Cunimondo Takiguchi's Personal Selection for His Top 10 City Pop Albums of the 1980s ~ Part 1

 

Over the past few years, it's become fairly regular for me to wait in hospitals and clinics while my folks and myself go through various medical procedures. And as such, I bring a book along to wile away the time. A few weeks ago, I brought the above tome called the April 2018 edition of "Record Collectors" which was focusing on the City Pop singles and albums from 1980 to 1989.

Well on Page 47, there was an article with the title "Cunimondo Takiguchi ga Erabu Shiteki Hachi-juu Nendai City Pop Best 10"（クニモンド瀧口が選ぶ私的80年代シティポップベスト10）which has been translated into the title on the above byline. Now, Takiguchi is the leader of the band Ryusenkei（流線形）, one of the groups that spearheaded a new version of City Pop going into the 21st century although he has gone on record to state that he doesn't particularly want that exact label applied to his work since City Pop is a musical phenomenon of past decades; he would prefer that his discography and those of other similarly-minded contemporary musicians be called urban contemporary. I respect his opinion but I also have my own on the reach of City Pop throughout the past few decades and I feel that City Pop never really died out even when the Bubble Era collapsed at the turn of the decade from the 80s into the 90s so I have continued to use the label to categorize songs by Ryusenkei, Kirinji（キリンジ）and Suchmos, etc.

But in any case, I have here Part 1 of his list of those City Pop albums from the 1980s that he has enjoyed starting from 1 to 5. The latter half of the selection will be posted next week. I have also included the comments that he stated in the article for each album. For the last couple of entries, I wasn't able to find a full album.

1. Tatsuro Yamashita -- For You (1982)

When I was a junior high school sophomore, one summer, my three buddies and I listened to "Futari" on the Walkman from the veranda of an Atami cottage while looking at the night sky. We were so moved as we each had a turn listening to it and the memory has lasted as a formative experience in City Pop for me.

2. Hiroshi Sato -- Awakening (1982)

For the wonderful keyboardist, Hiroshi Sato（佐藤博）, who had his input on that Yamashita album, I took another look at his "Awakening" in my thirties and it became one of my most favourite albums. He once gave me an interview and though I was nervous, he was kind enough to give me two hours of his time which was a happy memory.

3. Makoto Matsushita -- First Light (1981)

Going back from Matsushita's（松下誠）days with AB's, the original jacket from "First Light" struck me as something that was so cool. The refined chord progressions and arrangement along with Matsushita's not-overly-polished vocals were very comfortable to hear.

4. Izumi Kobayashi -- Coconuts High (1981)

I got into "Coconuts High" through the soundtrack she provided to "Urusei Yatsura"（うる星やつら）, and those tropical songs contained the Latin rhythms and her light and cute vocals which harmonized just right with those muscular synths.

5. Junko Ohashi -- Point Zero (1983)

I fell in love with "Tasogare My Love"（たそがれマイ・ラブ） when I was in elementary school. I got to know her cool and groovy side when I listened to "Point Zero" in my twenties. 

The Works of Fumiko Okada（岡田富美子）

 

I never expected to see her name up on television but recently I saw that veteran lyricist Fumiko Okada had received some sort of award for her decades of work via an NHK report. From that, I thought that it would be time to post a Creator article regarding her.

But first a bit of background from her J-Wiki file, Okada hails from Hiroshima Prefecture. When she gradated from university, her parents pressed her to get a job at television broadcaster TBS working as a timekeeper for music programs. However, knowing herself as someone who never really enjoyed the rigors of an average job or career, she was pretty miserable. Also, she developed insomnia but one night, she gained the urge to write poetry and found out that the words flowed out of her surprisingly easily. Then one day, after amassing her poems into a collection and having some faint interest in becoming a songwriter, she was noticed by the manager of a famous arranger at work. Noting how unenthused young Okada looked, he asked her what she really wanted to do for which she replied "I want to become a lyricist". A mere few days later, that manager suggested Okada to a record company as a rookie lyricist. At least, one song with her lyrics got into a music festival and that apparently was all she needed to write...literally. She started getting requests for her words, something that has been continuing for her for close to 55 years.

