Yuko Shibuya -- 5AM wa Violet Pink de（5AMはバイオレット・ピンクで）

Even in my younger days gallivanting around Tokyo as an English teacher, I rarely painted the town red into the wee hours....those salad days were restricted to my university years. However, there was one night when a bunch of us actually stayed beyond the hour of the final subway (which wasn't too late, believe me) at a karaoke box in Shibuya. I recall that the length of our stay was 6 hours and our throats were just as shredded as the rock guitars in some of the songs that we tackled.

By the time that we got out of the place at 3:30 am on Sunday, we were surprised to see how deserted the Teen Mecca of Japan had become. I had assumed that the neighbourhood never learned how to sleep but aside from a few night owl buskers performing on the sidewalk with some fans standing in front of them, Shibuya was pretty much closed. Fortunately, we were able to crash at my friend's place about 20 minutes' walk away.

Of course, this song's only connection with my anecdote above is the singer's last name and part of the title. "5AM wa Violet Pink de" (5AM is Violet Pink) is a track from Yuko Shibuya's（渋谷裕子）3rd album "Made in Japan" released in 1980, and I gather that the violet pink in the title refers to the colour of the sky when the sun is about to peek through the horizon to start off another day in the big city. I don't have a full grasp of Yuriko Matsuda's（松田侑利子）lyrics, but it sounds as if it describes a lady having a fine long night out on the town and finally calling it a day right when the day is about to begin.

For me, it's the music by Shibuya herself and the arrangement by Ichizo Seo（瀬尾一三）that got it a bookmark. It's been a while since I've heard a City Pop song strut happily down the street, and those horns and twangy guitar give "5AM wa Violet Pink de" a cheerful sunrise-y type of feeling as if the heroine still appreciates the sun coming up although she may be having that desperate need for sleep. Moreover, for those listeners who have a much more conventional sleep cycle, the song is nice enough to get up and at 'em. Incidentally, my previous Shibuya article was on this tune's fellow track, "Tokai no Ehon"（都会の絵本）.