I've been a fan of Japanese popular music for 40 years, and have managed to collect a lot of material during that time. So I decided I wanted to talk about Showa Era music with like-minded fans. My particular era is the 70s and 80s (thus the "kayo kyoku"). The plus part includes a number of songs and artists from the last 30 years and also the early kayo. So, let's talk about New Music, aidoru, City Pop and enka.
Credits
I would like to give credit where credit is due. Videos are from YouTube and other sources such as NicoNico while Oricon rankings and other information are translated from the Japanese Wikipedia unless noted.
With my previous article being "Night Drive" for all those City Pop fans who want to take it out on the road in the evening, I guess this article can be about the nocturnal jazz while enjoying time at some intimate alley bar downtown. And it's from a source that I hadn't expected.
All this time, the Mayumi Asaka（朝加真由美）file on KKP was one that really consisted of tracks from one album; namely "Yasashii Kankei ~ Mayumi I"（優しい関係...A Gentle Relationship） from October 1981. It was indeed a City Pop release and Asaka was good for it. And J-Wiki only lists that album as her only album output in her discography. Well, strangely enough, the discography was lacking by at least one more album. In 1984, Asaka released her purely jazz album titled "Loving For...". Right from the start, we get "My Heart Belongs To You" with the singer and band providing a smoky version which deserves its own tumbler of scotch. Finally glad to add a totally new angle to the Asaka file.
Welcome to another Urban Contemporary Friday on "Kayo Kyoku Plus". I'm starting things a little differently today with an Author's Picks. I was inspired to do this one this way from actually viewing a segment on Wednesday's edition of NHK's "Asaichi"（あさイチ）morning infotainment program which focused on the Kawasaki Industrial Site.
I not only remember seeing this glittering otherworldly complex of lights and metal but for one night, I was actually within it! That night, due to a teacher falling ill, I was assigned to teach a lesson for a couple of the employees working within the complex and yep, it was pretty stunning especially when seeing it from the train. Entering the area felt like boarding the mother ship.
The Japanese tourism industry certainly didn't let the opportunity go. There are now tours on foot, bus and boat to take a look at the Kawasaki Industrial Site through selected spots. If you're interested, you can take a look at the relevant page at Japan Experience. Also, the above video is by YouTuber Hachimantai Outdoors.
The reason that I wanted to do this "Night Drive" is because seeing the Kawasaki Industrial Site from the air had me thinking of Kazumasa Oda's（小田和正）lovely ballad "Oh Yeah!". The official music video for Oda's 1991 song had couples enjoying each other's company but there were a couple of scenes in there showing some glorious eagle-view night shots of Tokyo which stayed with me.
Now, to be honest, this Author's Picks isn't something unprecedented. I've already noted "Oh Yeah!" in a 2014 article "J-Canuck's Nighttime Playlist". Plus in 2022, I whipped up "Driving to City Pop" with its cool songs. So, consider "Night Drive" to be the love child of the two articles and I will be choosing different tunes that still reflect in my opinion, the nighttime drive experience in Tokyo, Yokohama, Osaka, etc. (although of course, you may have your own choices). Furthermore, another inspiration for this one is the old "Night Ride"1980s late-night Toronto show that appeared almost every night in the wee hours on Global Television to relax those night owls.
It happened now and then that an ingenue entered the revolving doors to the 80s aidoruindustry and proceeded to pull off a one-and-done before disappearing back into normal Japanese society. And the way that the description by YouTuber nothingmuch') puts it, Chie Saijo（西城千恵）was one of those young ladies.
The channel also mentions the following: "...she would be one of the last idols (and well, artists in general) that debuted under Yupiteru - as their record department would eventually go bankrupt by the end of the year with this ending up as her only release...however, there is a report under the name Chie Takahashi (as the remark about her is about her debut in July under the same label - it's most likely her real name, but I'm unsure) that she was born on April 21, 1962."
You can read nothingmuch's whole report from this link, but basically the above is most of the information gleaned about the lass. The one single, "Omoide Tazunebito" (In Search of Memories), was released in July 1984, and as written and composed by singer-songwriter Kyoko Kosaka（小坂恭子）, who has her own entries on KKP such as her 1975 "Omoide Makura"（想い出まくら）, this is quite the refined creation for an aidoru with a stately string-led melody that makes me imagine a nightclub in Akasaka rather than a cute cafe near the high school. I could even consider it a form of New Adult Music.
