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.
Welcome to the final day of July...pretty much halfway through summer. And hopefully, your entry into August and the latter half of the hot season will be a good fun one.
Despite the title of this sparkling Chiyono Yoshino（吉野千代乃）song, "1985-nen no Koibito"(Lovers in 1985) was actually something from 1987 when it and the rest of its track mates were released in the singer's June 1987 3rd album "Say Goodbye". Not sure about why the focus on lovers in that specific year but...and I say this tongue in cheek...with the signing of the Plaza Accords in 1985, perhaps lovers realized that they pretty much had carte blanche when it came to dating and having fun in Bubble Era Japan.😊
But I digress. "1985-nen no Koibito", which was written by Goro Matsui（松井五郎）and composed by Kyoko Matsumiya（松宮恭子）, is a very upbeat slice of sophisticated pop with a wedge of happy-happy samba on top which launches with some pounding bass and keyboard. It practically demands listeners to get into a conga line on the Lido Deck of some cruise liner. Strangely enough, the footage in the video above comes from the 1990 trendy drama "Sekai de Ichiban Kimi ga Suki"（世界で一番君が好き....I Love You The Most in the World), one of the first such dramas that I watched on Fuji-TV when I arrived on the JET Programme some months before. Its theme song is of a much different genre, though.
Well, it's been over six years since I wrote about 80s aidoru Maiko Okamoto's（岡本舞子）sophomore and final album to date, "Fascination", from July 1986. As was the case back then, I only wrote about a few of the tracks there but was...well, fascinated by the fact that some bigwigs in the industry such as singer-songwriter Etsuko Yamakawa（山川恵津子）were behind the production, especially since City Pop was involved.
Happy to say that I've reopened the Okamoto file thanks to this track from "Fascination" that I hadn't covered. Titled "Aoi Summertime", this was written by Goro Matsui（松井五郎）with the aforementioned Yamakawa behind composition and arrangement. It's quite the zippy aidoru tune with the sparkly synths and Okamoto's genki vocals singing about young love in the hot season. I'm just glad that I could find a song with "summer" in the title especially when things have been blazing both here and in Japan. As for the colour mentioned in the title, aoi（蒼い）, I had initially assumed that it was "Green Summertime" but apparently considering the lyrics, I think it might be better to say "Sky-Blue Summertime".
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）.
I realize that I should have done this yesterday when the Lunar New Year began but it was getting late into the night and I was just too tired. Anyways, perhaps it's just as well that I'm doing this today on Hump Day when I need to get some energy expended especially on a dreary stormy day. So, allow me to give my Happy Lunar New Year greetings to everyone who's celebrating it this week and they include some of my friends and some of my brother's in-laws. Hopefully, you have eaten very well so far.
To be frank, I'm kinda surprised that I hadn't done an Author's Picks based on the Lunar New Year before but that simply means that I get to do it today when folks are celebrating the Year of the Horse. My picks here don't have any significantly deep meaning aside from the fact that they include song titles connected to areas whose populations would celebrate the holiday. Among the five I'm listing here, three of them already have their own articles on KKP, while the last two are newbies, so I guess this article is a hybridization of an Author's Picks and a regular posting.
The entries above and below are the newbies as I mentioned at the top and they're being included now since I had been looking for these songs on YouTube for years (and giving up) before they finally popped up. I actually borrowed Naoko Kawai's （河合奈保子）March 1985 11th studio album"Stardust Garden ~ Sennen Teien"（STARDUST GARDEN -千・年・庭・園-...Millennium Garden） from a friend back in my university days but never got my own copy, and the one song that I remember from it is "Chinatown Rhapsody" which also has the English subtitle of "Missin' Girl" which hints at some sort of neighbourhood intrigue. Written by Masao Urino（売野雅勇）, composed by Kyohei Tsutsumi（筒美京平）and arranged by Hiroshi Shinkawa（新川博）, the song goes at a good clip with a certain mysterious aura imbued throughout. I do like that twanging instrument in the intro.
(1987) Koji Tamaki -- Hong Kong
Honestly speaking, I hadn't gotten a great impression of Koji Tamaki's（玉木浩二) "Hong Kong" in the intro which sounded like a combination of a soundtrack from an episode of "Doctor Who" deep into the 1980s when the show was frankly going downhill and a little smidgen of a Pet Shop Boys tune. Now that I've gotten to hear it for the first time in many years, "Hong Kong" still won't enter my Top 5 Tamaki songs but it's a pretty tight and sexy song thanks to his considerable vocals and the simmering arrangement by Chris Cameron. Tamaki was responsible for melody while Goro Matsui（松井五郎）provided the lyrics.
I'd never seen the music video for "Hong Kong" before and it appears that the director was going for a Neo-Noir look in the titular city with Tamaki cutting quite the figure as someone reminiscent of the late actor Yusaku Matsuda（松田優作）. Tamaki's naturally saturnine looks can have viewers wondering about which side he's working for. "Hong Kong" is a part of his debut solo album"All I Do" which was released in August 1987 and peaked at No. 2 on Oricon.
