Ahhh...the more you learn. It has only been within the last half hour that I found out that Cyndi Lauper's big hit "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" was actually a cover of the original recorded by Robert Hazard in 1979, and it was New Wave back then, too.
However, as it was for most of us, "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" came to us via the "She's So Unusual" girl. For me, the September 1983 single by Lauper came to my eyes via the music video on a local show as I saw her prancing about with her buddies in a New York City neighbourhood, and from that point, I was hooked and apparently it was hooked on the radio charts for many weeks. It was all about that party girl vibe, Lauper's appearance as this polychromatically-fashioned dynamo and all those cute hoots in her vocals.
It was a huge hit worldwide including America, Canada and Japan where it went to No. 1 on their respective music charts. Speaking of that last country, I'd heard years ago that Lauper was a Japanophile although the only indications of any affinity that I've read have come through pieces of information that she used to be a waitress at a Japanese restaurant in the Big Apple called Miho and that she appeared as an official participant in the 1990 edition of NHK's Kohaku Utagassen. Apparently, her ability with the Japanese language, according to J-Wiki, has been described as being at toddler-level.
"Girls Just Want to Have Fun" will always be the quintessential Cyndi song to me, but of course, I also enjoyed "Time After Time" and "She-Bop" afterwards, and I'll probably be doing the latter tune next on a future ROY article.
Being a September 1983 single, I was going to provide the Top 3 songs on Oricon for that month. However, I found out that those three had already been taken on an earlier ROY for Commodores' "Turn Off The Lights". As such, I will go with Nos. 4, 6 and 8 this week.
No. 4 Hiromi Iwasaki -- Ieji (家路）
No. 6 Seiko Matsuda -- Glass no Ringo （ガラスの林檎）
No. 8 H2O -- Omoide ga Ippai （思い出がいっぱい）
As a PS, I also knew about Lauper's earlier career as the main vocalist for the New Wave band, Blue Angel. I just listened to their "Maybe He'll Know" from 1980. Pretty snazzy.
First comment after I got back from Toronto to show that I'm still alive :). Looks like it's still subzero in Toronto even though it's March.
ReplyDeleteMan, this is nostalgic! I love the 3 Cyndi Lauper songs you mentioned: "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun", "Time After Time", and "She-Bop". And I didn't know that "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun" is a cover. It's very interesting that she had such a connection with Japan.
On something different, H2O's Omoide ga Ippai have a very very famous covered version in Hong Kong by Alan Tam. You can listen to it here: https://youtu.be/b5l63lKrTKU. Usually when it comes to Japanese cover songs, I like the original version more. But for this one, I actually prefer Alan Tam's cover. I think it's the vocal.
Hi, Larry. Good to hear from you again, and I hope that you are doing well and safe in Oakland. Yup, it was freezing again here in Toronto but it could be going all the way up to 16 degrees C on Sunday...and then fall again to about zero from Monday.
DeleteI had no idea about the original "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" until earlier today so it was quite the revelation. I'm not sure what the extent of Lauper's interest in Japan is; is it anime, manga, food, or is it more along the lines of history or art?
Tam was someone that I knew about when I visited that Chinatown record store during my university days along with Sandy Lam. The timing is good to mention about "Omoide ga Ippai" since this month is the graduation season for students in Japan, and this song is one of the favourite for this time.