Ahhh....Seiko Matsuda（松田聖子）, back in the early days when she had that Seiko-chan cut. I was looking around for a particular song to herald the arrival of spring, which incidentally came to Toronto at about 12:57 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time today (instead of the desired green, we got a rather ash-gray appearance).
Then, I came across a site on the Net which highlighted some of the seasonal J-Pop/kayo kyoku tunes and discovered Matsuda's 4th single from January 21, 1981. Yup, the release date for "Cherry Blossom" was a tad early but I gather the producers wanted to get that happy spring feeling through to everyone as early as possible. And Seiko certainly succeeds at that with her singing about looking forward to the future with all those sunny images of waves and good times on campus. Yes, you kids going through Examination Hell in Japan....there is a spanking new tomorrow for you....provided you pass.
Written by Yoshiko Miura（三浦徳子）, who was also responsible for Seiko's 2nd single, the just-as-bouncy "Aoi Sangosho", "Cherry Blossom" was composed by Kazuo Zaitsu（財津和夫）, the lead singer of Tulip. This was Zaitsu's first song for Matsuda, and he knew how to put a zip into this aidoru tune. To me, it kinda starts off with a bit of drama in the disco before it drives off into another happy, shiny song for her. The lyrics may hint at that scene of heading off to college among the blossoming sakura, but the melody is ready to propel the listener right off to the beach.
The song hit No. 1 on Oricon where it stayed for most of the month of February, and it eventually became the 9th-ranked song for 1981. The good times were just beginning for The Queen of the 80s Aidorus.
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