Quarterflash -- Harden My Heart

 

Once again, it's time this week for another Reminiscings of Youth where I talk about some of the Western pop songs that I got to know in my callow childhood and teenage years. When I first truly got into music at the turn of the decade into the 1980s, I discovered all the wonders of synthesizers, the cool of groove and the boppiness of aidoru music in Japan.

And years before I knew about Kaori Kuno（久野かおり）and Mariko Takahashi（高橋真梨子）, I'd realized that women could sing main vocals and play the saxophone. That is thanks to Rindy Ross from the Portland Oregon band Quarterflash. I don't know too much of Quarterflash's discography but I did get to know their September 1981 debut single "Harden My Heart" as one of my touchstones for 80s pop music. The memory of this smoky pop-rock tune with Ross' sultry vocals and tenor sax exhortations has managed to remind me of my favourite decade in a musical sense for decades now. 

I think I first saw the music video on either "America's Top 10" or one of the local music video shows in Toronto. The video was the usual adventurous dreamscape and I was amused as Rindy was running around in what might have been a prototype for the Backrooms. Just taking in all that visual atmosphere gave me that dark urban impression of West Coast pop from those years. "Harden My Heart" peaked at No. 10 in Canada while it did even better Stateside when it hit No. 3.

So, what else was being released in Japan in September 1981? We have three songs here.

Tsukasa Ito -- Shojo Ningyo（少女人形）

Naoko Kawai -- Moonlight Kiss (ムーンライト・キッス）

Toshihiko Tahara -- Kanashimi 2 (TOO) Young （悲しみ２「ＴＯＯ」ヤング）