Back in the winter this year, I discovered and wrote about the Gentle Forest Jazz Band led by the dapper yet clownish Gentle Kubota（ジェントル久保田）, and their work based on the beautiful music from almost a century ago.
Yes, it's almost been 100 years since a number of nations had first entered the Jazz Age. I'm not sure if there are any enterprising companies who will also be aware of this part of music history and start releasing the jazz from the 1920s and 1930s through special collections, but if not, no worries. There is at least one band in Japan which has kept that part of the genre alive and well.
"Otokotte, Otokotte" (Men Are, Men Are) is a gently swinging number that was released as a downloadable single in May 2012. Led by the Gentle Forest Sisters, the song seems to be a "can't live with them, can't live without them" treatise on the male animal. If there had been speakeasies in Taisho Era and early Showa Era Japan, this could have been played in front of the guys and gals.
The video has the band performing in the middle of a quiet river. Some of the scenes even remind me of Toronto's Don River. Of course, it couldn't be the Don since if that had truly been the case, there would have been the smoke of dissolving legs and feet. One of the jokes about what was once one of the world's most industrialized waterways is that the Don River never froze in winter...it gelled.
Anyways, if you're not one for downloading singles (and that is me, for now), then no need to worry. "Otokotte, Otokotte" is also a track on GFJB's 2nd album "High Present"（ハイ・プレゼント）from June in the same year.
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