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.
Recently going over "Light Mellow ~ Beams", I've come across a few tracks on the compilation that I never thought to cover on the blog, so shame on me for that oversight.
One of those former neglected songs from "Beams" is Izumi Kobayashi（小林泉）& Flying Mimi Band's "My Beach Samba", originally from her March 1978 debut album"ORANGE SKY－Endless Summer". Written, composed and arranged by Kobayashi herself, it's a fun and perky and Latin jazzyCity Pop number of the 1970s with inclusion of that decade's aural symbol of the genre...the keyboard haze effect. Speaking of keyboards, I think that is indeed Kobayashi just going crazy on her instrument near the end. Not to be outdone, I have to mention the saxophone and guitar solos, too.
PS. Well, it looks like my memory is failing me. I did write up something on the album proper back in 2019 and that also included my comments on "My Beach Samba". But hey, any song is worth another look.
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!
Not sure what the situation is regarding the huge billowing mass of forest fire smoke that's been coming down into Southern Ontario for the past few days. Apparently, some winds were supposed to give us some respite from the smaze before returning tonight. Well, so far, I've got the window open but I haven't exactly been coughing up my lungs yet, so maybe this is a good development.
Anyways, I have another song by Tokimeki Records. Up to now, I've collected a small group of their songs which have been covers of some of the City Pop classics. But this time, the unit has come up with an original tune "Tsuki wa Mirror Ball" (Under the Mirror Moon) which came out in June. Still, as usual, a featured female vocalist is on the mike and her name is Mai Zaitsu（財津マイ）. I couldn't find out anything at all about her although she's been depicted as an anime character thus far in Yahoo Images. Her voice is nice and smoky alongside the Neo-City Pop showing some of that nocturnal bouncy rhythm (maybe good for the car stereo). The only other question that I have about the singer is whether she is a relative of Tulip singer-songwriter Kazuo Zaitsu（財津和夫）.
For some reason, I'd been under the impression that actress-singer Teresa Noda（テレサ野田）had already been on KKP but apparently not; this is her first appearance on the blog, so I bid her welcome. Maybe it was something about the name or a similarity in album/single covers.
Anyways, Noda hails from Okinawa as the daughter of a second-generation Japanese-American man and a Japanese woman (according to her J-Wiki profile, she had been far better in English than Japanese). She made her debut as an actress in the early 1970s and it would be another several years before she began recording those singles she released with the first one coming out in 1977. Incidentally, she's had a number of different stage names during her career including her real name of Tamaki Saionji（西園寺環）.
Her third and final single under the name of Teresa Noda to date is "Tropical Love" from May 1979 which was created by the golden duo of lyricist Kazumi Yasui（安井かずみ）and composer Kazuhiko Kato（加藤和彦）with Ryuichi Sakamoto（坂本龍一）behind the arrangement. I'm not sure if it would be considered City Pop, but it does have those disco strings and a strong reggae beat. Noda does have a resonant and attractively creamy voice here.
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:
Well, it was quite a time in Toronto over the past few weeks. This World Cup that had been talked about for years and years finally showed up and ended with one of the mighty showstopping games of the tournament between Portugal and Croatia last night. I'm not a big soccer fan but even I had known that Portugal and Croatia would be a huge spectacle and it was. And up until then, Toronto got to see some massive fan parades downtown in the afternoons including the one represented by Germany above. But now that my hometown has finished its contribution to World Cup 2026, Toronto Stadium is now losing its extra seats and being reconverted back to ol' BMO Field.
Coincidentally, speaking of afternoon parades, I have here singer-songwriter Shikao Suga's（スガシカオ）"Gogo no Parade" (Afternoon Parade). Suga was actually on yesterday's "Premium Talk" segment of NHK's "Asaichi"（あさイチ）morning information show and he got to perform what I had thought was some new material. As it turned out, it was more of his old hits including "Gogo no Parade".
