Ippu-Do -- Chinese Reggae

 

I gotta say that when the Japanese music community discovered the way to mesh their combinations of notes with computer technology back in the 1960s and 1970s, they really loved to push some of the older genres through the filter of synthesizers and emulators. Yellow Magic Orchestra played with surf rock via "Cosmic Surfin'" and Taeko Ohnuki（大貫妙子）melded some of that new French pop approach to the technopop in her album "Romantique".

It was also during that time that the synthpop band Ippu-Do spearheaded by singer-songwriter Masami Tsuchiya（土屋昌巳）was making its mark on the stereos and radios. Back in 1980, they came out with their second studio album "Real" and within it, there was the track "Chinese Reggae", written and composed by Tsuchiya, which was indeed as advertised. It was an English-language tongue-in-cheek ditty with a Chinese-sounding melody overlaying a reggae rhythm and Tsuchiya was able to make it work. Then in 1981, their third album "Radio Fantasy" included the Japanese-language version of the song. 

The above video provided by YouTuber Contain Yr Brain has both versions with the Japanese-language version before the original English version.