Reiko Ike -- Ocho no Blues（お蝶のブルース）

 

Although I'm not a fan of the traditional tough woman series of Japanese movies in which a lady ends up becoming the head of a yakuza gang, for example, the tropes are quite well known to me. That includes the fatal flashing of blades, the tempting flashing of skin, and the theme song. Actress and singer Meiko Kaji（梶芽衣子）was the first example that I knew by name thanks to my viewing of "Kill Bill, Vol. 1".

Recently, a commenter asked me about another entertainer from the early 1970s who also had her finger in the industry as a blood-and-guts female warrior. Her name is Reiko Ike（池玲子）from Tokyo, and she was discovered as a teenage pinup model in the pages of a weekly magazine by a couple of higher-ups at Toei Company. She was made into a star through hardboiled crime flicks throughout the decade including a 1973 movie titled "Yasagure Anego-den Soukatsu Lynch"（やさぐれ姐御伝 総括リンチ）which can be translated into "Female Yakuza Tale: Inquisition and Torture". A lighthearted rom-com this definitely isn't.

I mentioned above that the theme song has been one of the familiar tropes and it's because of that sharp lone-wolf trumpet which seems to be part and parcel as an accompaniment for any ronin warrior in a chambara movie or TV series or a protagonist in a gangster flick. No exception here as Ike herself sings the theme song for "Yasagure Anego-den Soukatsu Lynch". The star's discography was brief with only two singles and a few albums in the 1970s and the second single was that theme, "Ocho no Blues" (Butterfly Blues) which was released in June 1973.

Written by Masao Ishizaka（石坂まさを）and composed by singer-songwriter Ichiro Araki（荒木一郎）, Ike and the arrangement sound like how her character probably comported herself as she walked through her territory: with confidence and nonchalant strength, and woe betide anyone who got in her way. In fact, I'd say that her vocals are even slightly more sultrier than the ones for Kaji, and she was only hovering around the age of 20 when this film was released. The video below contains scenes from the movie as the song is playing and just in case, I will give a friendly viewer's discretion advised warning here.