Toshihiko Tahara -- Love Spoor（ラブ・シュプール）/Gemini no Koibito-tachi（双子座の恋人達）

In the decades ranging from the 1950s into the 1980s, Japanese show business had a thing about putting together up-and-coming young stars into groups as a promotional gimmick. Therefore, there were the Sannin Musume（三人娘...The Three Daughters） consisting of Hibari Misora（美空ひばり）, Chiemi Eri（江利チエミ） and Izumi Yukimura（雪村いづみ）, the original Gosanke（御三家...The Big Three） of Yukio Hashi（橋幸夫）, Kazuo Funaki（舟木一夫）and Teruhiko Saigo（西郷輝彦）, and even the Shin-Gosanke（新御三家...The New Big Three） of Hiromi Go（郷ひろみ）, Hideki Saijo（西城秀樹）and Goro Noguchi（野口五郎）.

However, the very first similar grouping that I ever encountered was the Tanokin Trio（たのきんトリオ）: Masahiko "Matchy" Kondo（近藤真彦）, Toshihiko "Toshi-chan" Tahara（田原俊彦）and Yoshio "Yotchan" Nomura（野村義男）from Johnny's Entertainment, thanks to that 1981 summer trip to Japan. Their posters were everywhere for a particular movie they were starring in, and I'm sure that they had plenty of television coverage. I only found out today that Matchy, Toshi-chan and Yotchan were also in a December 1982 flick together called "Wien Monogatari Gemini Y to S"（ウィーン物語 ジェミニ・YとS...Vienna Story ~ Gemini Y and S） where the Trio were having their hijinks in Vienna, Austria. You can take a look at the highlights above. I'm assuming that the Y and S stand for two of the characters' names, Yutaka and Shunichi.

Well, as it turns out, Tahara's 12th single had its A and B sides coming from the movie and it was released on the same day as the movie. The A side is "Love Spoor" (Traces of Love) which I think is a really racing aidoru song even for Toshi-chan, but then when I discovered that it was the theme song for "Wien Monogatari", I figured that the arrangement by Kazuo Otani（大谷和夫）with the soaring strings was trying to reflect the whirlwind romance and other adventures in Austria, although it was a bit jarring to hear the cheerleading in parts. It's kinda like merging a typical Toshi tune and a high-flying number with the atmosphere of "Roman Holiday". There is some fine pedigree behind the words and music since it was lyricist Yoshiko Miura（三浦徳子）and composer Kyohei Tsutsumi（筒美京平）behind it.

Otani, Miura and Tsutsumi were also responsible for the B-side, "Gemini no Koibito-tachi" (Gemini Lovers) that was used as an insert song in "Wien Monogatari". With the intro of the European horns, I thought that it would be a somewhat different song, but it still follows the same high flying tempo as "Love Spoor". The J-Wiki article for the single points out that each song incorporates the title of the other in the lyrics.

The single managed to hit No. 3 on Oricon and it ended up becoming the 52nd-ranked single for 1983, so I'm sure that the fans swarmed over to the nearest record store after catching the movie. I gather that it was a nice Xmas-y thing to do back in 1982.