Yes, I took a lovely virtual drive from San Francisco down to California wine country, thanks to the latest J Utah video, and my musical accompaniment for most of it was Come Along Radio's latest entry, Rocket Brown's "Summer Connection: City Pop Mix #1". It's nice to have the likes of Taeko Ohnuki（大貫妙子）, Mariya Takeuchi（竹内まりや）, Circus（サーカス）and the others being your sidekick in the passenger seat while taking that road trip in the Golden State.
"Sunshine" seems to be the right song for that J Utah drive into Napa Valley just from the title alone, but of course, there's more with this one. There's simply that melody of happily moving somewhere, the sunny chorus and Tats' repeated mantra of SUNSHINE. He could break the clouds and let the rays penetrate. Would like to know though who was on the synthesizer during the instrumental break and would like to confirm whether it was indeed Minako Yoshida（吉田美奈子）and/or Taeko Ohnuki backing him up. However, we did get that famous Tats falsetto right as "Sunshine" was fading away.
I hear that Van Paugam has got his own mix up. Maybe I can try that one out along with J Utah's drive through Malibu tomorrow.🌞
Should also mention that realizing the current situation in the United States regarding COVID-19, I hope that everyone down south is keeping safe but enjoying their Fourth of July.
Hello J-Canuck,
ReplyDeleteI do know that Minako Yoshida wrote the lyrics to the song so she is probably singing in the background somewhere. She was involved in a lot of Yamashita's output during the 1970s.
Good album by the way. You should make it a part of your collection. And since you mentioned this song I'm going to put on this album right now.
Thanks.
Hi, Chasing Showa. Yup, I will have to try and get this album myself sometime later on in the year. Thanks for the Minako information.
DeleteBy the way, the person on the synthesizer was Hiroyuki Namba. You have done several articles mentioning this guy and a few you haven't.
ReplyDeleteFor example, what I was able to ascertain is that he used to play for a group called Bux Bunny (I read that article you made regarding group too.
He also had his hand in the music for a few anime soundtracks during the late 1980s and early 1990s. The only one I really recognize is from the OAVs and movies of the Armitage series.
Thanks!
It's Yoshida doing the backing vocals
ReplyDeleteThanks, Matt!
Delete