Masahiko Kondo -- Horeta ze! Kanpai（ホレたぜ!乾杯）

Well, one of those that kinda fell between the engrams in my brain.

As soon as I read the title and then imagined the singer himself yelling it out, I knew that I had heard "Horeta ze! Kanpai" (I'm In Love! Hooray) in the past. This was indeed a Masahiko Kondo（近藤真彦）single from September 1982, his 8th to be exact, and I realized that my first memory of listening to the song was on the Kohaku Utagassen of that year.

I guess that there must have been a Matchy sound back then. "Horeta ze! Kanpai" reminds me somewhat of his "Blue Jeans Memory" in that there are those dramatic cutting strings and that 50s beat in there. The only thing is that the electric guitar is strangely silent this time, or at least not nearly as prominent.

Written by Takashi Matsumoto（松本隆）and composed by Kyohei Tsutsumi（筒美京平）with arrangement by Tsugutoshi Goto（後藤次利）, "Horeta ze! Kanpai" reached No. 1 and quickly became the 26th-ranked single for 1982. Along with that Kohaku invitation, Matchy also earned the Golden Idol Award at the Japan Record Awards.