Tomokazu Miura -- Illusion（イリュージョン）

 

Amazing how fast a month can speed by. We're already in the final week of September 2023, but today is slightly warmer than usual for an autumn day. Not that I see a whole lot of people complaining, mind you.

Over six years ago, I added actor Tomokazu Miura（三浦友和）to the "Kayo Kyoku Plus" family because of his 1978 debut single "Hohoemi no Tobira" （ほほえみの扉）, and it didn't hurt that he would eventually marry aidoru Momoe Yamaguchi（山口百恵）and have two sons, one of whom is also up here, Yutaro Miura（三浦祐太朗）.

The second song that I'm providing for Pere Miura's KKP file is "Illusion" which is a track from his April 1979 album "Sobyou"（素描...Sketches） which managed to reach No. 28 on the Oricon chart. As with "Hohoemi no Tobira", this was also created by Etsuko and Takao Kisugi（来生えつこ・来生たかお）with Masataka Matsutoya（松任谷正隆）behind the arrangement. "Illusion" is somewhat bizarre since it seems to have lifted some of the rhythm part from Billy Joel's "Movin' Out" and along with it comes a grafting of a melody that was inspired by an old-style jazz café. At the same time, Miura himself sounds as if he were vocally on the verge of going outside of his comfort zone as opposed to the relaxed way he delivers in "Hohoemi no Tobira". Perhaps it was just as well that it was a non-single track on "Sobyou".