Hikaru Nishida’s (西田ひかる) “Kitto Ai ga Aru” is probably one of the catchiest songs out there, althought, in J-Pop's case, that’s probably a very dangerous and questionable statement.
The cute Hikaru Nishida debuted during the late 80s, but she didn't succeeded into reaching the spotlight in an aidoru landscape dominated by strong acts such as Wink, Chisato Moritaka (森高千里), Miho Nakayama (中山美穂) and Shizuka Kudo (工藤静香), to name a few. In this case, while some of her songs were nice tries, like the melancholic eurobeat-inspired "Namida no PEARL MOON" (涙のPEARL MOON), she still had to wait until 1994 to release a proper hit.
Released in May 1994, at a time when kawaii aidoru singers like Hikaru herself were kind of struggling to make a positive impact on the charts, “Kitto Ai ga Aru” is a very happy-go-lucky straightforward pop song tha relies heavily on Hikaru’s decent vocals (she was good for a 90s aidoru singer) and the chorus catchiness. Well, even though I’m far from being a Hikaru Nishida fan, I sometimes find myself humming to the whole “aru aru-ru-ru ai ga aru kanari kakujitsu, aru aru-ru-ru ai ga aru kitto daijoubu” lines (あるある・る・る 愛がある かなり確実 あるある・る・る 愛がある きっとだいじょうぶ). In the end, "Kitto Ai ga Aru" is an irresitible aidoru moment from the mid-90s!
Apparently, “Kitto Ai ga Aru” was Hikaru Nishida’s highest charting single on the Oricon charts, reaching #12. Lyrics were written by Miyuki Nakajima (中島みゆき) while music was composed by Noriyuki Asakura (朝倉紀幸).
I remember this song from Hikaru Nishida! Yeah, I thought she was on the bench as a second-string for a good long while until she finally had a bit more success in the 90s. I actually saw her more as the bilingual young tarento showing up on a number of variety shows, and then I saw her acting in a comedy-drama called "Change" as a manager for a very difficult actor.
ReplyDeleteYeah, she was probably more active on variety shows. As for the drama, I'm probably going go search for a subbed file. I like 90s dramas a lot. Much more than the ones produced in the 00s.
DeleteAs a side note, I don't hear a lot about Hikaru Nishida nowadays. It'd be nice to see her on some special shows, like FNS, for example.
I actually saw her appear some weeks ago on an NHK program about solving legal cases. Still looks pretty darn young!
DeleteThe chorus sounds suspiciously like Material Girl by Madonna...
ReplyDelete