When it comes to Suga's discography, I've known him primarily for "Progress", the theme song for NHK's long-running documentary series "Professional ~ Shigoto no Ryuugi"（プロフェッショナル 仕事の流儀...The Professionals ~ The Style of Work）, and the big hit that he provided SMAP with, "Yozora no Mukou"（夜空ノムコウ）. I'd had no idea that he did have a taste for disco (as do I) but he got that itch that he needed to scratch, so he whipped up the fun "Gogo no Parade".
Released as Suga's 21st single in September 2006, he wanted to go for the disco gusto, so he contacted former Simply Red drummer Gota Yashiki（屋敷豪太）. Of course, disco needs strings so Yashiki himself got in touch with the production team behind Jamiroquai with the result being that the London Session Orchestra lent a hand. Put up that disco ball! Not only was Yashiki on the drums but the late singer-songwriter Nobuo Ariga（有賀啓雄）was on the bass.
"Gogo no Parade" hit No. 23 on Oricon. It was also used as a theme song for a number of projects including a real estate firm commercial, a movie and a music variety show. As for the music video, it was filmed at a wedding reception hall in Atsugi City, Kanagawa Prefecture. Just the place for some group summer fun.
Back in the spring of 2023, I posted an article on a very obscure singer, Izumi Sara（沙羅いづみ）, and her B-side"Heartbreak City"（ハート・ブレイク・シティ）which was a pretty amiable disco City Pop tune.
Well, today to start off this edition of Urban Contemporary Friday on "Kayo Kyoku Plus", I have the A-side this time, "Spacy Love" which seems to amp up the disco and the brass. Along with the disco, there is the City Pop and maybe even some exotic kayoin the intro. Written by same duo behind "Heartbreak City", lyricist Fumiko Okada（岡田富美子）and composer/arranger Kunihiko Suzuki（鈴木邦彦）, the writer on Hip Tank Records gave their assessment of the song (translation by Google Translate):
"...a charmingly unpolished cult Japanese disco track—a medium-tempo, spacey disco number with a melody that evokes an oriental atmosphere...".
Perhaps there is a bit of a backhand swing in that compliment but I think that brass has some Yuji Ohno（大野雄二）or Spectrum vibes, and to be honest, I sometimes feel that the horns came in from a particular Ryohei Yamanashi（山梨良平）tune from the future or were inspired by Maynard Ferguson. Hip Tank Records also treats "Spacy Love" as one of those rare cult singles so if any of you City Pop fans can get a copy of it anywhere, consider yourselves fortunate.
Well, first off, I should recognize the fact that 80s aidoru and actress Kyoko Koizumi（小泉今日子）celebrated her 60th birthday earlier this year. Hopefully, her kanreki has gone well.
Less than a month ago, I featured Kyon-Kyon in techno dance mode through her 1989 song "Micro Wave"（マイクロWAVE）. Today, I'm heading back to her early days as an aidoru with her third single "Hitori Machikado"(Alone on the Corner) which was released in September 1982. I'd been accustomed to hearing Koizumi as this rather sassy-sounding teenybopper so hearing "Hitori Machikado", a song of being alone once again with only a seashell brooch as the final symbol of a former relationship, was interesting because the lass sounds less sass and more conventional high-falutin' aidoru.
Written by Yoshiko Miura（三浦徳子）and composed by Koji Makaino（馬飼野康二）, I'm never going to turn down a disco beat in an aidoru tune and it's got those fleet-footed strings that occupied many of such a tune. "Hitori Machikado" peaked at No. 13 on Oricon. Another piece of trivia is that this single was Koizumi's first truly original song since the first two singles including her debut"Watashi no 16-sai"(私の16才）were actually cover songs of previously recorded tunes by other singers.
According to the J-Wiki article on the song, it picked up a number of awards including a Gold Prize at the Shinjuku Music Festival for that year. During the finale of that festival though, Koizumi was pelted with a raw egg which hit her on the head by some disgruntled person in the audience. Apparently, Akina Nakamori（中森明菜）, who had been the runner-up for the Gold, immediately came to her assistance.
