Miyako Chaki -- Bye Bye Blues（バイバイブルース）

By Kentin via Wikimedia Commons

Cafe Renoir...there are a number of places in Tokyo whose interiors seem to transport the customer back into the past by a few decades just from the decor and the furnishings. The Tokyo Prince Hotel up to 2016 and Nakano Broadway come to mind. However, when it comes to coffee houses, Cafe Renoir is the coffee house equivalent of that portal to the past.

I've been to a few branches such as the one in Ueno, although the one in the video above (by kei japantravel) seems to be in Ginza. There are interior decor variations depending on the branch but whenever I enter one, I get the impression that I'm surrounded by something from the 1960s or 1970s complete with that smell of tobacco infused into the chairs and the walls (there was a time when people could happily smoke like chimneys in cafes).

Maybe what I will say next is unfair to singer-songwriter Miyako Chaki（茶木みやこ） (to whom I will apologize profusely) but whenever I hear a lot of her music, I get the impression that this was the type of enjoyably light and melodic tapestry that I could hear accompanying a trip to a place like Cafe Renoir. That was the case when I posted my first article on Chaki, "Chizu douri ni Hashirikitta Anata"（地図どうりに走り切ったあなた）, several years ago.

Well, I have the same vibes for her "Bye Bye Blues" which was composed by the lady herself while Ritsu Iwasawa（岩沢律）took care of the lyrics. A track from her August 1977 album "Rainbow Chaser"（レインボウ・チェイサー）, this feels like the type of music floating over and around a couple of buddies painting the town red on a major shopping excursion and then taking a well-earned break in a chic coffee house somewhere in Tokyo of the 1970s. In fact, some of that keyboard work seems to scream for inclusion in a soundtrack of some detective drama. Not sure whether the title is a declaration of farewell to those bad feelings or the dark miasma following a heartbreak. Chaki's music is cheerful enough but of course, kayo veterans know that happy melodies often come with sad lyrics.

I do like the album title though. "Rainbow Chaser" could describe how the Japanese were feeling back in those days when the Economic Miracle was finally paying dividends for everyone. People could actually dream of heading off to foreign climes on a vacation or buying something on the luxurious scale.

Ginji Ito -- Heart and Soul

 

Here I was about to start the Urban Contemporary Friday round of songs on KKP with Ginji Ito's（伊藤銀次） percolating "Cherry Night", only to find out at the last minute that I had already provided an article about this track from his 1986 album "Get Happy" back in 2023, almost exactly four years ago. Oh, dopey me!😵

It took some scrolling but I was able to find something Ito and City Pop and it's from the album that followed "Get Happy", his 1987 "Nature Boy". "Heart and Soul" had the same songwriters: composer Ito and lyricist Youta Yumeno（夢野よう太）, but this time, the result isn't overcaffeinated and happy. Instead, it's a more sultry and soulful combination on the side of sophisticated pop, which was a genre that was getting added to the City Pop mix in the late 1980s. Not sure if the song included real horns or synth horns, but hey it's all good.

Special Favorite Music -- Gold

 

Back in 2018, I introduced a band onto the blog called Special Favorite Music via their 2017 single "Ceremony" which had quite a bit of groove with the interesting inclusion of a violinist and a flutist among their band members.

I'm now going a bit further back in their discography to 2015 when they released their EP "Romantics" with the track of choice today being "Gold". Written and composed by Naohiro Okuda, the brass and violin are more in the foreground here and the whole arrangement sounds like an upbeat indies pop number straight from Shimo-Kitazawa, Tokyo. The music video is pretty fantastical although the slightly out-of-focus shots of people in animal masks were pretty creepy.

According to their Biography page, Special Favorite Music went from a 7-piece band down to a trio from 2019 but from 2024 which was their 10th anniversary, they apparently recruited new members. So, it'll be interesting how the folks sound now.

Naked Eyes -- Promises, Promises

 

A little over three years ago, I did a ROY article on Naked Eyes' "(There's) Always Something There to Remind Me" which was a New Wave version of an old Burt Bacharach and Hal David easy-listening ditty that I used to hear on AM radio all the time. Not only was I surprised but I was actually quite gobsmacked that a song like this could be made into a synthpop example of coolness.

Well, Naked Eyes pulled off another hit several months after that one. On April Fool's Day in 1983, they released "Promises, Promises" which I remember getting a lot of airplay on the radio and plenty of TV play on the music video shows. I will always remember that svelte young woman drying off her hair to the synthy jazz-soul. "Promises, Promises" hit No. 13 on Canada's RPM while in the States, it reached No. 11. On the Wikipedia article for the song, I read that Madonna even provided background vocals for the extended versions of it.

Up at Straw-Wara, I discovered that three hit tunes from Japan were also released on the same day as "Promises, Promises".

Anzen Chitai -- Las Vegas Typhoon（ラスベガス・タイフーン）

Yu Hayami -- Natsu Iro no Nancy (夏色のナンシー）

Rats & Star -- Me Gumi no Hito （め組のひと）

Mioko Yamaguchi -- Yume Hiko (album follow-up)（夢飛行）

 

Recently, I have been listening to my various CDs again and one I got to hear once more after a long while was Mioko Yamaguchi's（山口未央子）"Yume Hiko" (Dream Flight) album (pictured lower right) from 1980. Being her debut release, I covered the album and then a couple of songs from the album on their own: the title track and "Itsuka Yurarete Tooi Kuni"（いつかゆられて遠い国）. With the pretty, mysterious and silken Yamaguchi covering the two fresh genres of technopop and City Pop within "Yume Hiko", if I were asked by anyone interested in popular Japanese music of yesteryear for any recommendations, I would definitely suggest this one. Now, I still have four more tracks left to cover from the album so let's get those out of the way.