For some interesting reason, I came across a number of songs whose titles amount to "glass windows" in Japanese music including one by the mixture rock band King Gnu. Unless the music industry has a major Windex fetish, I gather that the window has been thematically used as a source of reflection or introspection after a certain unhappy situation.
But for this one, I have Hiroko Mita's（三田寛子）B-side to her January 1984 7th single"Haru no Bouken"（春の冒険...Spring Adventure） to start off this Hump Day. Indeed, this is titled "Glass Mado" (Glass Window), and it's quite the stylish aidoru tune by Mita with a splash of tango. And as noted above, the young lady in question here is looking at the titular window with a sense of sadness after an implied romantic breakup; she can see the reflection of herself as a happy lass yesterday but things cloud over considerably when it comes to tomorrow. Yes, definitely get the Windex!
"Glass Mado" was written by Machiko Ryu（竜真知子）, composed by Tetsuji Hayashi（林哲司）and arranged by Shiro Sagisu（鷺巣詩郎）. I don't hear too much Latin from Hayashi usually so also for that reason, this song stands out for me.
Starting off this week's Reminiscings of Youth on a sad note, I saw the news scroll yesterday state that Frank Beard, the drummer and founding member of the rock groupZZ Top, had passed away at the age of 77 on August 17th. My condolences to his family, friends and fans.
I wasn't a huge ZZ Top fan but there were a few songs that I remember during my youth in the 1980s. One especially was "Legs" which came out in 1984 and had one memorable video. Beard and his two main mates, Billy Gibbons and Dusty Hill in their iconic hats, sunglasses, long coats...and beards as they carried their furry guitars, acted as the scruffiest guardian archangels while their leggy and beautiful angels helped out a mousy young lady (and her admirer by association) somewhere in an American suburb to succeed over a lot of resistance. It was basically a contemporary rehashing of Cinderella and the classic tale of the bullied getting some revenge on the bullies. I saw the music video for the first time last night and remarked "Yep, that was some fashion back then!"
"Legs" was a song and video that held onto the charts and television screens for a very long time as I recall. I thought it was just a propulsive rock song but according to its Wikipedia article, it's got a lot of genre labels: blues rock, electronic rock, synth-pop, boogie rock, pop rock and new wave. But I'll stick with the rock label. The video itself won the 1984 MTV Video Music Award for Best Group Video and the song managed to hit No. 9 on the Canadian charts while in America, it peaked at No. 8.
Since Wikipedia only gives the release year for "Legs", let's find out which two acts won Best New Artist honours in that year's Japan Record Awards.
Not sure what's gotten singer-songwriter Masamichi Sugi（杉真理）so shocked on the cover of his May 1984 album "Mistone". Maybe he just saw the latest trailer for "Avengers Doomsday".
Anyways, I have here one of the tracks from "Mistone", "Terra". Y'know...I don't think I had ever heard a New Wave pop tune from Sugi (usually he tended toward the old-fashioned pop of the 1950s or 1960s) but here is one song that sounds just as if it really does belong to 1984. It's got that nice bouncy little synthpop rhythm to add to the singer's high-falutin' vocals. And there are also those certain nostalgic guitar chords of that decade.
It was just this morning when I saw commenter Brian Mitchell noticing that there were indeed a lot of songs in Japan with the word kanashii（悲しい）or kanashimi（悲しみ）or some variant. They refer to sadness or loneliness and it would fit in with the kayo kyoku tendency to bring up a lot of sad stories within the lyrics albeit the music supporting them has often been quite cheerful. Well, I've opted to show off an Author's Picks (not complete by any means) of these songs which are mostly upbeat except for one. I refused though to post a thumbnail of a sad face...I went with something more symbolic, namely a Wikimedia Commons photo by User Kenlin of someone pouring some sake for someone having the blues.
A little over a year ago, I put up "The First Day of Summer!", an Author's Picks consisting of all of those summery tunes with the explanation point being that all of the song titles contained the word "summer". Well, I figured that I would go for another similar posting but I've relaxed the rules slightly by also allowing the Japanese term for summer, "natsu". So, without further ado then, get into that hammock and pull up a citrus-y cocktail.
The above photo comes from flickr and Wikimedia Commons via author aotaro and it's quite the gleaming Tron-friendly photo of the Tokyo Bay Aqua-Line spanning across the titular body of water between Kanagawa and Chiba Prefectures. Imagine crossing this one in the wee hours.
