Keisuke Kuwata -- Hitotarashi（人誑し / ひとたらし）

 

A few days ago, I wrote about Yasuyuki Okamura & Kento Nakajima's "Shunpatsuteki ni Koi Shiyou"（瞬発的に恋しよう）, the opening theme for the currently running anime "Ganbare! Nakamura-kun!!"（ガンバレ!中村くん!!...Go for It, Nakamura!）. Well, in an interesting parallel, there's another case of a stylish anime this season whose opening theme is sung by another Japanese music veteran. And like Okamura, this guy also recorded another anison several years ago.

"Akane-banashi"（あかね噺...Akane's Story） is a tale of a young woman who decides to go through the trials and tribulations in becoming a top-grade rakugo storyteller. The only anime that I've seen with a rakugo theme has been "Joshiraku"（じょしらく....Girls In Rakugo) from over a decade ago which is a Seinfeld-esque comedy. I've got a feeling that "Akane-banashi" is probably a whole lot more serious.

But as for that opening theme, singer-songwriter and Southern All Stars leader/vocalist Keisuke Kuwata（桑田佳祐）is the man behind "Hitotarashi" which is his 4th digital single that was released a few days ago. The CD version will apparently come out at the end of June. I was wondering why the title has been illustrated in both its kanji and hiragana forms, and then I looked up the definitions for "Hitotarashi" and discovered something interesting. One meaning is "someone of respect" and "charismatic person", while another is "con-man" or "scammer". Considering what I've read of the synopsis of "Akane-banashi", this could be rather significant.

In any case, Kuwata is still living life large at the age of 70, and he's recorded "Hitotarashi" as this brisk flighty number which feels like the song itself is on the lam from someone or something. It's got the usual Kuwata/SAS twang in the arrangement but at the same time, there is something that sounds like an accordion which reminds me of the French gentleman thief Arsène Lupin since I am thinking about those two definitions of the song title. It was easy for me to identify Kuwata's wife and fellow SAS member Yuko Hara（原由子）as one of the backing vocals, and I read that Makoto Saito（斎藤誠）was both on the electric and acoustic guitars.