Yup, good ol' Richard Gere. Of course, he'd long been one of Hollywood's biggest stars which also meant that he just had to do one of those stylish if enigmatic commercials for Japan. He may have done ads for other brands but I will always know him for the ones that he did for Japan Air Lines. Yeah, I fly JAL. Well, not really. I wish I could, though.
It speaks to how long I've been doing "Kayo Kyoku Plus" when I actually get nostalgic about not just the song in question but also the article that I wrote for it. Yes, I fondly remember the article that I did for singer-songwriter Katsumi's "Just Time Girl" from April 1991, a song that I also fondly remember as one of the last ones I would hear within Japan before heading home from the JET Programme later that summer.
Well, he followed that one with his 5th single in June, "It's My JAL". While Katsumi wrote the lyrics, veteran composer Kisaburo Suzuki（鈴木キサブロー）took care of the melody which followed the singer's penchant for synth-driven upbeat tunes. I think "Just Time Girl" will always be my Katsumi tune but "It's My JAL" isn't too shabby either. In fact, it made it up to No. 3 on Oricon.
For anyone who wants to know that JAL CM features a 16- or 17-year-old 熊沢 千絵（くまざわ ちえ). So far, all my domestic flights have been on JAL, but I have also flown on JAL internationally and I plan on using JAL again, although I would also like to try ANA one day. Well, this song is a new favorite and it seem to be that JAL related songs tend to be good like JAL沖縄キャンペーン 夏離宮1990 テーマソング 「米米CLUB-浪漫飛行. I know this song began life in 1987 and it wasn't originally a JAL song, but it was always an Airplane/Airline song.
ReplyDeleteI don't think I ever flew on JAL although I did fly ANA for that round trip to Hokkaido many years ago. Would love to have either Japanese airline come to Toronto but that would bring major pushback from Air Canada and the unions.
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