Tracey Ullman/Irma Thomas/Tomomi with Wface/The Milkees -- Breakaway

 

Here I was thinking that I had already put up a ROY article on British-American entertainer Tracey Ullman whose "The Tracey Ullman Show" on FOX in the late 1980s would beget "The Simpsons". But nope, I have yet to post "They Don't Know" which is her most famous song during her brief singing career in the Eighties.

Well, I can put that up during the next major holiday weekend here which is Labour Day. But in the meantime, let's go with her very first single in the United Kingdom in 1983, "Breakaway", although that song actually followed "They Don't Know" in its release history in the United States. I remember the video quite well since it was getting some heavy rotation on Canada's Muchmusic video station and despite Tracey and company having the time of their lives in 1960s fashion singing the decade's girl pop, I had assumed that "Breakaway" was a 1980s tribute to the 1960s because of the then-current rockabilly revival.

But the truth is that "Breakaway" was indeed a 1960s song; part of a 1964 single, to be specific. According to Wikipedia, it was the B-side to Irma Thomas' "Wish Someone Would Care" which ended up becoming her biggest hit. The songwriters were Jackie DeShannon and Sharon Sheeley with DeShannon already getting coverage on KKP a couple of times including for her "What the World Needs Now Is Love" in 1965.

Now, for a brief change of scenery for Reminiscings of Youth this week, instead of the usual comparisons of the song of my youth with what was coming out or ranking in over in Japan, I have opted to introduce a couple of covers of "Breakaway" by Japanese bands. One band was wface, a rockabilly duo, who collaborated with vocalist Tomomi Yoshikawa（吉川朋美）on a mini-album titled "early times" in April 2004. wface consists of Takashi Kamisawatsu（上澤津孝）and Kenichi Yamaguchi（山口憲一）; the two had actually worked together before as Magic between 1988 and 1999 playing their rockabilly and college rock before breaking up and then getting back together again in 2001 as wface. In the 2000s, they released five full albums.

The Milkees are a four-piece band from Kobe that got its start in 2004 with sisters Berry and PECO being joined by another pair of sisters, Petra and Lily. According to their website, they're into rock n' roll, pop, jazz and blues. They've released four albums including the one that contains their Japanese-language version of "Breakaway", "Lover Soul" from November 2007.