Miki Hirayama -- Yokosuka Madonna（ヨコスカ・マドンナ）

 

I have to say that I never got a chance to visit Yokosuka. Therefore, my only knowledge of this city southwest of Tokyo is the fact that there is an American military base and that one of Momoe Yamaguchi's（山口百恵）greatest hits has her hometown in there: "Yokosuka Story"（横須賀ストーリー）. My initial and very wrong impression was with that US base, it was a municipality of bars and other drinking establishments to service not just the regular salarymen but also the American soldiers. However, looking at the above video supplied by japan view neth, Yokosuka seems like any regular small city, albeit it looks like the ratio of servicemen is quite a bit higher.

Recently, I discovered another Yokosuka-titled kayo called "Yokosuka Madonna" by veteran singer Miki Hirayama（平山みき）. Not quite sure on what the lyrics by Masao Urino（売野雅勇）are about on first and second listens, but through that sultry and slightly growly voice of hers, my imagination leads me to think that she's playing the role of one seen-it-all and done-it-all hostess, perhaps on the level of a Diamond Lil, in a Yokosuka nightclub. There's a certain vibe of that spider trying to lure the fly into her lair.

The music by Kyohei Tsutsumi（筒美京平）has some light influences of funk and City Pop but I think in the end, it's still a straight pop tune. "Yokosuka Madonna" is a track on Hirayama's September 1984 album "Emission" and it was also the B-side to the singer's 16th single, "Siren Girl", from April of that year. The introduction under the video has Yasushi Akimoto（秋元康）and Hirayama (under the name of Miki Chang) providing the lyrics, and they indeed provide songwriting for some of the other tracks but looking through the JASRAC database and even the shots of the actual record near the end of the video, yup, it's actually Urino. 

One last observation through Tsutsumi's melody and Masahide Sakuma's（佐久間正英）arrangement is that it reminds me of Laura Branigan's "Self Control" which also came out the same year. So maybe "Yokosuka Madonna" might be a form of Italo disco according to the Wikipedia entry for "Self Control"?