Miyuki Hatakeyama -- Keshi（罌粟）

For a Wednesday afternoon, it's looking very nice out there and there's a cool refreshing breeze wafting into my room. Now, this is the spring that I've been looking forward to.

As soon as I heard the first bars of this lovely song, I knew that this had to be another wonderful collaboration between chanteuse Miyuki Hatakeyama（畠山美由紀）and composer Tomita Lab（富田ラボ）. I'm sure that the former has worked with the latter a number of times over the past couple of decades, and sure enough he came up with "Keshi" (Poppies) for Hatakeyama.

This was a track from the singer's 2nd original album "Wild and Gentle" from August 2003. With Takashi Matsumoto's（松本隆）lyrics of comparing falling in love with getting hit with a toxin, "Keshi" is indeed intoxicating in the same way that taking a walk outside in bright sunshine and clear air infused with negative ions from a nearby waterfall is. Once again, that Tomita sound of strings and mellow bossa relaxed me right from the get-go along with Hatakeyama's tender vocals.

Hatakeyama and Tomita Lab also collaborated on another song, "Taegatakumo Amai Kisetsu"（耐え難くも甘い季節) which is on the latter's album "Shipbuilding" also from 2003.