Miki Imai -- smells like you

https://www.amazon.co.jp/Love-My-Life-%E4%BB%8A%E4%BA%95%E7%BE%8E%E6%A8%B9/dp/B00005G5BY

(excerpt only)

No...she most certainly does not!

Sorry...very bad joke there. However, I have to say that when I first saw the title for this Miki Imai（今井美樹）song, "smells like you", I just went "ick" and "eww". Let's say that I was never much of an optimist when it came to the topic of body odor. Yep, I realize that there are such things as perfume and cologne, but again that's not the first thing I think of when I see that title on an album, even for someone as lovely-looking as Imai.

However, the soft bossa nova by Tomoyasu Hotei（布袋寅泰）is pleasant enough and when I took a look at Imai's lyrics, I realized that the sylph-like singer was just quietly cooing about how much she missed her lover and how much the summer air reminded her of his scent when they were holding each other close. Yep, that's romance for you! Methinks she would be the type to take a deep whiff of his favourite sweater in the closet if he's off on some business trip.

It's been a very long time since I heard "smells like you", and so I had thought that the song came out on Imai's 1992 album, "flow into space", her very atmospheric release and her first time collaborating with Hotei. However, I was quite wrong on that point since it actually was a track on a later CD, "Love of my Life" from 1995 (peaked at No. 2). Imai does quite a nice job with bossa nova-flavoured tunes so it's a bit of a wonder that she hasn't devoted an entire album (at least not that I know of) to the Brazilian genre. Perhaps it's time to revisit some of the mid-90s Imai releases again.