Miki Imai/Akemi Kakihara -- Nakitakatta （泣きたかった）

I've noticed that there are quite a few YouTube videos devoted to this song that have images of flowers. And that would be no surprise since the lovely "Nakitakatta"(I Wanted to Cry) has that healing aura infused into both the melody and lyrics. Composed by Akemi Kakihara（柿原朱美）and written by Miki Imai（今井美樹）, the song is a track on one of my all-time favourite J-Pop albums, "Retour" that was recorded by Imai back in 1990.

The melody is in the gentlest, most relaxing bossa nova/pop style as Imai sings what is basically an intimate sad scene from a trendy drama. The lyrics describe a woman suddenly collapsing into a major crying jag on the kitchen floor after a painful memory from years back pops up. In Japan especially, having a sobfest whether it's because of a similar situation or even if it's watching a tearjerker is seen as being very therapeutic. Afterwards, people usually feel very sukkiri. So, perhaps the song isn't anything mournful but something very hopeful since one of the last verses indicates that the protagonist feels a whole lot better getting that memory out into the open and out of her system after so much time has passed. Regardless of the psychological benefits, it's a great song to listen to.

Kakihara herself did a cover of her song a few years later in 1993 for her 5th album, "refile". She sounds very much like Imai, but the melody is a bit more uptempo here.