I hadn't quite understood what the music video for Nik Kershaw's January 1984 hit "Wouldn't It Be Good?" was all about but dang, I really did enjoy the New Wave song. I finally realized that Kershaw had been acting as some alien curious about what humans were like and after having a good tasting, decided that they weren't all that healthy after all and scampered back off to his home planet.
Still, as I said, "Wouldn't It Be Good?" was a good load of fun to listen to, and just for YMOfan04's benefit, I can explain that the synths used were a PPG Wave 2.2 and a Yamaha DX7. It made for quite an interesting riff, and I was surprised to find out that the cool instrumental bridge in the extended version was actually an "orchestra of electric guitars" rather than a bank of synth-horns which now makes things even cooler.
I'd probably say that I heard "Wouldn't It Be Good?" more on the radio than saw the video on TV. The radio back then was giving it a whole lot of heavy airplay. In Canada, it hit No. 9 on RPM and in the United States, it only got as high as No. 46. Meanwhile in Kershaw's UK, it peaked at No. 4 on the OCC.
So, what was occupying the Oricon charts a few days following the release of "Wouldn't It Be Good?" in the world? I have Nos. 5, 6 and 7.
The disco/R&B band A Taste of Honey has had residency on KKP since the blog was three weeks old. I was tackling one of the great kayo classics in "Ue wo Muite Arukou"(上を向いて歩こう）, aka "Sukiyaki", when I also mentioned that A Taste of Honey provided their own cover on the song in the early 1980s...which proved to be their second and final hit in their career thus far.
However, as commendable as their elegant cover of the iconic Kyu Sakamoto（坂本九）song was, their first big hit has been the one that has been usually recognized when it comes to A Taste of Honey. The strange thing is that when I first heard their 1978 debut single"Boogie Oogie Oogie", it was through a TV performance of this song by then-teen sibling stars Kristy and Jimmy McNichol on some sort of nighttime special. With the whole mainstream disco craze, the McNichols' popularity at the time, and the novelty song-esque nature of that title, I actually did assume that this was the McNichols' tune, front and centre.
And yes, the above has Kristy and Jimmy, but no, it isn't for "Boogie Oogie Oogie".
So, it was actually many years later that I found out the truth that "Boogie Oogie Oogie" was by A Taste of Honey, and yeah as performed by Janice-Marie Johnson (and Hazel Payne) while slapping that bass hard and wearing those heels, maybe even the folks who were thinking that disco started to suck would have been willing to give a reprieve to this one. Heck, if I had been born a decade earlier, I probably would have been rarin' to run to my nearest disco and hit the dance floor. My dancing would have sucked for sure but I would have had oodles of fun doing so.
"Boogie Oogie Oogie" was not only a hit on the dance floor but also a hit outside of it as well. It hit No. 1 on Billboard's pop, disco and soul charts in September 1978, and according to the Wikipedia article for the song, it also became the first certified Platinum single in the history of Capitol Records by selling over 2 million records. I would probably posit that the chairman's office became a disco dance floor in celebration.
So, we've got one of the primo disco songs coming out in 1978. What else was winning at the Japan Record Awards that year?
I've got to admit...I wasn't quite sure what to make of this B-side to Hi-Fi Set's（ハイ・ファイ・セット）8th single from April 1977, "Kaze no Machi"（風の街）. The A-side is the straightforward City Pop driving song that's got the breeze going through the hair and love filtering through the heart.
"Crystal Night", not to be confused with Junko Ohashi's（大橋純子）classic "Crystal City" which came out the same year, is a B-side that had me popping question marks around my head initially. Right from the intro, my ears were hit by a mixture of disco strings and country-loving steel pedal guitar before things settled down into this 1970s peppy City Pop song. And then, the roots rock guitar came crashing in like Superman through a wall. Still, "Crystal Night" overall feels like another hot evening on the town much like its companion "Kaze no Machi". Two of the members of Hi-Fi Set, Shigeru Okawa（大川茂）and Toshihiko Yamamoto（山本俊彦）were responsible for words and music respectively with Ichizo Seo（瀬尾一三）taking care of the arrangement. The song was also a track on the group's 3rd album from February 1977,"Love Collection"（ラブ・コレクション）which not only hit No. 1 on Oricon but it was also the No. 1 album of the year.