Now, the Aqua-Line opened around thirteen years following the introduction of this opening track from Kiyotaka Sugiyama & Omega Tribe's（杉山清貴&オメガトライブ）December 1984 album "Never Ending Summer", but I'd imagine that current City Pop fans would be more than happy to traverse the Aqua-Line while listening to this one in the coupe.
What I'm talking about is "Misty Line Cruising" which was written by Chinfa Kan（康珍化）, composed by Sugiyama himself and then arranged by Makoto Matsushita（松下誠）. From the title and one early lyric, I'd assumed that the story was going to take place on a cruise ship but by the end, I was convinced that the cruising involved was through a car...an automobile occupied by a handsome couple out on their second date after meeting cute in a cafe somewhere. The feeling from the rest of Kan's lyrics is that the sky's the limit now as to what could happen in this relationship. The romantic vibe is thrumming as smoothly as that engine in the car and the melody in "Misty Line Cruising".
Being summer, it's festival season in Japan and I know that it's in full swing whenever I hear about or see Tokyo's Sumida River Fireworks Festival on the final Saturday of July. I've seen it on television from the air-conditioned comfort of my Ichikawa apartment and around thirty years ago, I actually saw it with my own eyes from the apartment of a student who generously invited teachers and fellow classmates over for a fireworks party. We were very fortunate in that the apartment was right by the Sumida River in Asakusa where I used to work, so the fireworks literally exploded right over our heads. Getting back home, though, was quite the adventure in time and physics.
Festivals in Japan also mean bon odori...the great communal dance around the raised stage all draped in red and white like the colours of the Japanese flag. Nothing says the dog days of summer than doing those rhythmic steps while sporting a colourful yukata and geta while a min'yo is being sung and performed on stage.
However, in the last several years, there has been some relaxation of the rules in terms of the music, so instead of the traditional stuff, examples of kayo kyoku and J-Pop have been used to get the crowds all roused up and dancing. Thanks to an NHK report yesterday, I was rather inspired to put up this list that I got from a far bigger list on Line Music. Yes, you can dance to these in the Bon Odori style!
As soon as I heard the boozy saxophone from the intro, I knew that we were in heavy Mood Kayo territory. I could already see the cigarette smoke and hear the clinking glasses of whiskey on the rocks.
The interesting thing is that the singer behind this B-side to her 1984 single"Gion Bojou"（祇園慕情...Longing for Gion）, "Fukanasake" is a bit of a mystery. There's not much information about Hitomi Kaga（加賀ひとみ）although there is an entry on someone else named Hitomi Kaga (same kanji and hiragana, too) on J-Wiki. But looking deep into that article and her file on Discogs plainly shows that we are talking about two different women. The J-Wiki article is of an opera singer who was still in high school in the 1980s while the Kaga here and on Discogs started her career as a singer in the 1960s.
And to be honest, I'd never heard of the word fukanasake before. I found out that it means "hollow kindness" and so I'm guessing that, considering the genre involved here, it's about some lady who was betrayed by a love 'em-&-leave 'em cad in the big city somewhere. Maybe she's drinking her sorrows away in some dingy hole-in-the-wall. Anyways, the song was written and composed by someone whose name in kanji form is one of the rare instances that has absolutely stymied me. Wild speculation with some help from Jisho.org is that it could be pronounced Hiizu Aika（愛佳禾）. It might even be an especially muscular pseudonym for an otherwise famous songwriter but if anyone can give me some insight, that would be great. But for right now, I look as pensive as Ms. Kaga does on the single cover.🤔
Last week, I posted up "Sagamihara Singers" in tribute to the fact that my hometown of Toronto and the city of Sagamihara had a sister-city relationship. Tonight, I'm talking about "Nagoya Singers" but my inspiration isn't connected to any similar bond between Nagoya and a Canadian city. In fact, I don't think Nagoya has any sister-city relationships with any urban zones in my nation although it does have them with Los Angeles, Mexico City and Sydney.
Nope, the impetus for writing about singers or bands who come from Japan's 4th-largest city is today's edition of NHK's "Asaichi"（あさイチ）morning information show. It just so happens that the focus was on Nagoya and all of those scrumptious dishes that originate there and elsewhere in its Aichi Prefecture. When I saw that wonderful dish of grilled eel called hitsumabushi（ひつまぶし）on my screen earlier, I just went "OK...got my second article for Hump Day!". But have a look at hitsumabushi and some of the other famous local treats in the video above from Mui's Diary.