(1972) Young 101 -- Kaiju no Ballad（怪獣のバラード）

In a desert where the blood-red sun set

A great big monster lived there in peace

One morning when he woke up, he heard a bell from a caravan off in the distance

He suddenly screamed out

I wanna see the ocean! I wanna love people! Monsters have hearts, too, you know!

Let's leave the desert behind and head to where love and the ocean reside

Although I didn't note this in the original KKP article for "Kaiju no Ballad", this was apparently Okada's first work as a professional lyricist. 

(1981) Ruiko Kurahashi -- Glass no Yesterday （ガラスのYesterday)

Yesterday

I danced all night with you

Yesterday, although we can never meet again

We said "See you later" and parted

You're the one who embraced me while saying

I can't love you on mere kindness

Whenever Okada's name is mentioned, I will always first remember Fashion Music specialist Ruiko Kurahashi's（倉橋ルイ子）songs since the lyricist provided a number of her works to her. 

(1986) Shibugakitai -- Sushi Kui ne! （スシ食いねェ！）

This is the No. 1 sushi restaurant in Japan

Gotta eat sushi! Gotta eat sushi! Gotta eat sushi!

Green tea! Green tea! Green tea! Pickled ginger! Picked ginger! Pickled ginger!

In contrast with the elegance of Kurahashi's signature song, the raucous "Sushi kui ne!" comes under the catchphrase of "Okada wrote this one?!". She must love her sushi.

(1987) Kiyomi Suzuki with Rats & Star -- Lonely Chaplin (ロンリー・チャプリン）

Lonely Chaplin

Time passes...and even if you fade away

I will always wait for you

Smile like the little boy you are

You want to come home

Into my arms, don't you?

As long as your dreams are unfulfilled

Oh, do what you wanna do again

Oh, do what you wanna do again

Man, didn't know that Chaplin was that lucky a guy!

(1979) Asami Kado -- Fascination (ファッシネイション）

I love you. Stop it because you make me feel so helpless

Stop it if you're only going to kiss me once

I love you. I got myself all psyched up

I hate you stalling for time

Nothing like pouty coquettishness to spice up a relationship!

Yuko Machida -- Yuuwaku Summer（誘惑SUMMER）

 

It's threatening rain out there as I type this now, but so far, any precipitation has held off. Plus, compared to some of the heat that was bombarding us last week, it's been quite pleasantly cooler today, and the wonderful thing is that the huge cloud of forest fire smoke from northern Ontario has largely stopped coming our way.

We have another obscure pop singer from the 1980s in our midst here. I could find little on Yuko Machida（街田祐子）aside from the fact that she released (only?) two singles in 1981 with the first one being "Yuuwaku Summer" (Summer of Temptation). Now, the songwriters here were lyricist/composer Ichiro Araki（荒木一郎）and arranger Akira Inoue（井上鑑）, both of whom have had their hands in the City Pop jar. However, aside from a few chord progressions that struck me as being City Pop, "Yuuwaku Summer" is really a cute pop ditty with Machida's twee vocals, although I don't think she was ever labeled as an aidoru. In addition, looking at the single cover with the singer wearing that particular dress, I'd expected something like a 50s/60s pop song but it actually all sounds rather contemporary to me (except for a boss sax blast).

Himiko Kikuchi -- Everyday's a Miracle

 

The above shows some of us on Deck 16 of the Harmony of the Seas on the second morning of our cruise several years ago. It was a pleasant start to our first full day on the ship with a hearty breakfast to greet us.

Maybe this was a feeling that jazz musician and composer Himiko Kikuchi（菊池ひみこ）was having when she came up with the wonderfully breezy "Everyday's a Miracle" from her 1981 "Flashing" album. Ernie Watts was on the saxophone for this travel-friendly or brunch-friendly track that pretty much sounds how the title reads. It's like a glass of optimism for the weary soul. If every morning can be as positive, then life would be that much more pleasing.

