YMO -- Tegakari（手掛かり）

 

I remember the Yellow Magic Orchestra single "Taiso"（体操）with its upbeat melody and its message of up-and-at-'em just to rouse up the kids for the morning exercise session. The music video made me wonder how much in the way of stimulants and the like were pumped into its production, though.

There's a bit of lyrical psychedelia as well in the B-side for "Taiso", although the more dramatic "Tegakari" (Key) didn't get its own video which is too bad in a way. Haruomi Hosono's（細野晴臣）words seem to describe a depressed fellow who's ended up in a one-person video adventure game that could also serve as a mindscape aching to be analyzed by a psychiatrist for their thesis. Hosono and YMO drummer and vocalist Yukihiro Takahashi（高橋幸宏）came up with the urgent pounding melody that could make that fellow build up quite a sweat as he's running up and down those hills in the gamescape.