According to Yamaguchi's 2017 liner notes for the remastered version of the album, "A Dream of Mio" serves as a more organic counterpoint to the earlier and YMO-reminiscent "A Dream of Eμ". As the latter song leads into the next track of "O-Matsuri"（お祭り...Festival）, "A Dream of Mio" leads into the title track. It's only thirty seconds but I couldn't help but feel that there was a bit of Akiko Yano（矢野顕子）whimsy in the arrangement.

Yamaguchi said that she had come up with the words and music for "Aru Yo no Dekigoto"（ある夜の出来事）when she was on the bus for university. And for those old movie fans, she indeed did get the title from the famous Clark Gable flick "It Happened One Night", and just like that classic, Mioko's technopop "Aru Yo no Dekigoto" sounds like a rom-com, and for that matter, it just seems to weave scenes from any anime with a clumsily delivered confession speech. A young lady realizes that she may have blurted out one sentence too much the night before (thanks to some alcohol) and rushes over to the guy's house to confirm. The guy's sly smile says it all.😎

"Waltz"（ワルツ (流舞)）is supposedly one of the fruits of her imagination and labour from attending a course in jazz piano, and it does come across as a most congenial pop waltz which starts off with some of that jazz. Just a personal opinion, but I would like to think that the comical couple from "Aru Yo no Dekigoto", having gotten all their opinions out earlier in the day, are now having their first official date with them dancing to "Waltz" to cap things off. Jake H. Concepcion and Akira Inoue（井上鑑）are helping out on soprano sax and keyboards respectively here.

The final song here and the final track on "Yume Hiko" is the bouncy "Paradise"（パラダイス）. Nice to have some of that City Pop funk in there but there is also some in-and-out of some synthy version of traditional Japanese phrases. In the liner notes, Yamaguchi stated that she had been inspired by Yutaka Yokokura's（横倉裕）1978 "Love Light" album which she listened to quite often back in the day, so she wanted to try some of that fusion as well.

Well, it took over eight years but I've finally covered all of "Yume Hiko".

Masahiko Kondo -- Jounetsu Neppu Serenade（情熱☆熱風☽せれなーで）

 

My usual impression of a serenade, and I know that a lot of kayo kyoku have used the word in their titles, is of a tenderhearted love song weaponized by a suitor underneath the window of the target of their affections.

Well, "Jounetsu Neppu Serenade" (Passionate Tropical Wind Serenade) isn't a heavy metal anthem but I don't think it's a soft ballad either. Released by aidoru Masahiko Kondo（近藤真彦）in January 1982 as his 5th single, it's a pretty upbeat tune about falling hard in love from afar for that lovely young lady, presumably in those sylvan glades in the warmer areas of Earth. Written by Ayumi Date（伊達歩）, composed by Kyohei Tsutsumi（筒美京平）and arranged by Kazuo Otani（大谷和夫）, there's nothing rock-n'-roll about the song, which is usually my genre impression for Matchy. It's more of an easy-listening tropical-tinged tune.

According to the J-Wiki article for "Jounetsu Neppu Serenade", the characters of the crescent moon and star were meant to be included in the title to reflect the starlight mentioned in Date's lyrics. Apparently, this particular song was enough of a tangent from what Matchy usually tackles so that it actually did become quite the long seller in the stores. It hit No. 1 on Oricon and ended up as the 9th-ranked single for 1982.

J-Canuck's Five Favourite Misato Watanabe Tunes（渡辺美里）

 

Once again, we have come to Hump Day and at least here in Toronto, it certainly feels and looks like a Hump Day meteorologically speaking. It's all gray, dreary and drizzly out there. So, let's try for something or someone very up with people and happiness. And I was thinking about Misato Watanabe. I hadn't written about her in quite a while and I realized while going through her KKP file, I had yet to provide my own favourite tunes by her.

(1986) My Revolution

Of course, I'm going to start with his one since this is the first song by her that I came to know her by. I think it's also safe to say that "My Revolution" is one of the pop songs of the 1980s in Japan. I will always remember the original music video where she showed herself basically as a human anime figure with that huge hair and just-as-huge eyes.

(1988) 10 Years

As I mentioned in the actual article for the song, I misunderstood the meaning of the song...initially assuming that this was some commemorative tune in Misato's career. It was really just about the protagonist's look back on her own decade as a working woman. Still, I'm sure that the singer herself has used the song for her own anniversaries. I don't know of too many tunes that are both elegiac and celebratory.

(1990) Summertime Blues

I think next to "My Revolution", "Summetime Blues" is the Misato tune that I'll always remember her for. It sounds both old-fashioned and contemporary at the same time, and obviously, it has her up-with-people pizzazz. And indeed, it was used as the campaign song for what is now the Meiji Yasuda Life Insurance Company...gotta keep the insured healthy and happy through the gift of music.

(1990) Koi Suru Punks（恋するパンクス）

As much as my favourites are along the pop vein, I know that Misato has had the vocals and movement style of a happy and hard rocker. "Koi Suru Punks" (Punks in Love) is one reflection of that from her 1990 "Tokyo" album. Nope, it was never put out as a single but I'm sticking with this one because it is so much fun to hear with ska and rock thrown into the cosmic blender like so much kale for a smoothie.

(1991) Christmas Made Matenai （クリスマスまで待てない）

This is another non-single track...this time for the 1991 album "Lucky", and it's a perennial favourite to be played when the Holidays approach. It may be a domestic creation with Misato herself behind the lyrics, but whenever I listen to it, I just get those Phil Spector Wall of Sound thoughts from the 1960s.  Merry Christmas, indeed.🎄

Any particular Misato favourites from your end? Let us know. Ah, one PS...she'll be celebrating her 60th birthday later in July.