Mayumi Asaka -- Toki yo Hohoende（時よ微笑んで）

 

The last time I wrote on actress-singer Mayumi Asaka（朝加真由美）was back last December when I posted the article for her "Hold On Me", a track from her lone album, the October 1981 "Yasashii Kankei ~ Mayumi I"（優しい関係...A Gentle Relationship）. Well, I've got another track here titled "Toki yo Hohoende" (It's Time to Smile).

Written by Tomoko Aran（亜蘭知子）and composed by Daiko Nagato（長門大幸）, it's another City Pop treat with the wailing electric guitar and the boppy bass, but there are also some interesting classical piano riffs ripping through the instrumental bridge. And Asaka's slightly husky voice keeps things within the urban contemporary. 

Glass Kayo

 

The above is a Very Berry Shake that I got at a place called Petit Potato. It was indeed very flavorful and thirst-quenching. However, the theme isn't on the contents but the container. Early this year, I came up with an Author's Picks called "Substance Kayo" which focused on those kayo titled with various substances. But then, I realized after writing up one recent article and remembering a couple of oldies that I'd written early in this blog's history that a subset can be made of kayo kyoku containing the word "glass" in their titles. As such, let me start this Tuesday edition of KKP with some glass kayo.

(1977) Yujiro Ishihara -- Brandy Glass (ブランデーグラス）

(1981) Jun Horie -- Memory Glass（メモリーグラス）

(1983) Seiko Matsuda -- Glass no Ringo （ガラスの林檎）

(1997) Kinki Kids -- Garasu no Shonen （硝子の少年）

(2009) Cheuni -- Glass no Tokyo Tower（ガラスの東京タワー）

Mayumi Ohnishi -- Saikai Yawa（再会夜話）

From YouTube

 

This album is a bit of a mystery to me. I would put it up as an APB with the apple pie photograph, to boot. However, this 1981 production has all the names and all the titles so they are identified. The problem is that I don't know any of the artists involved and I could only recognize one musician, Chuei Yoshikawa（吉川忠英）, on the credits.

I'm talking about "Good Season ~ New Original Songs" which has been described by YouTuber Ren as a compilation album of New Music and City Pop. Ren was kind enough to put up the album in the summer of 2023. As I mentioned above, I have never heard of any of the singers or bands involved so I'm wondering if they may have been university students recording as part of their music clubs or amateur acts that didn't last too long.

One track at 30:39 is "Saikai Yawa" (Meeting Again for an Evening Conversation) by singer-songwriter Mayumi Ohnishi（大西まゆみ）. I couldn't find anything on her at all although she has two tracks on "Good Season" including this one. It's too bad since her kittenish vocals enhance the feeling of the good life in her own creation here. Although 1981 was still a few years away from the flying-high Bubble Era, from personal experience, I already knew that Japan was already in a golden age and I can hear it in Ohnishi's light and playful bossa-influenced "Saikai Yawa". Images of fancy restaurants, champagne flutes and shameless flirting (or re-flirting) abound among the City Pop here.

If anyone, including Ren, can provide any further insight into "Good Season" aside from the one lonely page at "Rate Your Music", that would be much appreciated.

Keiko Goto/Junko Sakurada -- Mado（窓）

 

I don't watch French movies...although I did catch a few scenes of "Les Parapluies de Cherbourg" on television (warning: make sure you have the Kleenex next to you, especially in the last scene). As a rule of my imagination (and my apologies to all those fans of the Nouvelle Vague), I always envision old French movies with scenes like these: a man or woman sitting forlornly next to a window on a cold rainy day, letting their breath hit the pane with condensation. This lasts for two hours. FIN

Strangely enough, I've encountered this song titled "Mado" (Window) sung by Keiko Goto（後藤啓子）. In fact, this was her debut single from 1981 although it apparently was also a track on her 1980 album "Aimez-vous Sagan". I've posted about Goto once before for her 1981 song "Me wo Tojite"（目を閉じて）which was quite the bouncy City Pop tune.