Anyways, I've got four acts here from Nagoya. Please enjoy!
Anyways, Nagoya has been in the news for being one of the hottest places in Japan right now, so I'm hoping that folks there are trying to keep cool and safe. As a PS, you can also take a look at another Nagoya specialty, ten-musu（天むす）, from YouTuber Just One Cookbook.
Happy Monday! Well, the third Monday of July has already passed in Japan but they did celebrate a long weekend culminating in the national holiday of "Umi no Hi" or Marine Day (or Sea Day or Ocean Day). I was watching the NHK news footage of kids and grownups hitting the sea and having oodles of fun while the heat wave bombarded on them. And so I figured about whether I actually had done a tribute to the national holiday. As it turned out, I did do a tribute back in 2023, also on the third Monday of July.
But I still wouldn't let the idea of another Author's Picks go. So thanks to a J-Wiki entry called "Umi wo Daizai to Shita Gakkyoku"（海を題材とした楽曲...Songs Themed on the Sea）, I was able to find some more ocean-frolicking-themed tunes that I had already written about way back when. Without further ado then:
I knew that the city of Mississauga right on the west side of Toronto has had a sister city relationship with Kariya in Aichi Prefecture since 1981. For one thing, an old friend of mine from my hometown had a position as a liaison between here and Kariya by being assigned there on the JET Programme. What I hadn't known was that Toronto itself has had a similar relationship with the city of Sagamihara in Kanagawa Prefecture since 1991 (so I guess we're celebrating (?) 35 years of friendship this year). I only found out about the connection in the last year when I was curiously looking for whether Toronto itself had any sister cities in Japan. The ironic thing is that I had a couple of students who hailed from Sagamihara including one who was my regular Wednesday night Arashi-loving superfan student.
As for singers from Toronto, we have Drake, The Weeknd and Alessia Cara. But I was also wondering which singers hail from Sagamihara. I could find three such people.
I swear that the more I see the cover of Etsuko Sai's（彩恵津子）July 1984 debut album"Reach Out", the more I think that the stylish house behind Sai is the same one that got illustrated on Tohoku Shinkansen's（東北新幹線）album cover of their 1982 "Thru Traffic". And I'm still going to say that the good folks at paint companies such as DuPont and Glidden must be salivating in joy at the lovely exterior.
Regardless, I have another track from "Reach Out" to join other tracks such as the title track and "Heart wo Knock Shite"（ハートをノックして）that have gotten their due on the blog. This time, it's Track 5,"Mujaki na Hito"(Innocent Man) which was written by Tetsuya Chiaki（ちあき哲也）and composed by Hiroyuki Iso*（磯広行）. Incidentally, I've seen online that Iso is a percussionist who's also acted as backup chorus on songs such as "Kanashimi ga Tomaranai" (悲しみがとまらない）by Anri（杏里）.
It was a tad difficult to categorize "Mujaki na Hito" although I have nothing against the song itself; it's a lovely tune with an old-school Hollywood jazziness and sophisticated pop feeling. Kinda feel like mixing a couple of martinis for me and the missus whenever I hear that sax-y intro (nice strings, by the way). But by the time I reach the chorus, that boppy bass and the keyboards take me into City Pop land or something appropriate for Resort Pop.
*I'm not totally sure on the correct pronunciation of the composer's family name. As usual, if anyone can confirm or correct it, that would be greatly appreciated.
To any and all American readers of "Kayo Kyoku Plus", Happy Fourth of July and also a Happy Sestercentennial (250th birthday). I recall that three years ago, I also provided a special list of America-related songs on July the 4th and mentioned that we would have to do something about 2026. Well, the day is here.
And so, this is my "America" Tunes 2. Unlike the first one which mostly dealt with songs that had "America" in their titles, I'm being a bit more geographically precise so I'll be listing those numbers referring specifically to states and cities. Without further ado then:
Doing the blog for as long as I have, I've been able to encounter a lot of singers and bands that I never would have, and that includes the mysterious Rie Murakami（村上リエ）who only put out that one album in 1984, "Sahara". At the time I made my first posting for the singer, it was for one of its tracks, "Say Cheese", which had me reminisce about Boz Scaggs and Bobby Caldwell from their 1970s days.
