Picasso -- Tide

 

Along with the City Pop and other J-Pop YouTube channels, I've also subscribed to some other interesting channels including the drive-focused J Utah that I've mentioned in past articles. Recently, though, I've also cottoned onto another traveling channel called "Kuga's Travel" which since 2019 has had Mr. Kuga (if that is indeed his real name) travel on trains and ferries around Japan. The above video is his most recent entry from only several hours ago in which he's taking a ferry with cruise ship ambitions from Sendai to Hokkaido. Although I don't consider myself a traveler, I'm sure that there are many travel-starved folks who would appreciate his videos, and even I've enjoyed the soothing rides that he has provided.

I've used the oceangoing story above to introduce the appropriately titled "Tide" by the 80s/90s band Picasso（ピカソ）. For those "Maison Ikkoku"（めぞん一刻）fans, this group should be well known to them since they came up with one of the theme songs for the beloved 80s anime, "Cinema"（シ・ネ・マ）. Actually, "Tide" is the 2nd single from January 1985 by Picasso, just preceding "Cinema" by exactly 7 months.

The Wikipedia article for the band cites their "experimental sound", and I think that "Tide" is perhaps a reflection of that. Right from Note One, there's something of a unique arrangement which feels quite ska or a peppy reggae, and there's something in Tetsuya Tsujihata's（辻畑鉄也）voice which also hints at that, but then there are those synths and even a shift into a more tango-like rhythm as we go deeper into the song.

As was the case with "Cinema", "Tide" was also written by Junko Ohyama（大山潤子）and composed by Picasso. The song was also used for a commercial for Flouveil Cosmetics. Lastly, I don't think that I ever mentioned this but according to both the Wikipedia and J-Wiki articles for the band, keyboardist Hideharu Mori（森英治）is the younger brother of prolific lyricist Yukinojo Mori（森雪之丞）who is well represented on "Kayo Kyoku Plus".