"Mado" is probably more in tune with her days as a singer at Gin-Pari（銀巴里）in the 1970s, the famous chanson cafe in Ginza that I mentioned only a few days ago when I paid tribute to the recently departed Akihiro Miwa（美輪明宏）. I'm not sure if "Mado" would fall under the chanson category but it's still quite the spirited French waltz of a kayo kyoku as written and composed by Shigeru Inumaru（犬丸秀）*. Maybe I can give it the Fashion Music label. It certainly doesn't have Goto breathing sadly on a window pane for a couple of hours.

One interesting thing happened while I was searching how to read the lyricist/composer's name. I found out that "Mado" had gotten a cover version via aidoru Junko Sakurada's（桜田淳子）37th single from August 1982. If anything, it's even breezier and an accordion has been thrown into the arrangement, to boot, for that enhanced Gallic flavour.

*Not totally sure on the reading of the above name. If anyone can confirm or deny it, let me know.

Early Byrds feat. Kyoko Kimura -- Galaxy Special

 

Well, summer is officially here and the World Cup is well under way with both Canada and Japan heading into the knockout rounds. And of course, next week, both my nation and the United States will be celebrating their respective birthdays, so a holiday mood is most likely pervading all throughout the land.

On that vacation-minded note, let's have a listen to "Galaxy Special", the first track from fusion band Early Byrds and Kyoko Kimura's（木村恭子）1981 album "Up and Coming". It's a most upbeat and summery groovy instrumental punctuated by Kimura's vocal scatting. You can shake those cocktails on the Lido Deck while listening to this one.

There isn't a whole lot of information on Early Byrds aside from the lineup within the band. They are Hiroshi Nakanishi, Hiroyuki Fukue, Kunihiro Tsuji, Shingo Kanno, and Tsutomu Wajima (sorry, I couldn't find their kanji or what instruments they played). According to Discogs, they released two more albums in 1982 and 1986. As for Kimura, she has a J-Wiki profile which shows that she was active from the early 1970s in at least a few groups and that she was also getting into the Yamaha music contests a fair bit. Until her untimely passing at the age of 61 in 2013, she had also composed, narrated and recorded a vast number of commercial jingles to the extent that she had been called the Beethoven of Naniwa, to reference her home region in the Kansai area of Japan.

Ryuichi Sakamoto -- Photo Music（フォト・ムジーク）

 

Well, how about that for a coincidence? Just last week, I posted up an article regarding NHK-FM's late-night radio show "Crossover Eleven"（クロスオーバーイレブン）which focused on a lot of the popular non-Japanese music. And then just now, I discovered the radio program that immediately preceded it.

"Sound Street"（サウンドストリート）was a show which focused on both Japanese and foreign music that played in the 10-11 pm hour for about 45 minutes Mondays to Fridays. Lasting from 1978 to 1987, it was hosted by a number of folks in the music industry including the amazing Ryuichi Sakamoto（坂本龍一）who held the Tuesday night slot for about five years in the 1980s. The above broadcast from June 1st 1982 had Sakamoto inviting his good friend Tatsuro Yamashita（山下達郎）for a round of songs and laughs. Tats himself would host the Thursday program between 1983 and 1986.

The opening theme for "Sound Street" was Sakamoto's own creation "Photo Music" although I'm not sure whether it had been played right from the beginning of its run in 1978 (perhaps before its release on vinyl in 1981, there had been no official opener). Of course, that was also the same year that Yellow Magic Orchestra launched so I'm sure he and his fellow bandmates, Haruomi Hosono（細野晴臣）and Yukihiro Takahashi（高橋幸宏）, were fully in thrall to the technopop sound, and so not surprisingly, The Professor's dreamy and whimsical "Photo Music" is right up that YMO alley. "Photo Music" actually didn't get released until it found itself as a B-side to the light and fun "Computer Obaachan"（コンピューターおばあちゃん）which was released in December 1981.

