I've been a fan of Japanese popular music for 40 years, and have managed to collect a lot of material during that time. So I decided I wanted to talk about Showa Era music with like-minded fans. My particular era is the 70s and 80s (thus the "kayo kyoku"). The plus part includes a number of songs and artists from the last 30 years and also the early kayo. So, let's talk about New Music, aidoru, City Pop and enka.
Credits
I would like to give credit where credit is due. Videos are from YouTube and other sources such as NicoNico while Oricon rankings and other information are translated from the Japanese Wikipedia unless noted.
It wasn't too long ago when all of these visual memes were popping out of the woodwork like crazy. One example was "We'll Be Right Back" when certain scenes suddenly stopped just when things were about to get really interesting.
So I was a little amused when I saw this January 2023 single by New Jazz and Neo-City Pop group BLU-SWING with the very same title of "We'll Be Right Back". There's no cute flute-and-piano riff to signal a potential crazy effect stopped at the critical moment. Instead BLU-SWING keyboardist Yusuke Nakamura's（中村祐介）brief words and music provide an unstoppable groove and guitar churning like an engine to showcase a scenario of a potential romantic effect stopped at the critical moment. What is next to come? Enquiring minds want to know.
If I'm not mistaken, this song came out on a recent episode of "Uta Con"（うたコン）as performed by the aidoru group Juice=Juice. I've been paying a bit more attention to them because of their occasional predilection for the old City Pop stuff like "Downtown".
Well, Juice=Juice released their first official EP titled "MORE! MORE! EP" in June 2026 and one of the tracks is "BLOODY BULLET". With that title, I get images of flicks from Quentin Tarantino or Guy Ritchie, and to be honest, the music video above reminded me of "Thelma & Louise". But as written by Konnyaku Nishino（西野蒟蒻）and composed by Sho Hoshibe（星部ショウ）, "BLOODY BULLET" keeps the blood away and instead brings in the disco and some of the lively discography that I remember Morning Musume（モーニング娘。）doing a couple of decades ago. Some of the members go on a road trip and become tough gals (or as tough as a Hello Project idol is allowed to get) while the cops are hot on their tail. Someone in the gang has to toughen up if they're gonna make it.
Initially, I'd decided to post an article on the B-side of singer-songwriter Shozo Ise's（伊勢正三）scintillating February 1981 2nd single"Moonlight", just to see how it was like. Unfortunately, I could only find an empty karaoke version of "Portugal Keel" on YouTube and I did want to have Ise's voice in there. However, I was able to find the title track from his 2nd album"Nagisa Yuku" (Going to the Beach) which was released a month later.
Also, the first track of the album, Ise took care of words and music for this relaxing mid-tempo song that hovers between City Pop and J-AOR. It really does feel like an aural version of that barefoot stroll along the beach as the sun dips below the horizon. There's nothing like the lovely inclusion of Fender Rhodes and shimmering strings. Incidentally, the album also includes "Moonlight".
About a month ago, I featured an article regarding Chikara Ueda & The Power Station（上田力＆パワーステーション）and their music contribution to the 1981 TV Asahi detective series "Keishichō Satsujin-ka"（警視庁殺人課...Metropolitan Police Department Homicide Division）, "Breeze in Memories". Well, I've got another piece related to the show.
Actually, I should say that it is the opening theme to "Keishichō Satsujin-ka", "Urban Sunrise" which was the B-side to star Bunta Sugawara's（菅原文太）ending theme "Nemure Tokai yo"（眠れ都会よ...Sleep, My City）. Ueda and his band take care of this one as well although Asei Kobayashi（小林亜星）is the composer behind this dynamic and even hopeful fusion number which includes a sparkling trumpet lead. Maynard Ferguson would be proud! It's rather coincidental that this and the previous article both involve bands that have the word "station" in their names and the two songs have something to do with sunrises.
I'll be honest and state that it was because of this song that I had even heard of the Pamir Mountains located in Central and South Asia. Geography and City Pop...what a combination!
Strangely enough, this might be my first example of a hybrid between Exotic kayo and City Pop via "Journey to the Mind ~ Pamir no Yoake"(Dawn Over the Pamirs), the first track on Junko Ohashi & Minowa Central Station's（大橋純子＆美乃家セントラル・ステイション）June 1978 album"Shalom"（沙浪夢）. As written, composed and arranged by Masami Tsuchiya（土屋昌巳）with Ohashi helping out on lyrics and Kenjiro Oda（小田健二郎）assisting on the music, it's certainly got the funkiness of Ohashi's brand of City Pop, but at the same time, there is also something indeed rather exotic about it, as if all this was playing out on some sort of Cessna hundreds of metres above the titular Pamirs themselves. It's also got some rock in there and a weirdly filtered boozy saxophone that pops up at times. It contrasts quite nicely with the second track "Kisetsufuu Tayori"（季節風便り）.
