Mayumi Horikawa -- FM Radio Band

Ugh! In the last couple of hours, I was confronted with a false fire alarm that brought an engine running over and then there was some drunk guy out not too far away from my home that a few of us had to take care of since he was unconscious on the grass with his key and wallet thrown out. Such is a Friday night in our fair city.

Anyways, it's indeed a Friday night so let's finish my quartet of songs today with a City Pop number. Last night, I was on my Steely Dan binge so I was listening to their best including "Peg", "Deacon Blues" and the above "FM (No Static At All)". I even got onto my Donald Fagen "The Nightfly" album and listened to "I.G.Y." and "New Frontier".

I was wondering whether model-turned-singer Mayumi Horikawa（堀川まゆみ）had been nibbling a bit on Steely Dan herself when she composed "FM Radio Band". Despite the similarity in the titles with this song and Steely's "FM", Horikawa's track from her 2nd album "Maym" (1986) is quite the different animal in that despite the lovely brass including Shin Kazuhara（数原晋）and Jake H. Concepcion, and Nathan East's bass along with the borrowing of that familiar Steely riff from the aforementioned "New Frontier", "FM Radio Band" is a much more chipper tune than the cool and romantic "FM".

In fact, I would say that Horikawa's creation also has a slight resemblance to a couple of other songs: Captain & Tennille's "Love Will Keep Us Together" and even Ben E. King's "Spanish Harlem". There are no deep musings about love here, just a whirlwind and comedic shopping trip in the more luxurious parts of Tokyo with the girlfriend literally dragging her hapless boyfriend along (these are just my images...the actual lyrics talk about the love of the titular band). But what a trip thanks to that brass and Robbin Ford's guitar solo. Perhaps "Maym" will be another target when Xmas comes around.