Leon Niihama -- Dame Dame...（ダメ ダメ…）

 

Although this has been a slight point of contention even among the artists themselves, the City Pop of Tatsuro Yamashita（山下達郎）, Mariya Takeuchi（竹内まりや）and Makoto Matsushita（松下誠）has had its 21st-century analogue in the form of Neo-City Pop with folks like Kirinji（キリンジ）, Ryusenkei（流線形）and Hitomitoi（一十三十一）. Perhaps by the same token, the Mood Kayo of Frank Nagai（フランク永井）, Los Indios and The Cool Five has their new version with acts like Junretsu（純烈）and this young fellow.

I wrote about Chiba Prefecture-born enka and kayo singer Leon Niihama（新浜レオン）a couple of years ago with his "Kimi wo Motomete"（君を求めて）due to the fact that I saw him perform the song on an episode of "Uta Con"（うたコン）. It felt like an enka/Mood Kayo mix with some octane-filled pizzazz via a dynamic arrangement including horns. Some weeks ago, Niihama appeared on the NHK show again to perform a May 2021 single "Dame Dame..." (No, No Way).

"Dame, Dame..." is another energetic blast, best illustrated by the music video with Niihama and a couple of women getting into dance moves and gestures while lasers are flying away harder than at the Empire/Rebellion battle of the Death Star. Written by Aoi Yamazaki（山崎あおい）, the lyrics are an open challenge to the usual broken romance tropes of staying stoic and admitting that the affair was another case of two ships passing in the night. As Niihama sings out "Is is really being a man to wish for one's happiness when saying goodbye to a woman forever?". Hmmm...things that make you go Hmmm.

Perhaps it's the Latin infused into Koji Makaino（馬飼野康二）and Toshiya Kamada's（鎌田俊哉）melody and Motoki Funayama's（船山基紀）arrangement, but I think that this can be a form of Neo-Mood Kayo. Nope, it may not have the same feel as the sultry and oft-mournful Mood Kayo of the past since songs like "Dame, Dame..." has a much peppier tempo and there are those contemporary synthesizers thrown into the mix. However, I can't help but feel that there is something very old-fashioned kayo about it. On that note, maybe it does straddle the line between Mood Kayo and pop. In any case, "Dame, Dame..." managed to peak at No. 12 on Oricon.

One more thing about the new Mood Kayo: I guess suits and backup choruses are now optional.