Nakamori Akina -- Nukumori (中森明菜ー温り)

J-Canuck and I went out for dinner yesterday and we had a great time. As you might expect, our conversation would ultimately turn to Japanese music. We're talking about Akina's birthday approaching in July, and how we might want to celebrate on this blog. Our conversation then gravitated towards her B-side songs, and that's when I mentioned Nukumori (which means warmth in English) to J-Canuck.

Nukumori (温り) is my favorite Akina B-side song. It came with the single "Ni Bun no Ichi no Shinwa" (１／２の神話) and so it's pretty old (1983 specifically). I think that's Akina's 4th single, right after her breakout song "Second Love" (セカンド．ラブ). 

I didn't know about Nukumori until I watched a YouTube video 10+ years ago, where she was singing it in her 2002 concert (or was it 2003? or 2000? I forgot, sorry).  Unfortunately, I couldn't find that video on YouTube anymore due to copyright strike.

I fell in love with Nukumori the first time I heard it. It was a complete surprise.  Even though it's written in the early 80s, I thought the music was quite timeless. I never get tried listening to it. In fact, after I bid goodbye with J-Canuck on the subway last night, I put the song in a loop and continued listening to it till I got home. I have the re-released 1983 version. But I think the YouTube version I mentioned above is better, with Akina's more matured voice. If you could find it, I would highly recommend listening to it and doing a comparison. Here's the "young Akina" version that I found on YouTube.

 

The song talked about a girl whose boyfriend was having an affair.  She knew about it, and was prepared to say goodbye.  She was hoping that her boyfriend would be brave enough to say it.  She remembered while they're walking on the street, whenever a car passed by, her boyfriend would grab her and took her into his arms.  She would never forget the warmth she felt.  Walking on the street and seeing the show window, she realized that spring was near.  However, she was not in the mood to celebrate.  Her time would be forever frozen until she could forget about him.

Overall, it's a sad love song.

There's a little back story about Nukumori, though.  I read about it on Bunshun's (文春) website.  Here's the link to the article: https://bunshun.jp/articles/-/49332 (go to page 4 of the article if you want to get to the back story directly)

Both the music and lyrics were written by someone named Inoue Azusa (井上あづさ).  According to the article, it's a pen name.  But you won't find this name anywhere in Akina's other singles or albums, or with any other singers.  This person was actually a staff member of Warner (I think Akina signed with both Warner and KEN ON 研音 at the time), who had been working with Akina for 3 years since her debut.  Having a staff member providing a song itself was not a problem, as there were many cases when a staff chipped in a song or two under a pen name.  The real problem was that Inoue never told Akina or Warner about it!  Furthermore, he used an outside company to manage the royalties he received without Warner or Akina knowing.  According to the article, "Ni Bun no Ichi no Shinwa" sold 770,000 copies, and with B-side's royalty at 180 yen per copy, it totaled more than 100 million yen (>US$500,000 in 1983) for this Warner staff!  Naturally, everyone's focus was on A-side, so it's easy for someone to sneak in his/her own song onto B-side, get a free-ride (remember, A-side is doing the actual selling), and make tons of money.  The article says he did it not only once, but on multiple occasions with Akina's other singles under different pen names.  Inoue was interviewed for the article.  He admitted that the above story was true, but shook it off as a norm in the music industry.  He told Bunshun that he didn't tell Akina because Akina didn't ask, and thought Akina would trust him.  He also said Warner's management never had a problem with it.

Bunshun characterized this as a betrayal against Akina.  I'm not too sure about it because I think Akina did not suffer from any monetary loss, or any other loss for that matter.  When you're a famous singer, many people made money off your name.  That's pretty natural and normal.  I'm not sure if I completely understand Bunshun's logic here.

Anyway, I hope you enjoy Nukumori, if you haven't discovered it yourself yet.