Hikaru GENJI -- Waratte yo (笑ってよ)

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).