However, another track is the appropriately titled "TNT" which had the same lyricist, Linda Hennrick but this time, the composer was Etsuko Yamakawa（山川恵津子）, and as dedicated KKP readers know, whenever I see her name, she has my undivided attention. And sure enough, this is one funky blaster. In fact, I think it so funky that it should have gotten a music video with plenty of choreography. The interesting thing about this one though is that it not only has some of that Dazz Band arrangement thanks to Masanori Sasaji（笹路正徳）but there are points where it approaches Manhattan Transfer-friendly fusion.
The above video was provided by Marty McFlies v2 (thank you for that, Marty) and I was struck by one comment he had in his explanation under the video. He mentioned that when he'd bought "Sahara", he hadn't been all that impressed with it and put it on the back burner for years. Years later, he gave it another shot and found it all so worthy. I could totally relate to that sentiment since I gave my first purchase of a Taeko Ohnuki（大貫妙子）album the same initial short shrift and many years in my cabinet before giving it another shot for some reason and then finally seeing the light.
On this blisteringly hot day, Canada is 159 years old. Happy Birthday to the Great White North! Personally, I'm trying to stay cool in my room with the decades-old electric fan helping me out.
Of course, being a national holiday and all, Reminiscings of Youth will be having a special article today (along with the regular weekly one tomorrow) to commemorate Canada Day. Glad to read that Ottawa-born singer-songwriter Bruce Cockburn (pronounced KOH-bərn...like James Coburn) is with us at the age of 81. Forty-two years ago in 1984, he released his "Lovers in a Dangerous Time" which became a Top 40 hit here and a long resident on the music video charts on television. There were some contrasts here: 1) the contrast of young teens finding fresh new love during a time when the spectre of the Cold War was still looming large and 2) Cockburn's button-down and soothing pop-rock arrangement meshed with a performance video of what I could describe as something quite avant-garde Cirque du Soleil.
In Canada, "Lovers in a Dangerous Time" reached No. 24 on the RPM charts while on US Billboard, it peaked at No. 56.
Barenaked Ladies was a band born in the Toronto suburb of Scarborough. It's nicknamed Scarberia because of how desolate parts of it can look like during the winter (just look at the music video) but it also has a ton of restaurants of all nationalities that can keep people very happy and fed. Anyways, Barenaked Ladies was the same band behind the theme song for the long-running American sitcom "The Big Bang Theory", and they've been a bunch of good local boys who love to rock with a sense of humour. I first found out about them through a friend's car tape-cassette recorder when he was playing a compilation of their stuff which included their cover of "Lovers in a Dangerous Time".
It's a friendly, folksy and peppy take on Cockburn's original and watching Ed Robertson and the gang perform from the back of a pickup truck while it drives on the streets of Scarborough in the dead of winter is probably one of the most Canadian things I've ever posted on the blog. Their cover first appeared on the 1991 Cockburn tribute album "Kick at the Darkness" and it was released as the band's debut single in 1992.
The original song peaked on August 18th 1984, so why don't we see what was hitting the top of the Oricon charts a couple of days later? Let's go with a scattering of songs here with Nos. 5, 7 and 10.
This is the eighth article for singer-songwriter Shoko Sawada（沢田聖子）on KKP, and when it comes to her music, my memories always drift to the first song I ever heard from her, the warm and folksy "Ochiba no Heya"（落葉の部屋）from 1981, thanks to that listening on "Sounds of Japan" many moons ago.
On the other hand, Sawada's 11th single from April 1984, "Tokaijin"(Woman of the City) is quite different. For one thing, she had nothing to do with its creation; instead, it was written by veteran lyricist Masao Urino（売野雅勇）and composed by Eiji Nishiki（西木栄二）. For another, it's a rumbling pop/rock song about a young lady who gets seduced by the night life of a metropolis despite her friend's increasingly angry and desperate warnings. Although I think Sawada handled the song ably enough, I couldn't help but feel that "Tokaijin" was perhaps not the most perfect fit for her and maybe the powers-that-be above her had wanted to put a bit more boost in her variety of music. Mind you, it's all speculation from me but I also thought that this was something that an aidoru like Akina Nakamori（中森明菜）would have tackled with more energy. The song was also placed as a track on the singer's 6th album"Kaze no Yokan"（風の予感...Presage of the Wind） which was released a month after the single.
I was once asked by one of the commenters about an Author's Picks regarding airports. After all, in terms of an old kayo kyoku, the airport serves as a setting for romantic farewells and (rarely) greetings. Plus, they can also be the launching point for adventures abroad. Now, I believe that I had yet to post such a list of airport-themed songs so I'm going with this one today to finish my trio of articles.
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