Yasuko Agawa -- She ~ Senior Dreams

 

Commenter YMOfan04 and I were conversing a bit on the melding of different genres for positive effect, and our observation was that Japanese composers and arrangers seemed to be especially enthusiastic. Anyone who has been a longtime reader of KKP has probably learned that I sometimes have trouble categorizing some songs here because the blend has been just that smooth.

Latin jazz, which wasn't invented by the Japanese by the way, has been one nice and tasty cocktail for decades upon decades. I found another fine example as recorded by jazz singer Yasuko Agawa（阿川泰子）on her 1981 5th album "Sunglow". The songwriters for "She ~ Senior Dreams" were Claudio Amaral and Jay Anthony Wagner and the result was this lovely classy tune which comes straight from Brazil but they couldn't decide on whether to have it come out as a slow bossa nova ballad or as something on the level of a fairly fast samba. So, they just opted to have it arranged into both modes. I kinda had to hold onto my desk when I heard the transition for the first time.

"Telephone" Songs

Infrogmation of New Orleans via Wikimedia Commons

I can say that the above looks just like the first telephone that I ever saw in my apartment in the late 1960s. The good ol' rotary phone. Never got to use the even older model where people had to crank it up and yell "Maisie! Is that you? I'm calling Pennsylvania 65000!".

Earlier today, the first article for Urban Contemporary Friday on KKP was Mariko Tone's（刀根麻里子） "Private Number" and that got me thinking that among the many different themes I've had for Author's Picks, one common object that I had yet to highlight was the telephone. And yet, as soon as I put up "Private Number", suddenly all these phone-themed tunes came back to mind. So, to finish my contributions today, I'm putting up my telephone or denwa songs. Not all of them are City Pop, mind you, but enough of them are including the one with City Pop's most famous number.

(1973) Finger Five -- Koi no Dial Six-Seven-Oh-Oh （恋のダイヤル6700）

(1976) Akiko Yano -- Denwa Sen （電話線）

(1981) Kyoko Endo -- Kokuhaku Telephone （告白テレフォン）

(1981) Junko Ohashi -- Telephone Number

(1987) Junko Yagami -- Telephone Number

(1988) Keiko Kimura -- Denwa Shinai de （電話しないで）

JAGATARA -- Last Tango in Juku

 

I'm not a punk rock fan by any means but I do know that it arose from around the mid-1970s and was perhaps one antidote to all that disco (which I just wrote about in my previous article). 

This has been hanging around in the backlog for some time, but I'm finally getting to JAGATARA's "Last Tango in Juku". This band that dabbled in a number of genres including punk rock, funk-rock, Afrobeat and post-punk got its start in 1979 touring the live houses beginning with the Kamiuma Gasoline Alley in Setagaya Ward, Tokyo. Led by vocalist Akemi Edo（江戸アケミ）, "Last Tango in Juku" was the band's debut single released in April 1981 (at the time, they were calling themselves Zaidan Houjin Jagatara/財団法人じゃがたら [Judicial Foundation Jagatara]), and though it sounds like a mix of rock and Eastern European tango music, I can pick up the punk attitude f rom Edo's singing and his lyrics of getting into the muck of some dark corner in the urban neighbourhood for some dancing and fine dining (sucking up a piece of hamburger that his dance partner dropped onto the ground). Not sure whether the "Juku" in the title refers to Shinjuku or Harajuku, although I'm leaning toward the former.

According to the J-Wiki article on the band, JAGATARA did a Kansai tour to promote "Last Tango in Juku". However, despite the goodly amount of fans showing up, Edo still felt the music was being unappreciated so once the tour was done, he decided to just focus on the music rather than concerts.

Five singles and six albums would be released by JAGATARA up to 2020 and a lot of members would come and go (along with some variations on the name of the band). Edo himself took a respite between 1983 and 1985 due to a deteriorating mental situation but did come back. Unfortunately, he would pass away in early 1990 due to an accident in the bathtub after which JAGATARA would break up.

