I think it may have been commenter Brian who recently reminded me of anime's favourite boarding house "Maison Ikkoku"（めぞん一刻）by stating that it had celebrated a recent anniversary. And sure enough, we're all here again admiring Kyoko the boarding house manager. But I come here through a rather coincidental route. Yesterday, I was delighted to find out that one of the new anime for Spring 2026, "Ganbare! Nakamura-kun!!"（ガンバレ!中村くん!!...Go for It, Nakamura!）, has adopted the policy of using some of the Showa and Heisei Era hits to end each episode, and the ending theme for Episode 1 was Kozo Murashita's（村下孝蔵）wonderful "Hatsukoi"（初恋）. Let it make a resurgence, I say!
Well, I've only just discovered that another Murashita single had become the final opening theme for "Maison Ikkoku". I've heard of his September 1987 12th single "Hidamari" (Sunny Spot) but only as something that I probably listened to for the first time on "Sounds of Japan" decades ago. I didn't know of the anime's connection with the song but now I recognize it as being part of the "Maison Ikkoku" family along with Yuki Saito's（斉藤由貴）upbeat "Kanashimi yo Konnichiwa"（悲しみよこんにちは）and Anzen Chitai's（安全地帯）mysterious "Suki sa"（好きさ）.
I figure that if anime fans can enjoy the fruits of "Hatsukoi", then why not lead them to "Hidamari", the opening theme for this classic show of the 1980s? Murashita had been known as a singer-songwriter who flitted between folk and pop with ease, but the really skippy "Hidamari" is definitely in the latter genre as his lyrics talk about one fellow mightily pining for that young lady. Kimio Mizutani（水谷公生）was behind its arrangement as it hit No. 61 on Oricon.
Love Maison Ikkoku. Speaking of Rumiko Takahashi, her newest work, "Mao" just debuted as an anime series yesterday.
ReplyDeleteYes, I watched that on NHK the other night. I have been collect the MAO manga for a few years now and was interested to see how they were going to adapt it.
DeleteI discovered 「陽だまり」 through めぞん一刻 years ago and as might have mentioned before this is one of my favorite songs! This is a song that has a very interesting back story or a life before めぞん一刻 . This song was original written for 蔡楓華 (ケン・チョイ) and released under the title 「讓你自由」(let you be free) in 1985, but it was reworked and released in September of 1987. 「陽だまり」sound a lot more upbeat than 「讓你自由」in fact they sound like two very different songs. But don't take my word for it check it out for yourself here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7tCwYw76yzA
ReplyDeleteNo worries here, Brian. I believe you. 👍I'm sure that there has been a fair bit of cross-pollination between Hong Kong and Japan that we're not aware of.
DeleteJust be sure that everyone knows Kozo Murashita is the author of both 「讓你自由」(or whatever it was before it was translated into Chinese unless he had some Chinese skills I didn't know about) and 「陽だまり」which are both supposed to be the same song even though these two songs seem so very different to my ears.
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