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.
Maybe it says something about veteran folk singer-songwriter Kosetsu Minami's（南こうせつ）April 1990 single"Ano Hi no Sora yo"(The Sky on That Day) that I could only find concert footage on YouTube rather than the original recorded version.
I also heard it for the first time on a recent episode of "Uta Con"（うたコン）which is why I'm writing about it now. Written and composed by Minami with Shozo Ise（伊勢正三）co-writing the lyrics, I had thought that his summery paean to almighty love had been created back in the 1970s so it was with some surprise that I discovered its emergence to fans happened a couple of decades later. But it goes to show that Minami has made some wonderfully timeless singalong music since he debuted over fifty years ago.
Singer and actress Ami Suzuki（鈴木亜美）appeared on NHK's "Asaichi"（あさイチ）a couple of days ago but it wasn't to sing anything or to promote a new movie or TV show. Instead, she came on the show's cooking segment to rustle up some ginger-infused meatballs in a sauce, and I recall last year, she whipped up another recipe on the show. I have to say that despite her being 44 years old according to her J-Wiki profile, she still looks like that sparkling wide-eyed teenager from the late 1990s.
Considering the Komuro Steamroller that ran through the Japanese music world throughout most of the final decade of the 20th century, I gather that Suzuki's time with music producer Tetsuya Komuro（小室哲哉）was one of the last examples of one of his proteges making a big mark on the charts. I saw Suzuki as a more girl-next-door type tackling the Komuro music compared to the dance club-friendly Namie Amuro（安室奈美恵）and Tomomi Kahala（華原朋美）from earlier years.
With Suzuki, it was more about the upbeat stuff including "Be Together" (which I heard repeatedly on the "Asaichi" segment as a running gag), so it was interesting to hear "Our Days", a ballad which served as her 8th single from September 1999. I barely remember it and indeed it was written and composed by Komuro with Mitsuko Komuro（小室みつ子）also helping out on the lyrics. I can't say that she had the most polished delivery with this ballad which might explain why I tend to remember her happier songs but then again, her forlorn vocals might be in line with the more melancholy melody.
"Our Days" did hit No. 1 on Oricon, going Platinum, and it eventually became the 47th-ranked single of 1999. It also became a track on Suzuki's 2nd album"infinity eighteen vol.1" from February 2000. That album also hit the top of the charts and became the 15th-ranked album of the year.
Well, that was quite the coincidence. I just posted up "The Firsts (Mariya, Tatsuro, Akina, EW&F, EPO)" earlier this afternoon and it contained a few of my 80s favourites that helped start my path of kayo kyoku glory. Then, I find out that this week's "Uta Con"（うたコン）was having an 80s theme night. It was quite the manna from heaven for me.
I recall that I wrote up years ago a somewhat rambling account of my history of liking kayo kyoku so in a way, this article will emulate the overall theme. However, this time around, I'm just going to be a little more judicious with my thoughts here. But let it be said that these songs made a foundation to start things off for me thanks to an old classmate's "The Top 10" and "The Best 10" videotapes and my graduation trip to Japan in 1981....before I got to listen to "The Sounds of Japan" and watch my first ever Kohaku Utagassen in January 1982.
The long black hair, the wide smile and the voice that could part clouds and let sunshine through. It was this ballad that started my own fan feelings for Hiromi Iwasaki（岩崎宏美）and pretty much pegged her in my mind as the Queen of Pop Balladry for a number of years.
Matchy the tough but tenderhearted teenager will always be represented by "Blue Jeans Memory" whose titular movie posters were all over the place when I was traveling through Tokyo and Osaka in the torrid summer of 1981.
One reason that I haven't included Yellow Magic Orchestra in the list is that listening to their "Firecracker" on the local Japanese-Canadian community TV show here in Toronto had me intrigued but not quite head-over-heels for Japanese pop music. It took that graduation trip several months later to finally cement things. Anyways, Jun Horie's（堀江淳）"Memory Glass" was more kayo than "Firecracker" but that certain synthesizer in play here further fired up my interest in technopop.
