Junko Ohashi & Minowa Central Station -- Simple Love （シンプルラブ）

There's nothing like a Junko Ohashi（大橋純子）song to get me wondering what the Tokyo night scene must have been like during the disco era. Her 5th single, "Simple Love", came out in April 1977 and has that bright and brassy disco ball feeling along with that boomer of a voice. I first heard it on a BEST album by the singer and was one of the songs that informed me that Ohashi was actually quite the Disco Queen back in the 70s, when compared to the first two songs that I had heard by her, "Tasogare My Love"（たそがれマイ・ラブ）and "Silhouette Romance"（シルエット・ロマンス）which were relatively softer ballads.

"Simple Love" was written by Takashi Matsumoto（松本隆）and composed by Ohashi's husband, composer Ken Sato（佐藤健）. It was also included on her 3rd album, "Rainbow", which came out in the same month and year as the single itself.

I also had a great feeling watching the above YouTube video (unfortunately taken down) with the vivacious Ohashi performing a couple of songs including "Simple Love" at the Tokyo Music Festival of that time. Just seeing her bop around in that shimmering gold outfit with the black slacks brought back a lot of my childhood watching and listening to some of the disco action on TV and radio along with hearing some of the Japanese tunes at the time. And again, I just love that voice of hers. Apparently, so did a lot of other people since she placed 3rd at the 3rd Majorca World Music Festival with this very song.