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.

Thursday, October 4, 2012

Toru Watanabe -- Yakusoku (約束)


The famous police show, "Taiyo wo Hoero"太陽をほえろ....Howl at the Sun) had a wide range of crusty and cool characters. Within that august cast, there was a subset of actors who also had a few hit songs among them. Of course, The Big Man and the star of the show, Yujiro Ishihara(石原裕次郎), had released a number of enka/mood kayo hits during the show's run, and Akira Terao(寺尾聡)had his huge hit album, "Reflections" in 1981.

And there was another by the name of Toru Watanabe(渡辺徹)who played the big, somewhat burly detective Junji 'Rugger' Takemoto (the nickname was for his love of rugby). In August 1982, he released his 2nd single, "Yakusoku"(Promise), a light pop song written by Akira Ohtsu (大津あきら)and composed by Kisaburo Suzuki(鈴木キサブロ). It managed to peak at No. 2 on the Oricon charts.

I'd heard a rumour (unfortunately I couldn't find any confirmation of it) years ago that the lyrics "...my sister..." may have referred to aidoru Ikue Sakakibara(榊原郁恵) , who would become Watanabe's wife. But I'm not sure if Watanabe had any say in the creation of the song.

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