Happy Monday! Inbound Japanese tourism has been a topic that's touched upon me and a few of my friends now and then since some of us do want to return to places like Tokyo, and I've got a student who is a senior tourism researcher. It certainly would be nice to visit Yokohama again and see things like the Nippon Maru as is shown above.
Not the smoothest segue, I have to admit, but I'm going to be starting this work week off with a couple of singles by Rie Nakahara（中原理恵）, including her August 1979 "Show Boat". In contrast with her big kayo-sounding hit of "Tokyo Lullaby"（東京ららばい）the year previously, Nakahara and the two songwriters behind that one, lyricist Takashi Matsumoto（松本隆）and composer Kyohei Tsutsumi（筒美京平）, got back together again with arranger Jun Sato（佐藤準）to create "Show Boat" which actually sounds like more like all three played some Queen and/or Electric Light Orchestra LPs before coming up with this one.
As the chorus sings out "Life is the show boat" in that one enjoys a ride on one of those cruise liners with a handsome captain for a while but while the journey inevitably ends, they can just hop off the one boat and hop onto another one. I'm not nearly as adventurous in my analogies; I'm happy enough just saying that life is a Toyota Corolla.
A few singles and years later, Nakahara came out with a new single in January 1981, "Shake, Shake..." (no idea regarding the three dots afterwards) which has more of a galloping City Pop beat provided by composer Kisaburo Suzuki（鈴木キサブロ）and arranger Motoki Funayama（船山基紀）. Tetsuya Chiaki（ちあき哲也）provides the lyrics about what seems like the trials and tribulations of living the night life in Tokyo. Must have been quite the time in the capital.
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