Got another in the string of Tetsuji Hayashi-penned(林哲司)City Pop numbers tonight. This time, it's Yoshimi Iwasaki's(岩崎良美)"What's Love?".
A track from Iwasaki's 8th album "Wardrobe" from September 1984, Hayashi's songwriter partner here was Chinfa Kan(康珍化), and I recall that this duo was providing a lot of genre-similar numbers for other artists including Omega Tribe(オメガトライブ)and Momoko Kikuchi(菊池桃子), I believe. Hayashi also handled the arrangement which is quintessentially City Pop from the beefy bass to the mellow keyboards involved. And from Kan, the lyrics involve a woman asking the titular question as she's falling deeply for that special someone. It's somewhat metaphysical transitioning into physical.
Listening to the younger Iwasaki here, I can still hear some of that resemblance to big sis Hiromi's(岩崎宏美)own great vocals, and I wonder if...really...whether by this point, Iwasaki should have even be categorized as an aidoru. Even with that first single back in 1980, "Aka to Kuro"(赤と黒), that was also a City Pop tune as well and so I gather that the singer was already tackling some very cool, rather than cutesy, tunes.
Fantastic song, great flow
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