Miki Yamazaki -- Namida no Ato ni Kuchizuke wo（涙のあとに接吻を）

 

One of the people I follow on Twitter put this 1986 song up a few weeks ago and wondered why it didn't get much more in the way of respect or rankings. To be honest, after listening to it myself, I'm also left in askance. Unfortunately, I've forgotten which person it was who made the initial call so let me know so I can give credit where credit is due.

I am talking about actress Miki Yamazaki's（山崎美貴）"Namida no Ato ni Kuchizuke wo" (Kiss After the Rain), and I note that the above profession is the only one listed for Yamazaki right off the bat and that her career origin year has been put down as 1988. However, looking further into J-Wiki, I found out that the Yokohama native who had won the White Cinderella contest while in high school in the early 1980s and then scouted in Harajuku got into show business as a magazine model. Then, she joined the late-night TV show "All-Night Fuji"（オールナイトフジ）and ended up joining two other girls to form the short-lived aidoru trio Okawari Sisters（おかわりシスターズ）in 1984 with four singles and one studio album going up to early 1985.

Yamazaki had an even shorter career as a solo singer with two singles and one album under her belt beginning in 1985. Her second single was the aforementioned "Namida no Ato ni Kuchizuke wo" which was released in March 1986. To me, it's the quintessential aidoru tune of the latter half of the 1980s with the singer surrounded by a creamy yet bopping keyboard arrangement thanks to composer Tsugutoshi Goto（後藤次利）that has always been catnip for my Japanese pop-loving ears. Yasushi Akimoto（秋元康）was the lyricist, and with those two behind its creation, I can say that it was most likely put in as aidoru material.

The song did moderately OK by scoring a No. 56 ranking on Oricon and that was the end of her singing career apparently, although I think her vocals were quite pleasant and pure. But perhaps with so many aidoru songs taking on that certain arrangement, the competition was probably a little too crowded and fierce for Yamazaki the singer to make much headway, so into acting she went a few years later.