Tis a Wednesday. Therefore, it's Hump Day probably to match the hump of muscle growing between your shoulder blades due to the usual stress. For me during my time in Japan, it really depended on what happened during a day that would have me designate it as not a great day. Luckily, though, there were various places where I could go to de-stress. Of course, along with my apartment in Ichikawa, there were my favourite record shops in Tokyo such as Tower Records and RecoFan, the neighbourhood massage clinic across from Minami-Gyotoku Station, and Tonki, my tonkatsu restaurant in the station plaza (as you can see above).
As well, music can be a balm. As such, I offer you "Your tender lovin' care" from Kanagawa-born guitarist Yuji Toriyama's（鳥山雄司）debut album "take A break" released in 1981. From what I've read in his J-Wiki profile, he actually produced his first project all by himself while still in Keio University. I'm not sure how much stress he was under when creating "take A break", but to my ears, "Your tender lovin' care" is quite de-stressing from the caressing delivery of the title by the chorus to the warm and sunny guitar. It's about as AOR as one can get and could have easily transported Japanese listeners at that time all the way over to California. Both it and the album were well-named.
It's photos like the one above and below for which I can go for some of more of that (pork) tender(loin) lovin' care.
Hello J-Canuck,
ReplyDeleteNice find! I was on the train early this morning and went to this site. While reading on my commute I found this article and clicked the link.
My, my, my.
When I got off the train, the sun had just risen and this made a perfect song for the perpetual soundtrack that plays in the background of my daily life. We’ve had a spate of severe spring thunderstorms this week so this is the first time we’ve seen the sun in the past few days. The air was clear and clean and the vegetation was just so lush and green.
The song itself is truly of its time. Kind of like the late fusion/early smooth jazz era when things slowly changed. Spyro Gyra comes to mind.
I had never heard of this guitarist so I looked up the full album on Youtube. After listening to it in its entirety I decided this is a must buy.
However, it is haiban and the prices for both the LP and the reissued 2002 CD are absolutely outrageous. And yes, there are “certain places” on the inter webs where I can procure this album but you’re also taking chances.
I’ll just have to bide my time.
Thanks!
Hi, Chasing Showa. Glad to hear that the song made quite an impression on you, and it's always nice when that sun follows the rain to have the grass suddenly pop. Spyro Gyra is always the go-to band that comes to mind whenever I think of this sort of music.
DeleteI gather that Toriyama may be one of those artists whose works will provide a good sweat in the hunt for them. At this point, I will simply be glad to get some of his stuff on compilation albums such as the "Light Mellow" series.