PSY-S -- Asobi ni Kite ne （遊びにきてね）

The music video (unfortunately it's been taken down) for PSY-S' 13th single "Asobi ni Kite ne" (Come on Over) was the first time I had ever seen or heard anything about this fun and eclectic duo. Watching it on "MTV Japan" on TBS back in Gunma, my first impression was.... yep...this was what I imagined about Japanese music videos after having seen the few examples back in Canada via Yellow Magic Orchestra, The Plastics and what clips I could see on that special on Japan on "The New Music".

The video had that eerie fuzziness about it and then to see CHAKA singing in that high bright tone with a melody by her partner Masaya Matsuura （松浦雅也）that I had never heard before in a Japanese pop song. When I first heard it, it sounded/didn't sound like something from European New Wave...maybe something I would expect from The Style Council or even Scritti Politti.

With lyrics by Yukinojo Mori（森雪之丞）, as the title says, CHAKA is more than happy to invite that special someone over, no matter how he/she may be feeling; as long as they are together, they'll be fine. The title itself has been one of those fine expressions I used to hear a lot as a resident back in Japan. It came out from friends as "Mata, asobi ni kite ne"（また、遊びにきてね）. It's kinda like the expression "Now, y'all come back again now" that I heard on the old cornball country-and-western TV show "Hee Haw" when I was a toddler.

For me, the vocals and the music were the factors that had me keep an eye and ear on PSY-S for the next number of years until I finally got that BEST album of theirs at a CD shop in Chinatown after I moved back to Toronto once my JET session was done.

"Asobi ni Kite ne" was released in May 1990 and it was also a track on PSY-S' 6th album, "Signal" from July 1990.