Ryuusei -- Oute!（王手！）

 

I've been meaning to get this enka and min'yo singer onto the blog for a while now. I saw Ryuusei（彩青）on a past edition of "Shin BS Nihon no Uta"（新BS日本の歌）, and in my estimation, he's quite striking. Although he has been the apprentice of fellow enka singer Takashi Hosokawa（細川たかし）, his appearance reminds me more of the beatific presence of the late great Haruo Minami（三波春夫）and his abilities on multiple traditional instruments bring to mind another enka legend, Hiroshi Itsuki（五木ひろし）.

The Hokkaido-born Ryuusei made his debut back in 2019 and up until now, he's released eight singles and the one that I'm posting to start his file on KKP is his fifth from December 2023, "Oute!" (Check!) meaning the ultimate threatening move in shogi. Written by Hajime Tateishi（多手石松観）and composed by Shosuke Ichikawa（市川昭介）, it's a proud and manly-man enka about the ancient Japanese game as an analogy for life that also brings to my memories of another shogi-themed enka, "Osho" (王将), by another legend who left this mortal coil long ago, Hideo Murata（村田英雄）. 

Ryuusei has yet to make an appearance on the Kohaku Utagassen but I think it's simply a matter of time. If he does get an invitation and he accepts, it would almost be like the second coming of Minami and a brief return of the more enka-dominant days of the New Year's Eve special.

Yukihiro Takahashi -- MIRRORMANIC

From YouTube

Considering that I have a face that is perfect for radio, I really should get rid of all of the mirrors, but that would be rather weird. I can't imagine coming out of the shower or brushing my teeth in the bathroom without having that shiny pane of reflective material there. That area of wall would look awfully barren. Plus, we can always use the mirrors to open up the space a bit.

Interestingly enough, on first listen and first sight, I had thought that "MIRRORMANIC" was one of those Yellow Magic Orchestra songs that slipped through the cracks for me. Maybe it was a single B-side that never made it onto an album. However, I was wrong because the song was actually a track on YMO drummer Yukihiro Takahashi's（高橋幸宏）2nd solo album "Ongaku Satsujin"（音楽殺人...Murdered by the Music）from June 1980.

Written by Chris Mosdell and composed by Takahashi, the drummer's two bandmates from YMO, bassist Haruomi Hosono（細野晴臣）and keyboardist Ryuichi Sakamoto（坂本龍一）were helping out in the recording along with Kenji Omura（大村憲司）on electric guitar. Despite the familiar faces though and the technopop genre in play here, there is something not quite YMO about this one. I couldn't help but feel that there was something somewhat Davie Bowie-ish here in the arrangement and vocal stylings. And that's a good thing since Takahashi should have been able to distinguish his solo stuff from his work with the main band.

"Ongaku Satsujin" also has the faster-paced and playful "Kanashiki Blue Colour Worker"（悲しきブルーカラーワーカー）so have a listen to that as well.

J-Canuck's "America" Tunes 2

Wikimedia Commons

To any and all American readers of "Kayo Kyoku Plus", Happy Fourth of July and also a Happy Sestercentennial (250th birthday). I recall that three years ago, I also provided a special list of America-related songs on July the 4th and mentioned that we would have to do something about 2026. Well, the day is here.

And so, this is my "America" Tunes 2. Unlike the first one which mostly dealt with songs that had "America" in their titles, I'm being a bit more geographically precise so I'll be listing those numbers referring specifically to states and cities. Without further ado then:

(1948) Haruo Oka -- Akogare no Hawaii Koro (憧れのハワイ航路)

(1983) Mayumi Itsuwa -- California

(1978) Goro Noguchi -- Catalog L.A.（カタログL.A.）

(1984) Himiko Kikuchi -- Hollywood Illusion

(1979) Casiopea -- I Love New York

(1983) Seiko Matsuda -- Miami Gozen Go-ji （マイアミ午前5時）

Alan Gorrie -- Diary Of A Fool

 

For the usual fifth and final article on Urban Contemporary Friday on "Kayo Kyoku Plus", I'm using my prerogative to choose something not Japanese but still fulfills the feeling of urban contemporary elsewhere in the world. I've done so a few times for the wonderful duo Young Gun Silver Fox.

The mission of this blog was always to talk about the kayo kyoku of those early decades in my life and to see if there were others on Earth who shared the same interest in music. Well, I fulfilled those statements fairly quickly. A side benefit has been that I've been able to delightfully find songs again on both sides of the Pacific that I had lost contact within the deep recesses of my memories. A couple of them have been used as Reminiscings of Youth pieces: Bill Champlin's "Tonight, Tonight" and Robert Armes' "Jump To It". Not surprisingly, both of them were AOR numbers that I used to hear on FM radio as a high school and university kid.

