Daddy Takechiyo & Tokyo Otoboke Cats（ダディ竹千代&東京おとぼけCATS）, led by Daddy, aka Go Kajiki（加治木剛）, was a comical and talented band which I discovered via a track in that "Light Mellow" CD series. That led to my first article about them for a breezy City Pop-esque 1980 song called "Itsuwari no DJ"（偽りのDJ）back in the summer of 2020.
I've now found a track from their 1980 first album, logically titled "First". "Yuugata Friend" (Sunset Friend) seems to be a playful pun on the Carole King song "You've Got a Friend" but that's where any similarities end. Written and composed by Daddy Takechiyo, it's a bopping track which starts out with what sounds like a polite rejection letter to the leader's confession of love from a pleasant-sounding young lady. The young lady just happens to be twentysomething Mariya Takeuchi（竹内まりや）, and I did mention in the "Itsuwari no DJ" posting that he and the Cats had some connections with not only Mariya but also her future husband, Tatsuro Yamashita（山下達郎）.
Hey, if I got rejected by the lovely Ms. Takeuchi, I would be crawling into a corner of my room (the one with the most dust and ant carcasses) myself for a certain amount of time, so I cannot blame Daddy for getting into the doldrums in the first verses of "Yuugata Friend" and thinking that he needs to drink his way into a stupor. There's something not surprisingly Tom Waits bluesy here but it doesn't take too long before he and the Cats get back on their feet and move on, thanks to some James Brown-style R&B. By the end of the five minutes and change, it's as if the rejection never occurred. Tats and Mariya are together and Daddy and his band are together as well.
This is really odd! I feel as if I have actually heard this before! I did not think so when I read through the blog post, but after listening to it sound familiar somehow!?!
ReplyDeletePerhaps the song was covered by another singer or band in the past? I can imagine a more recent group such as Ulfuls covering it.
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