Takako Ohta -- Kanashimi wo Koete（悲しみをこえて）

 

To remind us that although all of us here in the Greater Toronto Area are done with winter, winter is certainly not done with us (and probably won't be until May as is often the case here), we woke up to a few centimetres of snow this morning. Well, at least, it was neither frigid nor windy out there. Incidentally, the photo above is of the bridge between Tokyu Hands and Kinokuniya Book Store in the Times Square complex in South Shinjuku.

(19:50)

Up until today, I had only the one article regarding 80s aidoru Takako Ohta（太田貴子）on KKP and that was for her cute "Goodbye Mr. Extra" (Goodbye Mr. エキストラ) from late 1984. Today I am upping that number with another song a few years down the line of her discography, "Kanashimi wo Koete" (Farewell to Sorrow).

A track from her 6th album from May 1987 "Pop Station", "Kanashimi wo Koete" takes Ohta into a more pop/rock direction perhaps a la Misato Watanabe（渡辺美里）and very early Kahoru Kohiruimaki（小比類巻かほる）, and her voice goes a little deeper. I can almost imagine Ohta in leather atop a motorcycle riding down the highways and byways of California as I hear this. The lyrics by Kei Hayakawa（早川渓）proudly declare the endurance of a romance even if their surrounding acquaintances aren't too happy with the association. Rebels to the end!

According to one blog, the CD version of "Pop Station" comes with a bonus 11th track which is the English version of the song under that title of "Farewell to Sorrow", although I'm not sure whether it was Hayakawa behind those as well. The melody was provided by singer-songwriter Kazuhito Murata（村田和人）and the arrangement was taken care of by none other than Sentimental City Romance（センチメンタル・シティ・ロマンス）.