Misako Honjo -- Emergency

 

Yup, earlier this afternoon, I finally caught the latest Marvel movie, "Thor: Love and Thunder". Again, as was the case with "Dr. Strange in the Multiverse of Madness", it wasn't the greatest of the superhero movies but it was fun enough and it was far different from the latter movie despite the fact that both had their mystical elements. The music was interesting in that compared to the techno aspects in the previous "Thor" movie, "Thor: Ragnarok", the fourth entry here was having fun with hard rock and heavy metal, spearheaded by Guns N' Roses' classic "Sweet Child O' Mine".

https://www.billboard-japan.com/goods/detail/189270

(excerpt only)

Well, I kinda figured that I would probably do something in the rock and heavy metal field when I got home tonight. Happily, I could find this one from the backlog, and it's the first time that she's appearing on "Kayo Kyoku Plus", so please give a warm welcome to Tokyo-born Misako Honjo（本城未沙子）. Incidentally, her uncle on her mother's side happens to be producer Daiko Nagato（長戸大幸）, the founder of Being Inc., and so there might have been some of that influence on her musical choices.

Even as a student attending Seijo Gakuen High School in 1982, she had already released her debut album "Majo Densetsu ~ Messiah's Blessing"（魔女伝説...Legend of the Witch）, but her debut single didn't come out until 1984. "Emergency" was written by Kayoko Fuyumori（冬杜花代子） and composed/arranged by George Agatsuma（ジョージ吾妻）. My knowledge in differentiating the various rock subgenres is about as good as my knowledge on doing the same with techno...i.e. not very, so just to cover all of the bases, I'll throw in both the J-Rock and Heavy Metal genres in Labels.

Her J-Wiki article doesn't reveal who any of her influences were. Maybe they were Yuki Katsuragi（葛城ユキ）and 1980s Ann Lewis（アン・ルイス）, but the arrangement of "Emergency" and her vocals make me wonder whether Honjo herself may have influenced later turn-of-the-decade girl rock bands such as Princess Princess and Pink Sapphire. It's fascinating how similar she sounds to Princess Princess' vocalist Kaori Okui（奥居香）. In any case, she released just one more single in 1989 but has put out many more original albums up to 1990. However, that final album to date "Shall We Dance?" is more in the pop vein.