Zek Dechine -- Shichinin no Keiji（七人の刑事）

 

My previous article was in the form of a tribute to the late screenwriter James Miki（ジェームス･三木）who passed away a few days ago. I learned that, after making the switch from singing to writing, he basically started his new career in 1969 with scripts for movies and television. Perhaps his first foray into the latter medium was an episode in the final season of the cop show "Shichinin no Keiji" (The Seven Detectives) which had its run between 1961 and 1969 on TBS.

I've covered my share of Japanese cop show themes throughout the history of KKP. The theme from the 1970s "Taiyo ni Hoero"（太陽にほえろ）is downtown funky while "Rhythm & Police" from the 1990s "Odoru Dai Sosasen"(踊る大捜査線）is a techno-ized version of an old Mexican song, and another 1960s police cop theme for "The Guardman"（ザ・ガードマン）is cool and jangly. Basically, every cop show theme has its own distinctive DNA.

The theme for "Shichinin no Keiji" is no different. Composed by Takeo Yamashita（山下毅雄）, it's jazzy and moody as if it had been lifted from some film noir taking place in Europe somewhere. What further adds to that foggy atmosphere is the bass humming and scatting by Zek Dechine（ゼーク・デチネ）who sounds like he's been through every alley and dark street on the continent of life with a side trip through the Soviet Union or a Warsaw Pact nation. As it is though, the theme seems to reflect the lonely and tough lives these detectives have to go through in the pursuit of justice. 

Speaking of which, who the heck is Zek Dechine? I could only find his katakana reading and so I'm not sure if my romaji for his name is accurate. Secondly, I had never heard of this fellow before. It took quite a search online but eventually I found out through this Japanese blog that purports that Dechine hadn't even been a professional singer. It turns out that composer Yamashita knew this Jewish jeweler in Tokyo who apparently had a side gig singing at this Akasaka club that he frequented. Somehow, Yamashita persuaded Dechine to record the melancholy theme song for "Shichinin no Keiji" which ended up becoming a million-seller hit.

However, there's plenty of irony at the end of this one. It also turns out that Dechine ended up becoming wanted for fraud and fled Japan with an international warrant chasing him. The blog entry doesn't make clear whether he was caught or not. But just imagine: a criminal humming his way through a theme song for a cop show that ends up as a hit and possibly getting away with it.