Masaki Ueda & Junji Ariyama -- Osaka e Dete Kite kara（大阪へ出て来てから）

 

Among the many YouTube channels that I'm subscribed to, one of them is "VIRTUAL JAPAN" which has had plenty of video walks around Tokyo, but then this one came up a few years ago which features a stroll in good ol' Osaka. The Kansai metropolis will be hosting a major Expo in 2025 but I think that even without a world exhibition, it ought to be bringing in the tourists from all over.

But let's head back almost half a century, shall we? Considering Masaki Ueda's（上田正樹）huge hit of "Osaka Bay Blues" in the early 1980s and this song, fans could be forgiven for assuming that the soul singer and songwriter had been a native Osakan. However, he was born in Kyoto and as far as I know, I don't think that he had ever been raised in Osaka although his career started in the nightclubs and discos there.

"Osaka Bay Blues" is a soulful City Pop ballad but back in the 1970s, Ueda was probably more into the blues and rock scene. His debut album from May 1975 was "Bochi Bochi Iko ka"（ぼちぼちいこか）, a title in the Kansai dialect meaning "Shall We Get a Move On?" and it was a joint collaboration with singer and guitarist Junji Ariyama（有山淳司）. One of the tracks is the amiable "Osaka e Dete Kite kara" (Since Coming to Osaka), a bluesy and jazzy number written and composed by Ueda about a fairly schlumpy fellow quickly going over his five years and counting in the city within four and a half minutes. In that aforementioned Kansai dialect, Ueda sings about the guy not exactly making his fortune there but still getting pretty comfortable in his adopted home. Considering how open and gregarious the Osakans are, I'm not surprised.