Momoe Yamaguchi/Sayuri Ishikawa -- Toshigoro （としごろ）

(short version)

Y'know, as much as I enjoy listening to the powerful Ryudo Ozaki/Yoko Aki（尾崎竜童・阿木曜子） songs that Momoe Yamaguchi（山口百恵） sang in the latter half of her career in the late 70s such as "Imitation Gold", that cynical biting tone along with Momoe's slightly intimidating hooded-eye look during that time could get a bit heavy for me. So, I sometimes like to go back earlier in her career, notably right to her very first song, "Toshigoro". There are a number of definitions for the word at jisho.org, but in terms of the tone of this happy song, I'm just gonna go with "The Right Age".

Yamaguchi was just 14 years old when she debuted with "Toshigoro" in May 1973, and her voice sounds it. Of course, there was nothing of that whiskey huskiness that characterized her delivery in her later years. And looking at the video above, her eyes looked surprisingly bright and open. The song was created by Kazuya Senke and Shunichi Tokura（千家和也・都倉俊一）, the duo who would write almost every one of her first 10 singles over the next 2 years. The song itself was the usual pleasant summery happy-go-lucky "I'm in love" aidoru tune, but considering this was Momoe Yamaguchi who would soon pick up the reputation for singing some pretty racy lyrics at such a young age, hearing "Toshigoro" is a bit of a revelation. For me, it's just a nostalgically appealing song. By the way, it was also the theme song for the titular movie starring the singer herself..

Just like with the 70s male aidoru of Hiromi Go, Goro Noguchi and Hideki Saijo（郷ひろみ・野口五郎・西城秀樹） being tied together as the Shin Gosanke（新御三家....The New Big Three） by their marketing team, Yamaguchi was placed together with teen aidoru Masako Mori and Junko Sakurada（森昌子・桜田淳子） as the "Hana no Chuu-san Trio"（花の中三トリオ...The Flower Trio of Junior High 3rd Year）. The latter two singers had some solid hits with their debuts: Mori's "Sensei"（せんせい....Teacher） peaked at No. 3 while Sakurada's "Tenshi mo Yume Miru"（天使も夢みる....Angels Also Have Dreams） went as high as No. 12. However, Yamaguchi's debut "only" reached as high as No. 37 on Oricon which had folks panicking somewhat. Ahhh...ye of such little faith. Her 2nd single, "Aoi Kajitsu"（青い果実） would skyrocket into 9th place a few months later.

(cover version)

There was a bit of a surprise when I was looking for a YouTube video of "Toshigoro". I actually came across a cover of the song done by a teenage Sayuri Ishikawa（石川さゆり）. I'd known that when she first debuted, it was as an aidoru just like the members of the "Hana no Chuu-san Trio", but had never heard any of her songs from that time. Like Yamaguchi, she also debuted in 1973. However, her cover of "Toshigoro"was not an official A-side single; perhaps it was a B-side or just a track on her debut album. Her rendition of the song wasn't all that much different from Yamaguchi's, and perhaps that was what stopped her career as a teen aidoru. According to J-Wiki, one of the factors of her initial failure in the music industry was that she kept getting eclipsed by the trio of Yamaguchi, Mori and Sakurada. As it turned out, it was a blessing in disguise for her and all of us as she headed into the genre of enka and came out with some of her blistering ballads such as "Amagi Goe"（天城越え...Crossing Amagi）.

courtesy of
Ayanami_No03
from Flickr