Mari Iijima – Watashi no Kare wa Pilot（私の彼はパイロト）

J-Canuck here. Just to give credit where credit is due, the following article was contributed by one of our commenters, Fireminer, and it is about one of Lynn Minmay's beloved tunes. However, I'll let Fireminer take it from here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D8mbdoXml38

Super Dimension Fortress Macross is a show that needed little introduction. Much like Space Battleship Yamato and Mobile Suit Gundam before it, Macross captured the zeitgeist of that generation of young adults—the so-called shinjinrui (new breed)—and codified their modes of entertainment, consumption and organization into the otaku subculture we know. Macross’s effects on the anime and idol culture can still be felt even today?

But what about Macross’s legacies on its own descendants?  Like all long-running franchise (41 years to be exact), Macross sequels contain plenty of shout-outs to the original, and arguably the most enduring one is Watashi no Kare wa Pilot (私の彼はパイロット My Boyfriend is a Pilot). First appearing as an instrumental piece in episode 5, the song was eventually sung by Lynn Minmay (voiced by Mari Iijima) on her idol debut. It is nothing if not a lovely little tune and an interplay of young, dreamy love and the anxiety and thrills it brings about, on a backdrop of mankind’s existential war.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L1nP2vYO24k

(One interesting little tidbit is that Lynn Minmay was directly based on Seiko Matsuda. According to an interview with director Noburo Ishiguro -- https://www.zimmerit.moe/noboru-ishiguro-macross-animeigo-interview/ -- Macross’s character designer Haruhiko Mikimoto was a member of Matsuda’s fanclub at the time. There are also several shout-outs to Seiko Matsuda and Akina Nakamori in Macross -- https://yackdeculture.tumblr.com/post/86954906554)

After various appearances in the show and the movie compilation/in-universe propaganda The Super Dimension Fortress Macross: Do You Remember Love?, Watashi no Kare wa Pilot was sung once again years later by a character in Macross Plus, albeit as a karaoke song. Macross Plus also marked the return of original creator Shoji Kawamori, who was absent for the OVA sequel Macross II: Lovers Again.

In Macross Plus’s sister show Macross 7 (both were conceived at the same time, with Macross Plus the OVA taking place in-universe before Macross 7), Watashi no Kare wa Pilot was covered by Mylene Flare Jenius (voiced by Chie Kajiura), herself an idol and daughter of two of the chracters from the original series.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q7PFzhTanxA&t=27m31s

In a lot of ways the 2008 series Macross Frontier can be seen as a modernized version of the original Macross, complete with its own take on Watashi no Kare wa Pilot. Named Watashi no Kare wa Pilot - MISS MACROSS 2059, it was sung by Ranka Lee as she participated in the Miss Macross Frontier beauty pageant before becoming an idol—a plotline that greatly resembled the rise of Lynn Minmay.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qk_qTaW821I

There is something very different about the original Macross to its sequel, which I would argue mainly comes from two things: director Noboru Ishiguro (who was in a band and thus knew a lot about how to maximize the impact of film scores in his works), and the era it was born in. Watashi no Kare wa Pilot  is like that too, wrapping itself in the conventions of idol music at the time, yet also having a timeless quality.