City Pop specialist singer-songwriter Minako Ito（伊藤美奈子）has had plenty of representation on "Kayo Kyoku Plus" throughout a number of years. However, one year that has yet to be represented is 1985 which is when she released her third album "Portrait" in November.
I've heard a few tracks on this one and just like my wishes for the album that I referred to in my previous article, I wouldn't mind getting my hands on this one, too. The first track is "Mitsumete Hoshii"（見つめてほしい...Look At Me） whose lyrics were provided by Ito (and she wrote all of the songs) and the melody was also composed by her. A song of longing, "Mitsumete Hoshii" has that atmosphere of whirlwinds and the intrepid hunt for that guy punctuated by the electric guitar and bongo percussion.
"Mullion no Mae de"（マリオンの前で...In Front of Mullion） is the second track. Now, for those who may not have visited Tokyo before, Yurakucho Mullion is an old shopping complex located just up the street from the main intersection of Ginza and people like to meet friends and lovers in front of the place where a huge clock is situated. Yoichi Shimada（嶋田陽一）has composed this one as a synth-driven sophisticated pop number reflecting the neighbourhood.
One more track that I'll show here is Track 5 "Ku-gatsu no Yakusoku"（9月の約束...September Promises） which is pleasingly notable for how smooth and gliding it is through the chords. Thank you, Fender Rhodes! And also thanks to the jazzy saxophone solo by Jake H. Concepcion. Ito wrote and composed this pensive City Pop track, and supposedly Masataka Matsutoya（松任谷正隆）, who was also helping out on keyboards, may have been responsible for all arrangements of the tracks (I did pick up some Yuming in this one as well). For some reason, I'm a sucker for September songs in September so my eyes locked in on this one immediately.
You can also listen to the whole album right here.
Portrait is interesting as it seem that Minako Ito wrote the lyrics to all ten songs, and then composed three of them herself: 「見つめてほしい」, 「9月の約束」, and 「Air Curtain」. Maybe this album really is a Portrait of Minako Ito (at least that that time)! Then the other composers form a rather impressive New Music / City Pop circle: Yoichi Shimada wrote tracks 2 and 3, Ken Muramatsu track 4, Mari Sugi track 6, Seishiro Kusunose tracks 7 and 10, and Toshihiro Kirigaya track 8. In my opinion this is closer to mid-1980s Japanese New Music with sophisticated City Pop arranging: electric piano, synthesizers, very clean studio guitar, active bass lines, percussion, backing harmonies and jazz-flavored saxophone.
ReplyDeleteI also noticed that the background chorus almost all consists of singers that have representation on KKP including Kusunose and Kirigaya.
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