Makiko Imai -- Ten Years After

 

As I was sitting around in the waiting room while a family member was going through some medical tests which I mentioned about in my first article today, I whipped out my issue of "Obscure City Pop CD's ~ 1986-2006". Knowing that I had my usual quintet of articles to post today, I wanted to see if I could find something from the book.

Well, as it turned out, one singer in the book has already been given some coverage here on KKP. Makiko Imai（今井麻起子）is someone that I had mentioned about for the first time back in 2019 for her "Belly Roll ~ Kaze no Josoji"（ベリー・ロール -風の助走路-）from her debut album "Ciao!" from February 1988. The impression about her was that she was quite the perky pop star along the lines of Misato Watanabe（渡辺美里）.

In "Obscure City Pop CD's", attention was paid to her 2nd and final album "CANDY A GO GO!!" which came out in March 1989. Track 2 was readily available on YouTube. "Ten Years After" continues the upbeat good times of Ms. Imai but this time, there is some more robust funk in there. Written by Shun Taguchi（田口俊）and composed by Noriko Nigo（仁後典子）and Kazuo Horiguchi（堀口和男）, it's a story of some mild admonishment as a 1999 version of a young lady goes back in time to warn her younger self that she's letting a romantic opportunity go to waste, although it may already be too late (although knowing a sliver of temporal mechanics, I'm not sure how that could happen).

I have to say that though Imai only released two albums, those covers are among the more standout examples that I've ever seen. My compliments to the designers!