Well, in the last few days, I rediscovered another AOR tune from the past when suddenly like a bolt out of the blue, some semblance of a title appeared in my mind. When I popped that into the YouTube search engine, I was able to get Alan Gorrie's "Diary Of A Fool". This was also a song that I used to hear on radio all the time but never remembered the singer's name.

Gorrie is a Scottish musician who was a founding member of the funk and R&B group Average White Band from Dundee, Scotland. I'd heard of the name of the band but never realized that it had been based in the land of haggis and bagpipes and David Tennant/Peter Capaldi. AVB had a couple of periods of activity: 1971-1982 and 1989-2024, and in between those, Gorrie was a soloist, releasing one album in 1985, "Sleepless Nights".

"Diary Of A Fool" has remained in my brain all these years because of that elegant piano intro that sounds as if David Foster had something to do with it (he didn't...Gorrie was the lyricist, composer and arranger), the wailing electric guitar and Gorrie's own soulful vocals. The whole thing was just this smooth and laidback ballad that would be able to release all of those endorphins in my AOR-addled noggin...just like the other two songs by Champlin and Armes. 

Now, I've gotta see if I can recognize any of Average White Band's discography.

Yoshitaka Minami -- Sweet Memories

 

Have you ever thought about Steely Dan covering Seiko Matsuda's（松田聖子）iconic ballad "Sweet Memories"?

Nope, neither have I. And yet, here we are. Indeed, back in 2019 when singer-songwriter Yoshitaka Minami（南佳孝）came up with his 2019 album of covers "Radio na Kyoku-tachi Ⅱ"（ラジオな曲たちⅡ...Radio Songs 2）, he included one of "Sweet Memories" as the final track. Yup, the jazziness and meticulous chords are there in lyricist Takashi Matsumoto's（松本隆）and composer Masaaki Omura's（大村雅朗）tune for Seiko-chan. The original 50s or 60s girl pop stylings have been turned into urban and urbane radio-friendly grooviness for your evening pleasure.

Mayumi Ohnishi -- Saikai Yawa（再会夜話）

From YouTube

 

This album is a bit of a mystery to me. I would put it up as an APB with the apple pie photograph, to boot. However, this 1981 production has all the names and all the titles so they are identified. The problem is that I don't know any of the artists involved and I could only recognize one musician, Chuei Yoshikawa（吉川忠英）, on the credits.

I'm talking about "Good Season ~ New Original Songs" which has been described by YouTuber Ren as a compilation album of New Music and City Pop. Ren was kind enough to put up the album in the summer of 2023. As I mentioned above, I have never heard of any of the singers or bands involved so I'm wondering if they may have been university students recording as part of their music clubs or amateur acts that didn't last too long.

One track at 30:39 is "Saikai Yawa" (Meeting Again for an Evening Conversation) by singer-songwriter Mayumi Ohnishi（大西まゆみ）. I couldn't find anything on her at all although she has two tracks on "Good Season" including this one. It's too bad since her kittenish vocals enhance the feeling of the good life in her own creation here. Although 1981 was still a few years away from the flying-high Bubble Era, from personal experience, I already knew that Japan was already in a golden age and I can hear it in Ohnishi's light and playful bossa-influenced "Saikai Yawa". Images of fancy restaurants, champagne flutes and shameless flirting (or re-flirting) abound among the City Pop here.

If anyone, including Ren, can provide any further insight into "Good Season" aside from the one lonely page at "Rate Your Music", that would be much appreciated.

Rie Murakami -- TNT

Wikimedia Commons

 

(18:03)

Doing the blog for as long as I have, I've been able to encounter a lot of singers and bands that I never would have, and that includes the mysterious Rie Murakami（村上リエ）who only put out that one album in 1984, "Sahara". At the time I made my first posting for the singer, it was for one of its tracks, "Say Cheese", which had me reminisce about Boz Scaggs and Bobby Caldwell from their 1970s days. 

However, another track is the appropriately titled "TNT" which had the same lyricist, Linda Hennrick but this time, the composer was Etsuko Yamakawa（山川恵津子）, and as dedicated KKP readers know, whenever I see her name, she has my undivided attention. And sure enough, this is one funky blaster. In fact, I think it so funky that it should have gotten a music video with plenty of choreography. The interesting thing about this one though is that it not only has some of that Dazz Band arrangement thanks to Masanori Sasaji（笹路正徳）but there are points where it approaches Manhattan Transfer-friendly fusion.

The above video was provided by Marty McFlies v2 (thank you for that, Marty) and I was struck by one comment he had in his explanation under the video. He mentioned that when he'd bought "Sahara", he hadn't been all that impressed with it and put it on the back burner for years. Years later, he gave it another shot and found it all so worthy. I could totally relate to that sentiment since I gave my first purchase of a Taeko Ohnuki（大貫妙子）album the same initial short shrift and many years in my cabinet before giving it another shot for some reason and then finally seeing the light.