Yutaka Kimura Speaks ~ Japanese City Pop Masterpieces 100: Jin Kirigaya -- Shiosai（しおさい）

 

Number: 036

Lyricist/Composer: Jin Kirigaya 

Arranger: Hiroshi Sato

From Kirigaya's 1979 album "My Love For You"

Initially coming out with normal ballads with a languid tempo, "Shiosai" (The Sound of Waves) is a 16-beat medium-slow masterpiece by Kirigaya（桐ヶ谷仁）with a floating sensation, thanks to Hiroshi Sato's（佐藤博）touch. With the effective playing of the Moog and the timbre of the sax solo during the bridge, no matter how you cut it, this is without a doubt a miraculous pairing and it takes my breath away every time I hear it. I have to tip my hat to Alfa Records back in those days.

The above comes from "Disc Collection Japanese City Pop Revised" (2020).

Hello, J-Canuck here and just like with last week's Yutaka Kimura Speaks with Yumi Arai（荒井由実）, I'm here with another song that I hadn't previously covered on the blog although I have posted about another track on Kirigaya's "My Love For You", "Yotsuya Yuumagure"（四ツ谷ゆうまぐれ）. I guess as we get deeper and deeper into these 100 masterpieces, this sort of thing will be popping up, so we'll just play it by ear.

Anyways, although I'm not quite ready to be as gushing as Kimura about "Shiosai" since I've only started listening and only really appreciating the first track of "My Love For You", it's growing on me. The first few measures did have me wondering whether I was in for a prog rock thing but the melody quickly turned into something more warm and comfy. And Kimura was right about the pairing of the Moog synthesizer and a saxophone that sounds a lot like Artie Shaw's playing. I can only imagine how Hiroshi Sato came up with that sort of arrangement.