Happy Monday! First, a very tiny PSA from me. I found out from a good friend of mine last night as well as from an announcement from CD Japan that all registered mail and EMS packages from Japan to Canada have been suspended as of November 26th. Although other methods exist of getting those albums from the company, I am glad that I did get my latest package when I did. If you're a regular customer of CD Japan, you may want to check the mail situation for your country.
In any case, to start this first article on the last day of November 2020, I have to provide an observation that it seems that Japanese songwriters have a thing for the facial profile. They imbue perhaps quite some meaning into the side of the face for some reason. I've come across a number of songs that involve the word "yokogao"（横顔）which means "profile" or "side of your face" with the most prominent example from my memories being Taeko Ohnuki's（大貫妙子）jazzy standard "Yokogao" from her 1978 "Mignonne" album.
Well, I've now encountered yet another song title with that very word...this time, being in Miki Imai's（今井美樹） 2nd track on her 1989 "Mocha (Under A Full Moon)" album. Titled "Yokogao kara I LOVE YOU" (Saying I Love You From the Side of Her Face), it follows right after the very zippy "Tokyo Hachi-gatsu Sunglass" （TOKYO 8月サングラス）, so unsurprisingly it's also quite the synth-heavy urban contemporary pop fest. The segue is really quite smooth between the two songs considering that both of them had different lyricists and composers working on them.
This time, it's prolific lyricist and frequent Imai collaborator Yuuho Iwasato（岩里祐穂）and composer Satoshi Takebe（武部聡志）on "Yokogao kara I LOVE YOU" which even has a synthesizer pulling off the City Pop trope of a sax solo. I covered a much different Iwasato-penned song just last night which was released 22 years later. As for my two Canadian non-existent pennies on the meaning of the title, I've known that perhaps until recently, it's awfully difficult for a Japanese person to say those three important words to his/her significant other unless the pair is in the most intimate of circumstances and environment. Therefore, I can imagine that in all other situations, whispering out "I love you" out of the side of the mouth was probably the thing to do. But again, that's just my take.
One final piece of trivia is that on backup chorus here is Yoko Takahashi（高橋洋子）, the singer behind one of anime's most beloved theme songs.
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