Miki Matsubara -- Wash

All the way back in relatively warm September, I wrote about about a splendid cover that the late Miki Matsubara（松原みき）had done for the bossa nova classic "Wave". Just wanted to have that great steak dinner by the Riviera while listening to this.

Well, it's time to get Miki back to her City Pop roots again. So I found this B-side of her 8th single "See-Saw Love" from February 1982 called "Wash". Folks can be forgiven if they think that the song had been some catchy jingle for a detergent commercial in Japan, but Chinfa Kan's（康珍化）lyrics have Matsubara exhorting her current love to finally scrub his heart clean of any memories of his past love. Could be easier said than done.

Ken Sato（佐藤健）took care of the post-disco downtown music with some of those honey-toned horns and a really cool backup chorus. Perhaps not all of the disco was washed out of "Wash", though, since I still get some of that 1970s feeling from it. And hey, it's got a nice peppy speed as well.

Tried to see if "Wash" had come out on any of Matsubara's original albums but apparently it didn't (unless remastered versions have included the B-side). I did find it on one of her BEST compilations, specifically "Matsubara Miki Best Collection"（松原みき ベスト・コレクション）by Pony-Canyon, released in July 2008, and her "The Premium Best ~ Matsubara Miki"（ザ・プレミアムベスト 松原みき）from 2013. Unfortunately, it's not included on the BEST CD that I purchased by her, "Golden Best Matsubara Miki"（ゴールデン☆ベスト 松原みき）from 2011.😞