a yakiniku dinner, I had a reunion of anison hour at my buddy's house and I finally asked him from which anime this was from, and he mentioned that it wasn't an anime but an eroge. 

Ah, I see...I would have thought more along the lines of a wacka-wacka electric guitar but of course my mind was going back to the 1970s and 1980s.

The adult game in question is the 2004 "Quartett!" which involves four students among many vying to be the best string quartet. From what I've seen so far, I haven't gotten any hint that there's any hentai but the YouTubers must have been very careful in their selection of scenes. Plus, there's some rather exquisite string quartet work that I also heard from the soundtrack.

In any case, the theme song for "Quartett!" is "Lampin'" by Suzuka Nakahara（中原涼）. The Nagano Prefecture-born singer got into music at a young age through piano lessons and chorus work. However, during her student days, her views on music (which had been in the classical vein up to that point) changed when she heard Chage & Aska's "Say Yes", and from then onward, she wanted to sing that type of music. Her career in music began in earnest around 2001 once she graduated from high school and performed at the live house Yotsuya Tenmado（四谷天窓）in Tokyo. Since then, she's been providing her brand of pop music and game music.

Not sure what "Lampin'" means but it's a pleasant and soothing tune with a hint of soul, and sometimes during the song, I get the impression that Nakahara has a bit of Hikaru Utada（宇多田ヒカル）in those vocals. Azuki Sawada（沢田あづき）was responsible for the lyrics while Soushi Hosoi（細井聡司）came up with the melody. By the way and sad to say, but Yotsuya Tenmado closed down for good at the end of November 2020.