This song was something that I discovered through the usual browsing on YouTube some time ago. When I checked to see if I could find some information surrounding it, I came across something pretty interesting.
On Hiroshi Sugai's（スガイヒロシ）blog, there was a small article regarding "Kibun wa Red Shower" (It Feels Like a Red Hot Shower), an obscure song by actress Yuuko Funakura（舟倉由佑子）, or as she was known back in 1980, Tamaki Funakura（舟倉たまき）. With lyrics by Yoshiko Miura（三浦徳子）, the song was composed/arranged by Tetsuji Hayashi（林哲司）, the maker of some of the great City Pop tunes, and apparently Hayashi felt that he had a triumvirate of City Pop songs of which the latest release was "Kibun wa Red Shower" while the first two were from 1979: Mariya Takeuchi's（竹内まりや）"September" (although personally I treat it as a pop tune) and Miki Matsubara's（松原みき）"Mayonaka no Door"（真夜中のドアー）.
Indeed, those two are considered among the primo of Hayashi songs but "Kibun wa Red Shower" is not all that well known. And yet, when I listen to it, I can hear elements from the other two songs especially through the rhythm and the chorus, so it's not that surprising that Hayashi would consider them a trio. However, out of the three, I think "Kibun wa Red Shower" seems to veer away from City Pop over to kayo kyoku. The song was used for a body soap commercial although I'm not sure what a red hot shower is. Considering that I had just been watching some of the finale of "Alien: Earth", I don't really want to know anymore.
From 3:44 of the above video is the B-side, "Yes, I Do" which was also taken care of by Miura and Hayashi. This one is a straight pop tune, quite aidoru...short and sweet. As for Funakura, she was born in Sasebo, Nagasaki Prefecture but was raised in Nishinomiya City, Hyogo Prefecture. She was a naturally talented athlete so there were thoughts that she would become a gym teacher, much like another singer who happened to start her singing career in that same year of 1980. But in her sophomore year of high school in 1977, she was scouted at Osaka's Umeda Station by an employee of Toei Company and made her debut on film in 1978. The singing part of her career would only consist of two singles, the aforementioned 1980 "Kibun wa Red Shower" and the second one coming out in 1984 under her current stage name of Yuuko Funakura.
It would have been interesting to see what direction she would have gone in if she had pursued her singing career and grown as an artist in the 1980's, but she seems to have had plenty of success as an actress.
ReplyDeleteHello, Brian. Yeah, she's had a long career as an actress so I gather that she wasn't too keen on the singing part. I saw on one site that "Kibun wa Red Shower" only scored a ranking in the 120s or 130s on Oricon, so the writing was on the wall.
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