Natalie by Mariya Takeuchi (竹内まりや )

Many years ago, when I was a young(er) man, I attended film school in Hollywood. I made a lot of friends there, all with their own dreams and aspirations. One was a talented writer from the Midwest who had escaped a traumatic family situation. Another was an amateur game designer and another wanted to become the next Steven Spielberg.

They all had one thing in common: Hollywood kicked their ass.

It was pretty common to meet people from out of state who moved to California hoping to make it big. But more often than not, they ended up disillusioned by the whole thing—whether for financial, health, or cultural reasons. Sometimes it was a combination of all three.

If there were a name for a person like that, it would probably be Natalie.

Mariya Takeuchi’s 1981 ballad “Natalie” is about a young woman who moves to California to become a big movie star. Unlike my friends, she actually does fulfill her dream, but success changes her into a different person than the one she started as—and not for the better.

This beautiful country ballad is sung from the perspective of someone Natalie knew from her old life in Georgia. This childhood friend, possibly even an old lover, can see past the superficial glamour and ask Natalie one simple question:

Natalie, are you really happy?

https://www.dailymotion.com/playlist/x4pqae

(30:47)

While Natalie definitely reminds me of my friends, perhaps most of all, she reminds me of myself.

As someone who once had a foot in the door of Hollywood—and probably screwed it up, lol—I’ve experienced a lot of what the song describes: walking down Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills, going to Hollywood clubs, driving out to Malibu, rubbing elbows with superstars. And I let it all go to my head.

And I was just an intern, mind you. I must have been insufferable.

But much like Natalie, I eventually had to ask myself whether I was actually happy. I had to look deep and question why this life of “sex, drugs, and rock & roll” was only bringing me the blues.

“Natalie” is my absolute favorite song about Los Angeles because it acknowledges a hard truth about the city that people like to ignore: it looks great from afar, but it’s far from great. And if you get caught up in the culture, it can change you for the worse.

In a strange way, it’s reassuring to know that this was just as true in 1981 as it is today.

On a lighter note, J-Canuck once mentioned that this song would fit right into the country-themed variety show Hee Haw. After sitting through a few episodes myself, I’m inclined to agree.

On my quest to find the song on YouTube (its probably been copywrited) I found out there's a Cantonese(?) cover of the song by Priscilla Chan (陳慧嫻) which is pretty good.

Stanley Clarke and George Duke -- Sweet Baby

It is a national holiday today so as per KKP custom, we have a special holiday version of Reminiscings of Youth. I'd say this story goes back almost thirty years but when I was teaching a class in Tokyo, I recall asking the students regarding their favourite ice cream flavour (my classes were often quite whimsical). One of the students was a half-French/half-Japanese lass named Francoise who was quite popular in the group and had quite the outgoing personality. As usual, she went beyond the parameters of the question and gave us her own choice of an invented ice cream flavour. When I then asked her what she would name this new taste, she enthusiastically chirped "SWEET BABY".

Not too long after, I was at Yamano Music in Ginza doing my usual browsing of anything interesting in the CD department. I ended up purchasing the two discs making up the BRIO AOR collection, one of which had a song by a couple of musicians that I had never heard before: the late American keyboardist George Duke and American bassist Stanley Clarke, and the two of them had apparently collaborated back in 1981 through an album titled "The Clarke/Duke Project". The song from that album was the song chosen for the BRIO collection and it was called surprisingly enough, "Sweet Baby".

Yes, I will always remember Francoise and her ice cream flavour through Clarke and Duke's "Sweet Baby". For one thing, the song is probably one of the smoothest and most enjoyable AOR songs that my ears have had the honour to absorb and digest, and for another, it came out in the year that I was finally awakened to the wonders of not only Japan but also music in general. My only regret is that I hadn't discovered it back then and that I would have to wait until the end of the century to finally know about it. And who would have thought that an AOR tune would invite an electric sitar into the mix? To finally reach full circle, I would love to encounter an ice cream at a parlor somewhere that was actually called Sweet Baby.

"The Clarke/Duke Project" came out in April 1981, so let's find out what else came out that month in Japan. 