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.
Near the end of last month, commenter Francois informed me of a Linda Yamamoto（山本リンダ）song that I hadn't heard before titled "Crazy Baby", so I decided to investigate.
"Crazy Baby" is actually the B-side to Yamamoto's 37th single from February 1978, "Minato no Soul" (Harbour Soul) and just seeing the title had me intrigued enough to tackle this one first. And yup, it's certainly got that strutting soul as the chorus pipes up like horns on a ship as they rattle off some of the major ports around Japan such as Yokohama. This was written by Akira Ito（伊藤アキラ）and composed/arranged by Tetsuji Hayashi（林哲司）, no slouch when it comes to the City Pop department. Some nice horns come in near the end as well.
The disco continues with "Crazy Baby" and once again, it was the team of Ito and Hayashi behind this B-side which is a little peppier than "Minato no Soul". Francois and I also noted the sexy and soft kittenish vocals by Yamamoto for both songs compared to the Charo-like voice on her classic "Nerai Uchi"（狙いうち）from a few years earlier. But then again, I think Yamamoto did something similar for her debut single"Kommachauna"（こまっちゃうナ）although not as softly.
I believe I mentioned that I finally caught Zack Snyder's very long take on "Justice League" recently, and I was a lot more satisfied with that than with the version that I had caught some years previously at the theatre. Most notably, I was really happy with the scene involving Wonder Woman as played by Gal Gadot taking on those psychos in London early in the movie. Once I heard that warrior theme by Rupert Gregson-Williams, I knew I was going to witness some massive ass-kicking by Diana of Themyscira.
One day, the Snyderverse take showed up on the local sci-fi channel and that same scene popped up when I turned on the channel. My mother who has never understood or liked any form of superhero media surprised me when she verbally identified Wonder Woman. But then again, she had seen Diana many moons ago.
That's right. There was a time in the mid-1970s when my brother and I saw the weekly TV series "Wonder Woman" with Lynda Carter. So, we got to see the indestructible bracelets, the Lasso of Truth and the spinning around each episode.
Yes, I still remember when a pre-"An Officer and a Gentleman"Debra Winger guested as Diana's little sister, aka Wonder Girl. In fact, I think I prefer the first season when the show had been set during World War II instead of the more contemporary setting for the last couple of seasons.
At the time, I was also confused when I was watching the opening credits which paid homage to the original comic book from decades ago, and yet, the theme song was decidedly cheesy disco boogie. I mean, nowadays it all comes to me as very nostalgic but at the time, I thought it was pretty progressive to hear a superhero theme song that sounded like something one would dance to in the clubs.
I never knew who was behind the theme song for "Wonder Woman" the 1975 series. As it turns out, it was John Bahler of the Ron Hicklin Singers on the main vocals, Marti McCall, Carolyn Willisof the R&B group Honey Cone, and Julia Waters of the R&B group The Waters according to Wikipedia. Charles Fox and Normal Gimbel made up the songwriting team.
November 7th 1975 was the date when "Wonder Woman" premiered. Well, what was hitting the Oricon charts a few days earlier on the 3rd? We have Nos. 3 and 6.
But as the informercial announcer says...Wait! There's more!
"Wonder Woman" did make its way to Japan sometime down the line and though the Bahler theme song was played for that first season, the subsequent seasons had actress/singer Kaoru Yumi（由美かおる）provide a Japanese theme tune in the form of "Ai no Boukensha"(Adventurer of Love) which was specifically for the series; Machiko Ryu's（竜真知子）lyrics give a blatant shoutout to Wonder Woman. Meanwhile, the melody by Ken Sato（佐藤健）and arrangement by Akira Inoue（井上鑑）also follow a disco line but more on the AOR side of things.
This is Yumi's first time on the blog. From what I remember of her, she had a recurring role in the legendary jidaigeki series "Mito Komon"（水戸黄門）as quite a warrior herself. She was also famous in that show for her bathing scenes which you can see being parodied in the commercial below.
