Yes, "Seibu Keisatsu"（西部警察）...the one Japanese cop show that could even make The Untouchables and Al Capone shake at all of the ammunition fired in a single episode. Mind you, it also generated some very shibui theme songs. There was the Mood Kayo of star Yujiro Ishihara's（石原裕次郎） "Yoake no Machi"（夜明けの街）and "Yuusha tachi"（勇者たち）, and although this song wasn't officially part of the "Seibu Keisatsu" grand soundtrack, I've always thought that Akira Terao's（寺尾聡）"Ruby no Yubiwa"（ルビーの指輪）had a stake in the series since the singer-songwriter and thespian had played one of the maverick cops on the show as he was coming up with this City Pop hit and its source album "Reflections".
Well, for the third instalment of "Seibu Keisatsu" which ran from April 1983 to October 1984, the ending theme was some refined sophisticated pop in the form of Mieko Inoue's（井上美恵子）"Kaze no Shoutaijou" (Invitation of the Wind). I couldn't find any single piece of information on this singer outside of the fact that she had sung this particular song which spurs on thoughts of classy nights on the Riviera and pleasant evenings in Shinjuku hotel bars.
Takako Ozawa（大沢孝子）was behind the words while Kentaro Haneda（羽田健太郎）took care of the music. The bossa nova-spiced arrangement has me thinking Keiko Maruyama（丸山恵子）while the vocals by Inoue reminds me slightly of Machiko Watanabe（渡辺真知子）. If anyone out there can inform us a bit more of Inoue, that would be greatly appreciated.
This is a well-done song! It has some kind of flair to it, and the singer is a great vocalist, so she is either talented or very well trained. I am not sure how well this song did on the charts, but I do think it must have been underrated because I do not recall ever hearing it on any of the music shows or on the radio.
ReplyDeleteI'm wondering whether Inoue was more in the backup singing or studio singer part of the industry, and aside from this one song, she didn't have any singles come out.
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