KAN/Juice=Juice -- Pop Music（ポップミュージック）

 

Well, who'da thunk it? Some 30 years after wholesome singer-songwriter KAN came out with his arguably most famous tune, "Ai wa Katsu"（愛は勝つ）, he came out with his 35th single last year in February.

Not only that, but he actually does some choreography in the music video (shortened version) for "Pop Music" as if he were a boomer getting down with the millennials. The song obviously has the disco influences but there is also something in there which had me thinking old-fashioned kayo. Moreover, I can even hear a certain keyboard at points that reminds me of the 1990s urban contemporary sound in Japan.

But then, some weeks later in April 2020, Hello Project aidoru group Juice=Juice went full disco cavalcade with their cover of "Pop Music" under the full title of "Pop Music/Sukitte Itte yo"（ポップミュージック/好きって言ってよ...Tell Me You Love Me）. Kudos to arranger Tomohiro Sumikama（炭竃智弘）for throwing in so many aural shoutouts to the music of the past through M's "Pop Muzik", the Village People's "YMCA", Van McCoy's "The Hustle" and even a blink-and-you'll-miss-it bit of Frankie Valli's "Can't Take My Eyes Off You". It's like Sumikama stuffed all of Studio 54 into the song.

The lyrics by KAN are also interesting and all-knowing since he basically explains the whole thing about not only pop music in general but the old kayo from the Showa Era as well. Maybe he didn't intend to, but I think he literally poses the question about how some of those City Pop songs have managed to instill that feeling of nostalgia in fans although they are hearing them for the first time.

Juice=Juice's cover of "Pop Music" peaked at No. 3 on Oricon, and the single is their 13th (excepting all of their digital download singles). As for this Hello Project group, I'd heard the name before but "Pop Music" is the first song that I've covered by them, and apparently HP founder Tsunku（つんく♂）gave them this unique name to signify various concepts such as "fresh", "all-natural" and "100%" like that orange juice I have every morning, according to the J-Wiki introduction.

They've been around since 2013 and with all of the lineup changes, Juice=Juice currently has seven members: leader Tomoko Kanazawa（金澤朋子）, Akari Uemura（植村あかり）, Ruru Danbara（段原瑠々）, Manaka Inaba（稲場愛香）, Yume Kudo（工藤由愛）, Riai Matsunaga（松永里愛）, and Rei Inoue（井上玲音）. I've actually quite interested in their next single, scheduled to be released in April this year...a cover of Sugar Babe's "Downtown".

Did manage to find the full version of KAN's original.