Toshiyuki Nishida -- Moshimo Piano ga Hiketanara（もしもピアノが弾けたなら）

Hitomi Ishikawa -- Machibuse（まちぶせ）

Saki Kubota -- Orange Airmail Special

Mebae Miyahara -- Tasogare Metro（黄昏メトロ）

 

The KKP file for singer-songwriter Mebae Miyahara（宮原芽映）isn't very large but from the relatively few songs that I've heard, she's dabbled into both pop and City Pop. Furthermore, her style strikes me as being rather light and eclectic.

Case in point: the B-side to her 2nd single "10 Years" which was released in July 1981. "Tasogare Metro" (Sunset Metro) fulfills both adjectives that I used in the previous paragraph, and as written/composed by Miyahara, there is something that feels like French pop and 1950s pop at the same time. At the same time, Taeko Ohnuki（大貫妙子）was also utilizing some of that Gallic flavour in her music but I wouldn't say that Miyahara's style is similar to that of Ohnuki...at least, not from what I'm hearing in this particular song. 

"Tasogare Metro" can also be found in Miyahara's debut album "Cat" which came out earlier in May of that year. Have a gander at "Milky Cat" which is also on the LP.

Yasuha -- Morning Date（モーニング・デート）

 

Talk about a song that has had nine lives like a cat. Yasuha's（泰葉）1981 "Fly-Day Chinatown" (フライディ・チャイナタウン) has once again popped up like a rubber duckie in the pop culture bathtub after getting its exposure at the end of Episode 5 of the currently running anime  "Ganbare! Nakamura-kun!!"（ガンバレ!中村くん!!...Go for It, Nakamura!）. And hey, a good song is a good song no matter how often it arises out of the ether.

As such, I wanted to see what the B-side for "Fly-Day Chinatown" was. It is "Morning Date" which was also the creation of lyricist Toyohisa Araki（荒木とよひさ）, composer Yasuha and arranger Akira Inoue（井上鑑）after their primo work on the A-side.

"Morning Date" is the opposite of "Fly-Day Chinatown". For one thing, as the title shows prominently, it is an upbeat morning tune compared to the nocturnal swings of "Fly-Day Chinatown". Moreover, instead of some rumbling City Pop through a famous part of Yokohama, this is basically some happy West Coast AOR in an apartment featuring a couple of newlyweds as a wife wakes up all fresh and freshly showered just so that she can greet her husband in the breakfast nook. I don't think I've ever experienced a married couple that blissful at breakfast; must be really early in the relationship. Still, I can hear some City Pop chord progressions blipping through along with a rock n' roll coda.

The Works of Yuji Ohno（大野雄二）

 

Earlier today, I received word from commenter and contributor Fireminer that musician and composer/arranger Yuji Ohno had passed away on May 4th from natural causes at the age of 84 according to newspaper reports just coming out today. 

Whenever I heard his name, the music that automatically flowed through my head was jazz...whiskey-on-the-rocks jazz with lots of pizzazz. And of course, that means his iconic theme from the anime "Lupin The 3rd"（ルパン三世）comes pounding to mind. There have been a variety of versions of that theme but at the core of them all is a song that was just perfectly made for the bumbling if charming thief.

Born on May 30th 1941 in the city of Atami, Shizuoka Prefecture, he started playing the piano during elementary school and formed his own unit in high school while schooling himself on the joys of jazz music. He became a member of Keio University's Light Music Society, the school's big band of the genre while studying in the Faculty of Law. His first work for the public came out in 1966 for a record featuring singer/actor Yuzo Kayama（加山雄三）.

Sometime in the early 1970s, Ohno opted to take a break from piano playing and focus on composition. His first album "Sound Adventure Act.1" came out in 1975 and the above video has the whole album with the first track being the propulsive "Too High".

Ohno would create his brand of exciting music which took in disco, City Pop and jazz among other genres, and in the same year as "Sound Adventure Act. 1", he was also responsible for making most of the tracks on Hatsumi Shibata's（しばたはつみ）2nd album, "Singer Lady", including the title track whose lyrics were created by Takahiro or Masahiro Takeda（武田全弘）. Evidently, Shibata wanted some sort of melodic calling card for herself and Ohno provided one that pretty much bashed down the door.