I got to hear this in Japan, I also did the same on those videotapes and then finally, Hitomi Ishikawa（石川ひとみ）showed up on the 1981 Kohaku Utagassen. It was pretty much wall-to-wall "Machibuse" for several months so there was no way that I would leaving this one off the list.
This was another wall-to-wall song because of the Japan trip and videotapes although I wouldn't hear about the background behind the making of this song and even how the name of this group came about for several years. On tonight's "Uta Con", I even learned some more information which answered one question that had been rattling about in my head just as long: Why didn't these guys show up on the Kohaku despite the crazy popularity of this song in 1981? Well, Imo Kin Trio（イモ欽トリオ）, the trio of young comics-turned-sudden singers who did show up to perform "High School Lullaby" tonight, explained that they actually had been given that golden offer by NHK. However their mentor, legendary comedian Kin'ichi Hagimoto（萩本欽一）who starred with them on their Fuji-TV variety show shot the question across their bow, "Do you really consider yourself singers?" and explained that if you accept the invitation, you're taking away a spot from a real singer who's dedicated to their craft. So, long story short, the answer was NO. I find this a bit ironic on Hagimoto's part since I believe he was the one who got the trio to get themselves into the music business; I guess he hadn't realized how successful they were going to get. Sorry, I did say I was going to be more judicious but couldn't help myself here.
This was another wall-to-wall song that I heard in Japan and on those videotapes. And not surprisingly, it was the one to start things off on "Uta Con" tonight with Yo Oizumi's（大泉洋）rendition of the song. Still miss Nishida（西田敏行）who passed away almost two years ago.
Good heavens! It's September already! Time sure has flown in 2026. But as it is, autumn is just around the corner, school will be starting up again here and NHK will officially announce that the Kohaku Utagassen will be broadcast once more on December 31st. Ironically, though, for a summer that really hasn't been all that blazing hot this year in Toronto, today's been a really hazy and humid affair. But no worries, things will cool down by this long weekend.
Anyways, I'm dusting off the KKP category of The First once again. I began this one with "The First -- J-Canuck" almost a decade ago with a rambling recounting of some of the first Japanese songs that I heard and then a few years later, I posted "The Firsts by J-Canuck" where I selected some of my other firsts via genre. Other writers on the blog have also chimed in with their firsts.
Well, being whimsical me and acknowledging the fact that today is September 1st, I've decided to put up some of the first songs I heard by five artists. I also acknowledge that I'm putting up a couple of examples of "September" since I'm so shamelessly enthralled by them nearly fifty years following their release, but I'll defend myself with Blog Founder's Prerogative.
Yup, this was my first exposure to the legendary guys at Earth Wind & Fire thanks to my pink SONY radio. I always wondered why these guys were so funkily devoted to the ninth month of the year but the disco and the dancing kept distracting my (soul) train of thought. I hope the guys at Area 51 have another great time this year, too.
The whole Mariya Takeuchi（竹内まりや）thing began with this song on "Sounds of Japan". It put my whole impression of aidoru voices in a different perspective because up until this tune, I'd thought that female Japanese singers had to sing up in the ionosphere. I actually thought Mariya was Mario for a few days because her vocals were so low. As the years and decades have passed, I've come to realize that her "September" is pretty unique: a combination of 50s/60s girl pop, a bit of disco and contemporary pop.
I always remember my first and for Akina Nakamori（中森明菜）, it was "Kinku". I hadn't known anything about the singer or the image that her handlers had wanted to convey (misunderstood punk student) or the fact that the song was an example of techno aidoru music. At the time, it struck me as being this enigmatic and dramatic tune sung by a teenage girl whose vocals also went down to the basement.
If EPO had actually gone with her first choice for a career path which was (I believe) a gym teacher, she would have had her young charges whipped into shape with that boomer voice of hers. Thankfully for me and the rest of her fans, she has used her vocals to provide brightness and spark into the music sphere. Her surrounding musical arrangement has frequently followed suit. "U, Fu, Fu, Fu" may come off as one of the most unusual titles in Japanese pop, but the entire song can have the power to transport listeners to happy and joyful 80s Tokyo.
