UA/Motohiro Hata -- Milk Tea（ミルクティー）

 

In the past decade since coming back to Toronto for good, I've only had my beloved milk tea just a smattering of times. But when I was living in Ichikawa and working in Tokyo and environs, the drink was definitely a much more frequent libation, especially in the torrid summers. Even when I took my most recent trip to Japan in late 2017, the very first dinner that I had in my hotel was, as you can see above, karaage bento with a carton of milk tea. Nope...far from healthy but I have no regrets.

Coincidentally, for the first time in a few years, I have an UA single called "Milk Tea" which was her 9th release in March 1998. From listening to her cool and eclectic music, seeing her fairly serious demeanor, and noting her relatively sparse appearances on television, I had (perhaps unfairly) pegged Ms. Kaori Shima（嶋香織）as one of the more unapproachable singers alongside other acts such as Ringo Shiina（椎名林檎）and the early version of Koji Tamaki（玉置浩二）. Not that I ever had any opportunity to meet UA, but if the chance had presented itself, I probably would have been sweating bullets and handing out my autograph book at arm's length.

Now I remember watching this particular video for "Milk Tea" with UA in the red hoodie in the sparse household set while I guess her buddies are teasing the heck out of her during the song. Without all that makeup and seeing her actually getting all giddy and giggly on camera had me changing my mind about her so-called unapproachability. She was already in her mid-20s when "Milk Tea" came out, but she appeared more like an awkward and shy teenager in the video.

As for the song itself which was written by UA and composed by Hirofumi Asamoto（朝本浩文）, it's a laidback alt-pop number with the twangy guitar and the singer's measured and sultry vocals. There is another instrument mewling away like an impatient kitten. To be honest, it's not my favourite UA single since I actually go more for her R&B material like "Rhythm"（リズム）from earlier in her career. "Milk Tea" reached No. 21 on Oricon and is also on her 2nd album "Ametora"（アメトラ）from April 1998. That peaked at No. 2 and became the 57th-ranked album of the year, going Platinum with a little over 400,000 copies sold.

Singer-songwriter Motohiro Hata（秦基博）provided a pensive and unplugged cover of "Milk Tea" as the coupling song for his September 2007 3rd single "Aoi Chou"（青い蝶...Blue Butterfly）. That single peaked at No. 22.