Kiyohiko Ozaki -- Kaze no Graffiti （風のグラフィティー）

 

I would like to deeply apologize for my flash photography skills and reassure you that this is indeed a Kiyohiko Ozaki（尾崎紀世彦）album..."Kaze no Graffiti" (Graffiti of the Wind) to be exact, his penultimate original album from March 1980. Frankly speaking, I had never thought that I would ever purchase a CD of his despite the fact that I will always appreciate his most famous hit "Mata Au Hi Made" （また逢う日まで）, a truly evergreen kayo.

However, I came across "Kaze no Graffiti" a few weeks ago on YouTube thanks to the uploader Neon Sono, and after listening to a number of the original and bonus tracks, I decided to pull the trigger on my wallet for the first time in several months and made the purchase. The above is the video for the full album including those bonus tracks but I want to take a look at some of the original tracks on their own. Yuji Ohno（大野雄二）, the man behind the famous theme song for the anime "Lupin III", was behind the production of the album and he also provided some of the melodies.

For example, Ohno composed the first and title track, "Kaze no Graffiti", a wistful ballad about change and a requiem for a lost loved one. With lyrics by Keisuke Yamakawa（山川啓介）, Ozaki croons lovingly about the good ol' days when everyone got together for a round of drinks at their favourite watering hole only for the place to be replaced by a building. It also looks like with the loss of his beloved and all of his touchpoints, there is really nothing tying him down to the old neighbourhood anymore. 

I recall from the article for "Mata Au Hi Made" that Ozaki was compared to Tom Jones. Well, commenter Scott also thought he was similar to another tuxedoed crooner Englebert Humperdinck, and I think with "Kaze no Graffiti", there is some echo of Humperdinck's classic "After The Lovin'". The song is also an interesting combination of country ballad and metropolitan mood music with the horns and sax.

Ohno and Yamakawa bring some nighttime sophistication worthy of a Henry Mancini blessing with the second track "Lonely Again". This is the type of song that I love to hear during a fine night of dinner and the high life in the big city. Once again, I get those Humperdinck feelings but this time, Yamakawa's lyrics are somewhat more forlorn as Ozaki sings of the end of a relationship. I guess that dinner is just for one. Maybe it would be for Lupin III himself since I believe that "Lonely Again" sounds just perfect for one of his movies.

Once again, Ono and Yamakawa work together on Track 3, "Ojou-san O-te wo Yawaraka ni"（お嬢さんお手やわらかに...Softly, My Lady）, a foppy City Pop tune about that night out on the resort town. I gather that Ozaki and company really wanted to cover all the bases in the potentials of a relationship for this album. Maybe this could also be a Lupin III sort of tune with the snazzy and jazzy horns and an overall beat which suggests a strut down the boardwalk.

Gospel blues come to the fore in "New York Ballad"（ニューヨーク・バラード）which was written by Zenkou Takeda*（武田全弘）and composed by Toshiyuki Kimori（木森敏之）. There's more of that famous Ozaki boomer voice and the brassy chorus that reminds me of "Mata Au Hi Made" as the singer relates his tale of that trip to The Big Apple to forget about some bad times at home. A vacation never hurts and New York City is one place that has always promised plenty of excitement to shoo the blues away.

There is some of Frank Sinatra's "My Way" (an old karaoke song of mine) and maybe even a bit of "I'll Be There" by The Jackson 5 in "My Better Life", a comfy song that was naturally used for an air conditioner commercial. It was also Ozaki's October 1979 single. Once again, Ohno and Yamakawa were behind this ballad that pretty much puts out the slippers and places the hot soup onto the table.

As I mentioned, there are bonus tracks attached to the remastered album...six of them, to be exact. However, I will cover at least some of those in future articles since they are rather different in tone with two of them for a tokusatsu show and one really nice J-Xmas song that I would prefer to cover on its own as we get closer to the Yuletide.

*The first name for Mr. Takeda has a variety of different readings but I went with the first one listed since it was rather unusual. However, someone can correct me on this if I'm in error, that would be greatly appreciated.