Chiyuki Asami -- Sushi Ya de...（鮨屋で…）

 

Welcome to another work week at KKP! To start things off, I received a message from a downtown foodie emporium that Wednesday June 18th is International Sushi Day. Had no idea...I do love my sushi, though, although the realization hadn't punched in until that Japanese Language School trip to Japan in 1981. It wasn't just the love for music that arose within me that fateful July that year...sushi, sashimi and eel all became a thing for me.

Of course, I was scouting around for some sort of sushi-themed kayo kyoku. I'd already posted Shibugakitaki's（シブがき隊）"Sushi Kui ne!"（スシ食いねェ！）and Hibari Misora's（美空ひばり）"Edokko Sushi"（江戸っ子寿司）, both of which are pretty genki tunes.

But on the other hand, enka singer Chiyuki Asami's（あさみちゆき）"Sushi ya de..." (At the Sushi Restaurant...), her 8th single from December 2008, there's quite a solemn and bittersweet atmosphere hanging over the father and daughter dining at the titular eatery. The lyrics by Chiho Inoue（井上千穂）talk of the daughter, on the verge of her wedding day, no longer being able to have regular talks with Dad and no longer being to talk with Mom for quite a while now. Not sure if Mom had already passed away or left the family, but there is plenty of regret emanating from the lass as the sushi chef is molding his wares. Masato Sugimoto's（杉本眞人）melody is also very sad in a folk music kind of way. Masashi Sada（さだまさし）would nod in approval. "Sushi ya de..." managed to reach No. 38 on Oricon.

Have that negitoro on me!🍣

Chiyuki Asami -- Tasogare Cinema（黄昏シネマ）

 

The above is a theatre near the Toei Animation Museum in Nerima Ward, Tokyo. My friend and I visited the museum in 2014 although we didn't actually see a flick at the T-Joy. As someone who's been catching movies for decades, a multi-year move to Japan didn't change my habits for the most part and so I continued to see the Hollywood blockbusters in Tokyo. I think in the last half of my stay in Ichikawa, I noticed that theatres were getting more advanced up to the level of VIP versions which I've gotten spoiled on. But before then, a number of the movie houses had been darn old with seats small enough that at one point, I was virtually wearing them like a diaper...yes, let's not imagine that, shall we? I don't think red velour is that absorbent anyways.

It's those old places of Ginza, Shinjuku and Ikebukuro that I used to frequent that get the spotlight in Chiyuki Asami's（あさみちゆき）"Tasogare Cinema" (Sunset Cinema). I first wrote about the Yamaguchi Prefecture native in November 2023 regarding her 2004 song "Inokashira-sen"（井の頭線）, and noted how her choice of music settled in that middle ground known as New Adult Music between folk and enka.

"Tasogare Cinema" was released as her 10th single in April 2010 and it's a poignant ballad about a woman returning to a neighbourhood for the first time in a decade where she and her ex-boyfriend used to hang out. An old theatre there was one of their haunts and she goes inside noting that her old flame is probably now still living in the neighbourhood with his current girlfriend or wife. Written by Mami Takubo（田久保真見）and composed by Masato Sugimoto（杉本眞人）, there is very much a "que sera sera" feeling in the song as if the woman has moved on with her life but still wants to remember old times. The single peaked at No. 40 on Oricon.

"Tasogare Cinema" also appeared in an earlier version as a track on Asami's 2nd album from June 2005 "Asami no Uta II"（あさみのうたII...Asami's Songs II）. The original version has an even more elegiac feeling with that orchestra backing the singer up. On the other hand, the later 2010 single feels more along the lines of some of the power ballads from the 1970s and maybe early 1980s such as Michael Johnson's "Bluer Than Blue" and Saburo Tokito's（時任三郎）"Kawa no Nagare wo Daite Nemuritai" (川の流れを抱いて眠りたい）.

Chiyuki Asami -- Inokashira-sen（井の頭線）

 

Whenever I arrived at Shibuya Station, I often saw and heard about the Keio Inokashira Line which begins and ends there. I didn't ride it all that much but I believe that there was that one time when I used it to head over to the popular district of Kichijoji. A bunch of us all decided to have hamburgers at one particular place there. By the way, the above video is from the YouTube channel, Tokyo Explorer.

Romance was definitely not something that I ever thought about when it came to the Inokashira Line, and yet I did come across this song by singer Chiyuki Asami（あさみちゆき）. When I was posting Kazuya Amikura's（網倉一也）"Good-bye Yokosuka" （Good-bye 横須賀）over the weekend was the time that I discovered "Inokashira-sen" (Inokashira Line) because Amikura was the composer with Mami Takubo（田久保真見）as the lyricist.

Released as Asami's 3rd single in October 2004, the Keio train line is the setting for some bittersweet memories by a person who got on the line with their erstwhile lover back in happier times. It's been categorized as an enka on J-Wiki, but I think that there is also something folksy in the arrangement, too, so maybe this could also fall under the category of a 21st-century New Adult Music tune. "Inokashira-sen" managed to peak at No. 64 on Oricon.

Asami was born as Yoko Yamamoto（山本陽子）in Yamaguchi Prefecture. Her distinctive stage name was formed with the family name of Asami coming from the love of the morning seascape in her hometown and the given name of Chiyuki taken from her brother who had sadly passed away some years previously. Beginning her career in 2003, she's been known as The Diva of Inokashira Park, a place where she still performs monthly as a busker. She likes to cover kayo kyoku, J-Pop, enka and folk. She has released 20 singles up to 2017 and several albums.