Uh, nope. This "Bohemian" has nothing to do with the more famous "Bohemian" recorded by the late Yuki Katsuragi（葛城ユキ）. We're far from the rock genre with this one.
In fact, I would say that "Bohemian" as performed by singer-songwriter Naomi Sugimura（杉村尚美）has more to do with cruise liner-friendly Latin-spiced City Pop. Released with its A-side, Sugimura's 2nd single"Kaze no Nostalgia"（風のノスタルジア...Windy Nostalgia）, in 1982, this B-side has a lot of bop to boogie onto the Lido Deck. Written by Keisuke Yamakawa（山川啓介）and composed by Sugimura herself, it fairly sweeps over the ocean before a searing keyboard riff suddenly swoops over everybody to finish things off.
I'm always happy to start off Urban Contemporary Fridays on KKP, but today is especially auspicious since I'm going to begin with an album of the genre that I'd been searching for years. Yup, it was the odyssey of tracking down Junko Yagami's（八神純子）"Lonely Girl" from February 1983. For the longest time, it seems, the album had been discontinued although many of the singer-songwriter's other releases were available. But then, several days ago, out of a sense of whimsy, I tried out Amazon.jp and lo and behold, there were a few copies of "Lonely Girl" on sale. Well, I wasn't a lonely boy anymore. The air crackled over my keyboard as I whipped out my credit card and fingers and had that sucker sailing over the Pacific and much of Canada to my home.
It arrived, I listened to it and I'm a happy man. Mind you, out of the ten tracks, I've already covered half the album through individual articles on the title track itself, the theme for the anime feature "Final Yamato" "Love Supreme", "Yozora no Earring"（夜空のイヤリング）, "Touch you, tonight" and my favourite track on "Lonely Girl", the bouncy City Pop classic "Jealous". I found out through the liner notes that Ichizo Seo（瀬尾一三）had arranged the entire album and that Makoto Matsushita（松下誠）along with Etsuko Yamakawa（山川恵津子）helped out on the chorus including "Jealous". Also note that unless mentioned otherwise, the songs which all revolve around some aspect of love were written and composed by Yagami.
The folded booklet containing the lyrics is made out as a particularly expensive letter (well, those are a lot of stamps there). It isn't everyday that you get to see a smiling Junko so please enjoy one of the stamps. Anyways, without further ado:
Track 3 is "Kodou no Lullaby"（鼓動のララバイ...Heartbeat Lullaby） is a cool and sultry City Pop number about welcoming home a tired loved one, and without any sort of artifice such as a candlelit dinner or petals floating in a bathtub, the two happily engage in a cuddle in bed (how much clothing they're wearing, I'll leave to your imagination). The Joe Group strings and Masahiro Kobayashi's（小林正弘）fluegelhorn do wonders to take a very intimate experience and have it soaring into the night sky.
The final track on Side A of the original LP is "Moetsukiru made"（燃えつきるまで...Until It Burns Out） shows off why I'm often so in awe of Yagami with those incredible vocals of hers. They were what got me interested in her in the first place and I was given a good reminder of that here. Nice beefy bass by Kenji Takamizu（高水健司）and keyboard work by Maki Yajima（矢嶋マキ）. It's another night sky ballad.
Side A may have finished with a whisper but Side B explodes with cheerful thoughts via a good battery of horns including those manned by Shin Kazuhara（数原晋）and Jake H. Concepcion. There's something rather happily Stevie Wonder about this funk and strut"And I Love You". Just enjoy the stride down Shinjuku as you listen to this one. Keisuke Yamakawa（山川啓介）provided the lyrics.
The penultimate track is "You & I", another huggable love ballad which is arguably the most straight-ahead pop song of "Lonely Girl".Yamakawa and Matsushita provide a bit more in the chorus and Yagami sounds downright adorable whispering the last few syllables every other line at the end. It's quite short but it feels the right length.
The final track is "Falling For You" which has Yagami showing off those soaring vocals and has more of a feeling of Boz Scaggs or Bobby Caldwell. Tsuyoshi Kon（今剛）, who shows up in many of the tracks, has another epic solo and those electric guitar solos have often popped up in those 80s Japanese love songs. I can't also ignore the piano which starts and ends the ballad along with the Joe Group strings once more.
Unfortunately, I didn't get this song with my copy of "Lonely Girl" but apparently for the 2003 re-release of the album, there was a bonus track included as mentioned on J-Wiki. "Sono Mune ni Mou Ichido"（その胸にもう一度...Once More Into These Arms）. Written by Yagami and composed/arranged by the late Hiroshi Narumi（鳴海寛）of Tohoku Shinkansen（東北新幹線）, this is some pleasant Latin-infused sunset City Pop with a hint of disco and maybe even Herb Alpert. If you have the 2003 version of "Lonely Girl", consider yourself lucky...apparently "Sono Mune ni Mou Ichido" hasn't shown up anywhere else unless someone tells me otherwise.
