Hikaru
GENJI’s (光GENJI)
“Waratte yo” is a song I know since late 2010, when I first watched one of
Music Station’s Special episodes (ミュージックステーション), this one from December 1990. In
the aforementioned show, the Hikaru GENJI boys, which were the only male
performers of the night (if we exclude the fact that B.B.QUEENS was a mixed
band) in a vast sea of famous and ‘A game’ 80s female aidoru singers (names
like Chisato Moritaka [森高千里],
Wink, Seiko Matsuda [松田聖子],
Akina Nakamori [中森明菜],
Shizuka Kudo [工藤静香] and
Miho Nakayama [中山美穂]),
performed a medley of hit single “STAR LIGHT” and the newly released “Waratte yo”.
In general, it’s
not hard to have a problem with Hikaru GENJI, since they’re pretty cheesy and
the vocals really bad, even for Johnny’s standards. We can only think about
listening to them nowadays for two reasons: one, of course, is nostalgia, while
the other is production value, since their songs were not always that bad in
the compositon/arrangement areas. “STAR LIGHT”, for example, is a good late 80s
pop song, even if the group itself is lackluster. That said, my favorite from
them has always been “Waratte yo”, a somewhat forgotten Latin-tinged gem from
the group’s catalogue. I especially like the instrumental breakdown, but also wish it were longer.
To finish, here's the performance from "Music Station" I was talking about before.
Released in
November 1990, “Waratte yo” was another hit single for the group, reaching #1
on the Oricon chart. Lyrics were written by Yoshiko Miura (三浦徳子), while music and arrangement were composed by Kouji
Makaino (馬飼野康二).
Hi, Marcos.
ReplyDeleteYeah, I gotta say that this will probably be my favourite Hikaru Genji song due to the arrangement.
Hi, J-Canuck.
DeleteThe arrangement is pretty nice, but the vocals... well, let's just enjoy the song for what it is.
Yeah, let's not delve too deeply, shall we? :)
DeleteNostalgia at its finest!
ReplyDelete