The above photo regards a 1971 TV adaptation of a manga called "Taiyou no Koibito" (Sun Lovers). I've downloaded it from X or Twitter so if the owner of the photo doesn't want me using it anymore, just let me know but frankly it's the only decent evidence of the show that I could find anywhere. From what I can see of the above and the manga, it looks like the story revolves a couple of lovesick high school students.
The male protagonist of the TV Asahi show was played by actor-singer Kenichi Sakuragi（桜木健一）and he's also the one behind the recording of the theme song which has the same title of "Taiyou no Koibito". What's notable about it is that it sounds a lot like the later Hiromi Ohta（太田裕美）hit "Saraba Siberia Tetsudo" (さらばシベリア鉄道）that was penned by Eiichi Ohtaki（大滝詠一）. Ohtaki loved doing his Western gunslinger sort of melodies, and "Taiyou no Koibito" has that feeling in spades. I heard the song first before finding out about the drama, so I had assumed that the show had something to do with samurai or cops, not high school kids.
And yet, "Taiyou no Koibito" was actually composed by Takeo Watanabe（渡辺岳夫）with Masakazu Nagahama（長浜正和）behind the lyrics and a young Michio Yamagami（山上路夫）helping out as an associate lyricist. It was released as a single for Sakuragi in July 1971 when the series was starting up. Of course, I have another "Taiyou no Koibito" which sounds totally different by Kazuhito Murata（村田和人）.
To my ears, this sounds a whole lot more like a slightly slower superhero song than a romantic drama series song!
ReplyDeleteCome to think of it, there is that tokusatsu feeling, especially in the intro.
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