EPO -- Girl In Me

Another pleasant surprise here. EPO (nee Eiko Sato...佐藤永子) has been another favorite of mine for several years with her version of a City Pop classic, "Downtown" and "U, Fu, Fu, Fu" (う、ふ、ふ、ふ）. With her bright, soaring voice, it was no surprise that many of her songs had become commercial jingles. One singer who can automatically brighten my day. She was born and raised in The Big City itself, Tokyo, and went to Matsubara High School in Setagaya Ward...her kohai happens to be another singer with a boomer of a voice, Misato Watanabe （渡辺美里）.

I own a few of her BEST albums but "Girl In Me" never showed up in any of them, and I don't think I ever came across an image of EPO as a sultry seductress. But coming across the video on YouTube, I've listened to it a few times already. I spoke about American pollination in my last entry concerning Momoe Yamaguchi. Well, EPO provided the Japanese lyrics, but Ray Parker Jr. wrote the notes (yup, a few years before "Ghostbusters") and he even backs her up on guitar. Another happy, happy, joy, joy tune which was a cover of a minor hit by Maxine Nightingale back in 1979 from her album, "Lead Me On". (the video is at the very bottom). For the video above, EPO sings "Girl In Me" from about the 1:20 mark.

BTW, EPO just happened to be the childhood nickname for Ms. Sato.

(P.S. Ah, did find the album. It's "Uwasa ni Naritai" (うわさになりたい）"Rumor")