From the latest that I've been hearing regarding Typhoon No. 7, it seems to have shifted a few hundred kilometres to the west so that instead of Tokyo, it's now possible that Osaka may end up getting pummeled in the next several hours. So, I'm hoping that folks there and in the surrounding prefectures take care of themselves.
The late Mina Aoe（青江三奈）was a singer who kept her feet in both the enka and Mood Kayo genres, and she had her own series of go-touchi（ご当地ソング）"Blues" songs including "Morioka Blues"（盛岡ブルース）and her signature "Isezakicho Blues"（伊勢崎町ブルース）. It was all about romance gone wrong in the big cities.
Looks like Osaka was also not exempt from the blues, thanks to her November 1983 single "Osaka Blues". Written by Kaoru Mizuki（水木かおる）, the lyrics do the usual tale of a broken heart and the longing for just one more encounter in the famous Kansai city, but what's interesting is the melody by Kunihiko Suzuki（鈴木邦彦）with arrangement by Jiro Takemura（竹村次郎）. It has that languid if still go-ahead pacing of a Mood Kayo but the instruments, aside from that bluesy guitar, all fit an enka song. It's like having a Jack Daniels on the rocks in the middle of a sakura orchard. For that matter, "Osaka Blues" feels like Aoe tackling The Cool Five's territory.
If I'm not mistaken, the video below shows Aoe performing "Osaka Blues" on the 1983 Kohaku Utagassen.
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