Spitz -- Haru no Uta（春の歌）

 

Happy Monday! Ah, yes, we did pass into spring on Saturday morning and it's a welcome thing to embrace with the temperatures gradually rising and the snow slowly melting away. Of course, though not as much as summer, there are plenty of kayo in Japan celebrating the season of spring. I made it a quasi-tradition to feature some of those old tunes over the years of "Kayo Kyoku Plus" including "Haru Ichiban" (春一番）, "Haru Nanoni" (春なのに）, and "Kitaguni no Haru" (北国の春）.

Well, along with those aidoru tunes and one enka song above, I'm going to add the pop/rock of Spitz for some spring-themed J-Pop. "Haru no Uta" (Spring Song) is the band's 30th single released in April 2005.

For all of the fans out there, Spitz was one of those guitar pop bands from the 1990s alongside other acts including Mr. Children and DEEN. Perhaps I have already mentioned this in a past Spitz article, but vocalist Masamune Kusano（草野マサムネ）and his group have always provided this very warm and very comfortable presence through their music such as their 1994 "Sora mo Toberu Hazu" （空も飛べるはず）, and isn't warm and comfortable what one wants for spring (especially after a Canadian winter)?

Once again, they have done so with "Haru no Uta", and when I first heard the song, I had figured that it had to have been the theme tune for some uplifting television drama featuring the latest young talent. Well, as you can see above, the young talent is there but actually "Haru no Uta" was used as the song for a Ghana Chocolate ad. I did love Ghana Choco, mind you.

Written and composed by Kusano, "Haru no Uta" managed to peak at No. 5 on Oricon becoming a Gold record. It was also a track on Spitz's 11th original album "Souvenir"（スーベニア）which got onto shelves in January 2005, hitting No. 1 and ending up as the 38th-ranked album of the year, going Platinum.