I'm sure that a lot of folks in my neck of the woods would greatly prefer not to hear the word "snow" for the next several months at least. It was a very long and cold winter and even now, things are still pretty cool although temperatures should be rising happily next week.
However, allow me this one. A few weeks ago, I introduced singer Masaki Sato（佐藤正樹 or 佐藤真紀）who wasn't the most prolific fellow with just two singles that I could find online thus far. I did cover his second single"Million Night" from 1983 which seems to cover a really rumbling City Pop drive down the urban highways. Well, this time, it's his debut single from 1982 which is a whole lot more congenial and jingly.
I don't mean "jingly" as in a Christmas jingle bells sort of way, though. It's more like this really does sound like a commercial jingle (and the lyrics do contain the corporate catchphrase "It's the No. 1 spirit!"). "Snow Dancer" was the 1982 campaign song for the sporting goods store Salomon, and I guess from the title, perhaps the company was aiming for the skiing set. Written and composed by the same duo behind the later "Million Night", lyricist Akira Ohtsu（大津あきら）and composer Kisaburo Suzuki（鈴木キサブロー）, the happy City Pop disco arrangement was provided by Kazuo Otani（大谷和夫）. No, perhaps there isn't a city involved with the ski resorts and slopes but skiing has been connected with the urban and urbane lifestyle for such a long time that we can give this one a pass. It's just too bad that I couldn't find the commercial itself on YouTube.
Hiromi Ohta's（太田裕美）trademark song will forever be "Momen no Handkerchief"(木綿のハンカチーフ）. It has that fresh countryside feeling of innocence and hope emanating from a young lady. Written by Takashi Matsumoto（松本隆）, composed by Kyohei Tsutsumi（筒美京平）and arranged by Mitsuo Hagita（萩田光雄）, one couldn't have asked for a steadier trio of song creators to weave this hit.
But guess what? I guess that young lady simply couldn't resist that pull from Tokyo or whatever huge metropolis was close to her small town. She finally relented and took the train and ran into the disco to dance out her passions. And that's where we are with "Unlimited" which is represented by the "∞" on Ohta's source album"Umi ga Naiteiru"（海が泣いている...The Sea is Crying） from December 1978. It also happens to be the final track on the album, so I guess Ohta wanted us to continue all of the nocturnal dancing.
The crazy and wonderful thing is that Matsumoto, Tsutsumi and Hagita were also all in on this number as well which had me thinking mirror ball, Bee Gees and flashing floor panels. But then again, back in those 1970s, when it came to disco stuff, Tsutsumi was the go-to guy for the melodies. That piano instrumental break followed by the electric guitar is absolutely sublime to me. Enjoy boogeying the night away!
A few nights ago, I was wondering about all-night radio after having taken another look back at my article on my fantasy radio show. I then punched in "All-Night Radio" into the YouTube search engine. I'd been expecting at least a few excerpts on how the DJs sounded back then on their midnight-6 am shows, but I got nothing. Instead, though, I did get a lot of videos featuring singer-songwriter Ado and something "All-Night Radio".
Well, this was interesting, I thought. Up to now, I've always seen her as the enigmatic rock chanteuse who can soar up and down the vocal range like an express elevator powered by a ramjet. But with "All-Night Radio", which was released as her October 2023 single, it actually sounded like a very perky and upbeat pop tune that was ready-made for radio. In fact, it came across as a disco-inflected Neo-City Pop song that could have a lot of nightcrawlers cheerfully turning up that dial. Mind you, it may be a little too upbeat for the beginning or middle of a 6-hour all-night broadcast. Perhaps this could be the song to finish it off just when the sun peeks over the horizon in the morning.
Created by Mitchie M., "All-Night Radio" was used as the theme song for some sort of stage play on the Nippon Broadcasting System radio station, and its lyrics happen to be about getting ready for that radio show. There's even a shoutout to Mood Kayoand Frank Nagai（フランク永井）. The song reached No. 12 on Oricon.
Looking over the file for Rie Ida（井田リエ）& 42nd Street, I was somewhat shocked to see that all of the six songs that I've featured on "Kayo Kyoku Plus" have been from 1980 such as "Star"（スター）. I'm not sure if I'd had some sort of fixation on that year.
