TUBE -- Season In The Sun

For close to a decade, when it came to summer music, the Japanese would usually imagine legendary band Southern All Stars or singer Tatsuro Yamashita（山下達郎）. The entertainment conglomerate, Being Incorporated, decided to get in on the summer racket by launching its own band. In 1985, The Tube was born.

Two singles were released which didn't dent the charts too much in their debut year. The leader and singer of the band, Nobuteru Maeda（前田亘輝）, stated that if the third single didn't do well, then it would be the end. The Tube dropped its definite article and released "Season In The Sun" in April 1986, written by Tomoko Aran（亜蘭智子） and composed by Tetsuro Oda（織田哲郎）, both established singers in their own right.

I had just replied to a commenter that I didn't really listen all that much to TUBE albums as a whole anymore. But listening to "Season in the Sun" for the first time in several years while watching the video above reminded me how great this song still is. Consider the hairs on my neck duly raised. I especially love the intro with the choral harmony before Maeda punches it off with "STOP the season in the sun..."

Of course, the band did survive since "Season in the Sun" was the first big hit for TUBE. The song stayed up in the Top 20 of the Oricon singles charts (it peaked at No. 6) from May through August (pretty logical) and became the 16th-ranked song of the year. The album picked up that lost definite article, and "THE SEASON IN THE SUN", released in June, went as far as No. 3 and became the 12th-ranked album of the year.

I did not know this even existed. This is the seven-and-a-half minute extended remix of the single! Enjoy those extra ounces of Corona while listening to it.

Considering Maeda's prediction about the consequences of their 3rd single not succeeding, the next bit of trivia is pretty amazing. Since the release of TUBE's 3rd breakthrough album, "THE SEASON IN THE SUN", every album that has been released by them up to 2012 (No. 31 "RE-CREATION" was released last summer) has been able to break into the Top 10, a 26-year streak which is the second-longest run in Japanese music history!