Sachiko Nishida -- Sakeyoigusa（酒酔草）

 

Most of Sachiko Nishida's（西田佐知子）songs represented on "Kayo Kyoku Plus" have been of her bluesy Mood Kayo outings in the 1960s, such as "Tokyo Blues"（東京ブルース）from 1964. However, going further into the 1970s, I think that she also gave some of the other genres a shot.

A couple of years back, I wrote about her "Hajimete no Machi de"（初めての街で）whose 1979 version mixed in jazz, country and even some folk in comparison to the original 1975 take that was more of the conventional Mood Kayo. Well, in between those two versions, Nishida released a July 1977 album "Itsumo no Gogo"（いつもの午後...The Usual Afternoon）, and to echo one Japanese commenter said under the YouTube video above, I would like to hear more of the tracks.

The one reason is that I heard Track 4 on Side B of the original LP, "Sakeyoigusa", which is very different from either the original 1975 and the multi-genre 1979 version of "Hajimete no Machi de", although one commonality among the three songs is the drinking. In fact, there is nothing Mood Kayo at all in "Sakeyoigusa", and nothing of jazz or folk in there either. There's some hint of country through the guitar but I'd say that the song is pure New Music along the lines of Yumi Arai（荒井由実）.

But the song was arranged and composed by one of the pillars of City Pop/J-AOR, Tetsuji Hayashi（林哲司）, and it was actually a cover of Mayumi Itsuwa's（五輪真弓）7th single from October 1974 with Itsuwa herself providing the lyrics. Furthermore, from the sound of "Sakeyoigusa", it does mesh very well with how Itsuwa must have sung it originally; regrettably, I couldn't find her version of the ballad...otherwise, I would have had it here as well. 

As for the meaning of "Sakeyoigusa", I couldn't find anything at my usual sources but looking at Itsuwa's lyrics which only mention the title once, I think the closest definition might be barfly as in someone who just hangs about at the local watering hole making small talk with any of the other customers. Indeed, both the melody and the vocals by Nishida herself paint a very woozy picture as the supposed tipsy barfly invites a fellow drinker for some convivial conversation over mass quantities. It's quite the different feeling from Nishida and as mentioned above, because of this particular song, I'd be interested in how the other tracks on "Itsumo no Gogo" come across.