Allow me to expand on her discography, temporally speaking, by going back to their 1977 debut album"Street Talk". The track that starts it off is the wistful "Koi no Arashi" (Love Storm). Written by Hikari or Kou Kurashiki（倉敷光）and composed by Yoshihiro Yonekura（米倉良広）, it's a pleasant slow simmer of disco and soul which certainly doesn't come across as something that Ida was trepidatious about. Her breathy vocals, the silvery strings and the sax solo give a good sign about the next few years in 42nd Street's career. I will always appreciate a song which brings images of enjoying a beer at the top of a New York brownstone at the end of a day.
Ah, yes...Vachon's Half-Moon Cakes...which have nothing to do with the sweets during the Moon Festival in September. Actually, these were a part of my youth during lunchtime. When I got together with the guys for lunch at high school in front of our lockers, my mother would usually put one of these into my brown bag as the dessert segment. They came in lemon and chocolate versions and were (and still are) so sweet that they were responsible for the sugar crashes in the afternoon classes.
The above makes for a Canadian treat segue into this 20th single by Hiromi Ohta（太田裕美）"Koi no Half-Moon"(Half-Moon of Love) which was released back in March 1981. This was also the follow-up to Ohta's "Saraba Siberia Tetsudo"(さらばシベリア鉄道）that had come out in December 1980, and it was basically the same songwriting lineup for that one that was responsible for "Koi no Half-Moon", lyricist Takashi Matsumoto（松本隆）and composer/arranger Eiichi Ohtaki（大滝詠一）with Masataka Matsutoya（松任谷正隆）helping on the arrangement of the strings and horns.
"Koi no Half-Moon" is an interesting one. It didn't impress me on first listen but it has started to grow on me. The notable thing is that it doesn't sound like a typical Ohtaki arrangement with that overall 50s and/or country-western twang that has become a staple of his melody work ("Saraba Siberia Tetsudo" is a classic in that way). In fact, I'd say that with some of the disco feeling in there, it sounds a bit more Electric Light Orchestra without the heavy synths. As for Matsumoto, he wove a story about a couple enjoying a night ride in the convertible and stopping off at their version of Inspiration Point in Japan, and if any of you have watched the old American sitcom "Happy Days", you'll know the significance of Inspiration Point. Hopefully, the only thing looking down at the soon-to-be very happy pair is the half-moon itself.
Although "Saraba Siberia Tetsudo" has become one of Ohta's trademark songs, it only scored a No. 70 ranking initially on Oricon, and looking through her discography on J-Wiki, it was evident that her big days (outside of what her most dedicated fans thought) were receding. "Koi no Half-Moon" peaked at No. 81.
The B-side, "Blue Baby Blue", was also created by Ohtaki and Matsumoto with Yasuo Arakawa（荒川康男）helping the former out on arrangement. Now, this sounds more like an Ohtaki production...yup, Richie and Mary Beth out on the porch swing in the 1950s. However, the lyrics are a whole lot sadder as someone is having some major regrets about breaking up with that special lass. Post-breakup blues never sounded more sweet and nostalgic.
It was back in 2018 when I first wrote on Izumi Kobayashi（小林泉美）& Flying Mimi Band, a group that had been listed within my first edition of "Japanese City Pop" for a number of years before I started exploring on YouTube. There I found their "Naze"（なぜ）which was some fine downtown City Pop funk from 1978.
Well, that was from their October 1978 2nd album"Sea Flight" (considering the slightly daring cover, I thought it was called "Sexy Flight"). I have also found another track from "Sea Flight" which is "Angel Sky", which was composed by saxophonist Yasuaki Shimizu（清水靖晃）and written by Kobayashi herself. It's a nice dusky form of jazzy City Pop disco, and though I was a bit dismissive of her vocals in "Naze", I think Kobayashi has got a better handle of them here. But I think for this one, it's all about the instruments coming to the fore, especially the sax, keyboards and bluesy guitar.
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