Betty & Petty -- Sasowarete Scandal（誘われてスキャンダル）/Chianti -- Ano Hito no Ashioto（あの人の足音）

 

On this Saturday night, we once again dive into the mountain of obscure 80s aidoru, and just to let you know right off the bat, the title above doesn't refer to two different aidoru groups but the same one with a name change.

Many years ago, I wrote up an article on a late 1970s aidoru group called Gyaru（ギャル）and over there I gave the lineup of the original members. However, there was one addition when one of those originals had left in 1978. Akiyo Nakaseko（中世古明代）joined up for that brief remaining time until Gyaru called it a day in 1979. But then in 1980, Nakaseko partnered with Kyoko Tsuda（津田京子）to form the aidoru duo Betty & Petty（ベティ＆ペティ）.

Betty & Petty put out a debut single in July 1980 titled "Sasowarete Scandal" (Invite Me, Scandal) which starts off with a streak of sky-high West Coast AOR before changing to a bit of Candies-like summery aidoru music, especially when the harmonies pour on in to sing out "scandal". Kaoru Ito（伊藤薫）was responsible for both words and music. 

Following their second single, though, Betty & Petty changed their name to Chianti（キャンティ）. Not sure whether the name change into that of an Italian wine meant a similar transformation in their style but I have to admit on listening to the B-side, "Ano Hito no Ashioto" (His Footsteps), of their 1983 5th single "Shirakattano"（知らなかったの...I Didn't Know）, it was quite the change at least for this particular song. Instead of channeling Candies, Nakaseko and Tsuda opted for the less cutesy and more elegant stylings of an older duo, The Peanuts（ピーナッツ）. In fact, I've even decided to also categorize "Ano no Ashioto" as a Mood Kayo because of that arrangement. The lyrics were written by Mieko Arima（有馬三恵子）and the music was provided by Jun Suzuki（鈴木淳）.

According to "Idol.ne.jp", there was one more single in 1984 by Chianti before they broke up. I'm not certain whether the duo produced an album.