Tomato n'Pine -- POP SONG 2 U

 

Happy Monday! Along with the mystery surrounding how they managed to get the caramel into the Caramilk bar (inside national joke), the other bugbear is how did the erstwhile aidoru group of the early 2010s, Tomato n' Pine, end up with that name. Was the producer hanging about in the produce section of a supermarket during the Holiday season and he/she noticed that there were Xmas trees selling nearby? Enquiring minds want to know.

While we mull that eternal question, I've unearthed another one of the group's catchy numbers "POP SONG 2 U", a track from their 2nd single “Captain wa Kimi da!” (キャプテンは君だ!) released in August 2010. Beginning with a riff that sounds like it was inspired from Kylie Minogue's "I Should Be So Lucky" or Sinitta's "Toy Boy", I gather that the members of Tomato n' Pine plus the songwriters Kenji, Jane and Yoshihiro Saito wanted to revive 80s Eurobeat once again. Heck, even during the opening rap by Yui, Hina and Wada, I even got a bit of Tom Tom Club.

Not sure what Kenji and Jane's lyrics are all about but they've been fortified by a lot of tropical fruits on a level that would rival the orchard that lives in Meiko Nakahara's（中原めいこ）"Kimi Tachi Kiwi Papaya Mango da ne" （君たちキウイ・パパヤ・マンゴだね）. For me, though, the important thing is that my memories of Stock, Aitken and Waterman are still happily intact thanks to this song. "POP SONG 2 U" is also available on the trio's lone full album "PS4U" from August 2012. It peaked at No. 38.