Nona Reeves -- Sannen（三年）

During my last spending binge on Japanese music albums, I did pick up another one in the series of "Light Mellow". This one is "Drive" and it has a few familiar tunes that I've written about at one time or another: Anri's（杏里）Vaporwave darling "Windy Summer", So Nice's "Kousoku Douro"（光速道路）and Michiru Kojima's（児島未散）"Best Friend".

But there are also a number of appealing songs on "Drive" that I hadn't heard before so I will be talking about those in the coming days. One is Nona Reeves' beautiful and bittersweet "Sannen" (Three Years) from the band's "Pop Station" album released in March 2013.

It's a nicely acoustic ballad with a touch of bossa nova about a man reminiscing over a past romance that ended thirty-six months earlier with the possible trigger being the discovery that the former couple's favourite restaurant in front of the train station is slated to be closed down permanently. Although I'm sure that the fellow must have some photographs of happier days, the big physical symbol of their relationship is about to come down literally like a ton of bricks, and he's unfortunately not quite ready to say goodbye, although the lyrics hint that they are still friends.

Written and composed by Nona Reeves' vocalist Gota Nishidera（西寺郷太）, "Sannen" was the first track on "Drive" that really caught my attention because of its mellowness pushed forward by the percussion. I especially love how the chords get further richness during the refrain. It's almost as if the realization of the impending destruction of the restaurant is like a gut punch to the soul.

I've also got another track from "Pop Station" already represented and it just so happens that it was the last time that I had written about Nona Reeves, "Yasumou, ONCE MORE"（休もう、ONCE MORE）. It looks like "Pop Station" may be worth getting sometime down the line.