Indeed, it was neither "Christmas Eve" nor any of his City Pop classics that served as the introduction to Tatsuro Yamashita's（山下達郎）works. It was the theme song to the 1990 TBS drama"Yuwaku"（誘惑）that caught my ear due to its class and moodiness...and that trombone! Who was bringing a trombone solo into a late 80s pop tune? It wasn't City Pop per se but it sure was urban and urbane.
We're on the last day of August 2026 and although we're still about three weeks away from official autumn, August 31st still feels as if the summer is coming to an end. Today for example, my hometown is rather overcast and rainy although the humidity is still there but the general atmosphere (no pun intended) is one of a season reaching its finale.
Perhaps it's the appropriate time and place then to post this instrumental by Osakan pianist Yukie Nishimura（西村由紀江）. "Natsu no Owari ni" (At the End of Summer) is a pleasant and calming track from her May 1986 debut album"Angelique". With the addition of that fizzy synthesizer in the middle, I'd been wondering about calling this a technopop tune as well, but I decided to stick with the pop label. Just the thing to accompany a brunch-cooking session.
I've known about Nishimura for quite a long time and it was because later in her career, she also came up with the soundtrack for the 1991 Fuji-TV drama "Hyakuikkaime no Propose"（101回目のプロポーズ....The 101st Proposal). I may have to take a look at that soundtrack sometime in the near future. Anyways, see you in September!
Some of this year's Winter Olympics took place in Milan, Italy and I've heard that it is one of European centres for high fashion, so it'll probably be a city that I'll never be able to visit with pride since I have all the sartorial taste of the Doctors Who of the 1980s.
A few days ago, commenter YMOfan04 sent me the link to this video of a song titled "Milano Fantasy" by Romi Yamada（ロミ・山田）. At first, I'd wondered if it were that veteran voice actor who had the Big Bad part on the entertaining anime "Kill La Kill"（キルラキル）over a decade ago, but that was actually Romi Park（朴璐美）and she would have been all of eight years old when "Milano Fantasy" was released. The only other person that I knew with that variant of name was German/French actress Romy Schneider.
Nope, actually, the singer here is Romi Yamada whose real name is Hiromi Yamada（山田ひろみ）. She was born in 1933 in Japan-annexed Korea and was both a singer and actress. From what I could glean from her J-Wiki biography, her career began in the early 1960s with songs from the kayo kyoku genre. However, her 3rd-last single was the 1980 "Milano Fantasy" which was written by Koutarou Aso（麻生香太郎）and composed by Osamu Shoji（東海林修）, one of the pioneer synthesizer players. And indeed, the song sounds like something quite New Wave and Euro technopop...perhaps a bit ahead of its time since I get some Gazebo vibes from listening to it. I'll have to find out from YMOfan04 about which synth was being used here.
One of the other trivia tidbits that I learned regarding Yamada was that she had her time working in Las Vegas and so she actually bumped elbows with many of the legendary Rat Pack such as Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin. And apparently, one time, even the King himself, Elvis Presley, complimented her on her performance. I'll have to check out her earlier discography.
Hope everyone is having a good Sunday out there. Indeed, we're in the final Sunday of August and so for us in Toronto, we're in that annual zone of pop culture appreciation as Fan Expo wraps up and the hype surrounding the Toronto International Film Festival heats up over the next couple of weeks.
Commenter Brian Mitchell was asking about a singer that I hadn't heard before. Yumi Shizukusa（滴草由実）is a Kagoshima Prefecture-born singer and songwriter who also happens to be an artist and radio personality. From what I've read so far, she retired from singing about half a decade ago but had been active between 2002 and 2021. There's one song from her 2015 album"Blue" titled "All My Life" that attracted my friend's ears.
According to her J-Wiki profile, Shizukusa delved into soul, rock and pop and with "All My Life", it feels like some especially sultry R&B...perhaps with some 90s dance beats and tribal percussion. I get the vibe that I have heard it somewhere before but I can't really remember when and where, and the J-Wiki article on "Blue" doesn't specify any tie-up between "All My Life" and any anime or commercial. But from the music video, I can see that it was filmed in Odaiba by Tokyo Bay.
