Ai Furihata -- Purple Eye Shadow（パープルアイシャドウ）

 

Last summer, I introduced an intriguing song, "CITY", by singer/seiyuu Ai Furihata（降幡愛）from the group Aqours who has had her own solo outings since last year. "CITY" just had this neo-City Pop vibe and maybe even more prominently, just this very 80s feeling about it.

"Purple Eye Shadow" is the lead track from Furihata's 2nd mini-album, "Makeup"（メイクアップ）, which was released in December 2020, and as with "CITY", Furihata was responsible for the lyrics while Akimitsu Honma（本間昭光）came up with the music. Also, the video about a love triangle has that similar Vaporwave sheen to it.

With "CITY", I compared it to songs such as Michael Sembello's "Maniac" from the "Flashdance" soundtrack and Olivia Newton-John's "Twist of Fate" (whose video has the singer putting on a pound of lipstick). However, with the slightly haunting "Purple Eye Shadow", I don't think that there is as much of a City Pop sound although the 80s are still alive and well in the song. Accompanying Furihata's vocals, which still remarkably resemble those of Midori Karashima（辛島美登里）, is a battery of synth-horns with some interesting blasts and descending riffs. Not the melody itself but the use of those horns reminds me a bit of the arrangement behind Dionne Warwick's "Heartbreaker" from 1982, and I think some of the melodic exploration which is going on in the song has me thinking of Chicago or Steely Dan in small parts. Just maybe, there is perhaps even some Yumi Matsutoya（松任谷由実）from that very decade among the notes.

As for the cast in the video, the young lady is played by actress/TV personality Ayano Kudo（工藤綾乃）, and the guys are actors Shun Nishime（西銘駿）and Yuuya Uno（宇野結也）.