The J-Wiki article for Ohno features a long list of clients who he whipped up songs for, ranging from Hi-Fi Set（ハイファイセット）and Circus（サーカス）to SMAP and Sayuri Ishikawa（石川さゆり）. He was also in the business of making music for not only singers but also for commercials, TV soundtracks and anime. For example, the aforementioned Hi-Fi Set got to record one of his compositions "America Monogatari"（あめりか物語）in 1978 which was used for a Japan Air Lines campaign.

One of his TV works was the opening theme for "Daigekito Mad Police '80"（大激闘マッドポリス'80）under the collaborative name of You & Explosion Band. It's a kickass tune to match a kickass special police squad. All I can say is that the horns should have been paid time-and-a-half for their work here.

For all of his swaggering and staggering jazz, Ohno probably surprised quite a few people including myself when he composed the tenderhearted "Chiisana Tabi"  (小さな旅）for NHK's long-running documentary travelogue series. Here, Hiromi Iwasaki（岩崎宏美）provided a sung version of the song for her album "Wa Ga Ma Ma" in 1986.

As for one more entry here, I only found out about this in the last few minutes, but apparently Ohno also provided his own tribute to the American cop series "CHiPs" through a 1981 album which included a really disco take on the original theme by John Parker (in fact, I'd probably say it sounds closer to Alan Silvestri's handling of the theme from Season 2 onwards). I didn't watch too much of the series compared to other cop shows but I recall the theme being pretty darn cool.

We lost one of the big guns in Japanese pop composition today. My condolences go to Ohno's family, friends and many fans out there. Play your "Lupin III" theme today if you've got it.

Chage & Aska -- TABIBITO（放浪人）

 

We are approaching the 45th anniversary of this Chage & Aska tune "TABIBITO" (Traveler) which was released on May 25th 1981 as the duo's 4th single. Compared to the slicker and older Chage & Aska that I got to know best when I was living in Japan (as you can see in the top photo), according to the cover of the single for "TABIBITO", the fellows were looking quite rugged back then.

Goro Matsui（松井五郎）was behind the lyrics while Chage took care of the music as Aska sang about heading to wherever to forget about a romance gone sour. Under Ichizo Seo's（瀬尾一三）arrangement, there is something quite Queen-ly or maybe even ALFEE-ish in parts of "TABIBITO" but then hearing Chage and Aska doing their harmonizing, I went, yeah, it's Chage & Aska!

The song peaked at No. 30 on Oricon. "TABIBITO" didn't get onto an original album initially but it was finally placed as a bonus track on the 1986 CD version of Chage & Aska's 3rd album from February 1982, "Tasogare no Kishi"（黄昏の騎士...Twilight Knights）.

Masayoshi Takanaka/Izumi Kobayashi -- Palm St.

 

I started off today's batch of urban contemporary tunes with a sultry nocturnal song by Naomi Akimoto（秋本奈緒美）, so why not wrap up things with something conversely lighter and bouncier?

Here's something to go with your margarita. "Palm St." is a track on guitarist Masayoshi Takanaka's（高中正義）6th original album "T-Wave" from June 1980, an album that hit No. 7 on Oricon and ended the year as the 34th-ranked LP. It's quite the spritzer of a song that was composed by Izumi Kobayashi（小林泉美）as a tune to get folks into a conga line out at some Caribbean resort after dinner to shave off the calories. When Takanaka gets on a bender with his guitar, enjoy the ride!

Speaking of composer Mimi, the musician did a self-cover of "Palm St." the following year when she released her first solo album "Coconuts High" in December 1981. This slightly longer version has Kobayashi showing off some layered scatting, more steel pan and her own virtuoso performance on the keyboards in an arrangement that invites some good old jamming. Incidentally, I covered the final track on "Coconuts High" a few years ago, "Mr. Cool".