Toshiki Kadomatsu -- 1975

 

Well, I figure that with a title like "1975", that particular year must have been something special for City Pop master Toshiki Kadomatsu（角松敏生）. And looking at his J-Wiki bio, young Kadomatsu was in high school in the mid-1970s when he first discovered bands such as Happy End（はっぴいえんど）and Sugar Babe, acts that inspired him to get into music.

"1975", a track from his June 1986 6th studio album "Touch And Go", is still pure 1980s spectacular happy horn-powered Kadomatsu that was created by the man himself. Sure enough, those horns were arranged by good ol' Jerry Hey, and there is that quintessential soaring good-time guitar solo as well. Lyrically, it's all about the guy putting in an that 1970s audiotape of New Music into the car stereo while driving down to the port. Near the end, the chorus excitedly goes into a patter giving shoutouts to the big guys back then such as the aforementioned bands from the previous paragraph and Tin Pan Alley, Sadistic Mika Band, Chu Kosaka（小坂忠）, Yumi Arai（荒井由実）, Sentimental City Romance（センチメンタル・シティ・ロマンス）and one other fellow who I couldn't quite hear (help me on this!). Take a bow, folks! Incidentally, "Touch And Go" hit No. 5 on Oricon.