Just a small matter but here I was thinking that I had plenty of female singers named Haruko up on "Kayo Kyoku Plus", only to realize that I merely have the one: Haruko Kuwana（桑名晴子）. Mind you, she's a fine soulful chanteuse so not complaining there.
However, there are now two on the blog. Haruko Sagara（相楽晴子）had her initial time in the limelight for about a decade...between 1984 and 1995...as an actress, aidoru and a tarento. Her family originally hailed from the city of Koriyama in Fukushima Prefecture but following the premature death of her father and growing business debts, her mother promptly closed down the store and took everyone to Tokyo. In 1980 when she was around 12, she was scouted out in Shibuya by a photographer and young Haruko became a successful model.
In the mid-1980s, acting and singing arrived on her entertainment doorstep with the latter part of her career beginning with her debut single"Virgin Heart"（ヴァージン・ハート）being released in May 1986. For this article, we have her 7th single, "Tokyo Marionette", from April 1989. Written by Goro Matsui（松井五郎）and composed by Masato Ishida（石田正人）, the song was arranged by Satoshi Takebe（武部聡志）as this fairly dramatic number with a bit of rock n' roll which had me thinking of a teenage gang moll riding on the back of her boyfriend's Kawasaki as they are fleeing something or someone. Her fate is his fate.
Fortuntely, Sagara's fate was far more benign. In 1992, she started a relationship with one of the staff while she was in Los Angeles on a location shoot for one of her photo books. A few years later, they would get married in the United States and in 2019, there was a move to the state of Hawaii.
As expected, "Uta Con"（うたコン）had its final episode of the year on Tuesday night with a retrospective on 2025's highlights. They did have some guests performing in front of the camera, though.
One of the acts was the oft-appearing group Junretsu（純烈）which has now been whittled down to a trio. They will be showing up on the Kohaku Utagassen in a few weeks as one of the relatively fewer performers providing something akin to the old kayo.
Maybe they will be performing their June 2025 single"Futari dake no Himitsu" (A Secret Between You and Me) which is what they sang on "Uta Con". I quickly caught onto their combination of old-fashioned doo-wop and kayo kyoku, and my mind went back to the sentimental music of the 1960s and 1970s because of it. Written by Goro Matsui（松井五郎）, composed by Kohei Miyuki（幸耕平）and arranged by Mitsuo Hagita（萩田光雄）, it's no wonder how old-school it sounds considering the three music creators behind it.
The official music video above has Junretsu taking on double roles: of course, as themselves performing "Futari dake no Himitsu" in what appears to be an Okinawan bar and as a trio of lunkhead barflies smitten over a demure lady. Double of course, hearts will be broken.
Aye, it is November 25th and within the world of "Kayo Kyoku Plus", that means the Christmas season has begun and so over the next month, there will be a liberal sprinkling of J-Xmas tunes popping up here and there like Keebler elves until December 25th. It looks like I may have accumulated a fair number of them for this year.
The first one for Xmas 2025 is a duet with Daisuke Inoue（井上大輔）, the same fellow behind the Group Sounds classic"Blue Chateau"（ブルー・シャトウ）back in the 1960s when he was part of the Blue Comets, and the splendid Cindy. "Namida yori mo Merry Xmas" (Merry Xmas Over Tears) was released in November 1990. Composed by Inoue and written by Goro Matsui（松井五郎）, this is a most bittersweet ballad in a contemporary pop style of the times that's quite typical of a number of Christmas tunes from Japan in which someone is waxing nostalgically over a past romance which had been sealed with that first kiss on Christmas Eve. Can't have Christmas songs be totally cheerful, after all.
The above thumbnail shot is a woozy photo of Roppongi Avenue with Tokyo Tower off in the distance. Not sure how popular it is as a Halloween get-together place but I can still imagine that it would be considering the numbers of foreigners that have conglomerated there on at least a weekly basis. I remember being there on October 31st in 2009 and saw a couple of ladies dressed up as gambling die walking down the avenue. Perhaps they should have been rolling down the avenue to keep up appearances.
Considering how bleary the above photo is, I can also imagine some guy moping down the street and wondering if and how he and his currently estranged love of his life can somehow get back together again. I think that's the premise of Yasuhiro Abe's（安部恭弘）"Fall in Love" which was composed by him with Goro Matsui（松井五郎）coming up with the lyrics. With a poignant minor-key arrangement leading the way, Abe dreamily relates the story of that young man planning to have a long-awaited conversation with the lady to give their relationship another try. The song was a track on his 11th album "Gallery" from October 1995. Despite the release date, "Fall in Love" sounds very 1980s.
Welcome to another Urban Contemporary Friday on Kayo Kyoku Plus. When I think of the crooning singer-songwriter Yasuhiro Abe（安部恭弘）, I will always think of him as one of the princes of 1980s City Pop in Japan.
So, when I saw one of his more recent songs I couldn't help but be a little surprised and delighted. "Sequence" is a track from his 2015 album"Time is", his first album release in a dozen years and though he obviously moved on from City Pop, the song is still in that comfortable area of café/bar-friendly jazzy AOR and pop. His vocals hadn't changed one whit either. While Abe took care of the melody, Goro Matsui（松井五郎）was the lyricist.
Never thought I would see the day that a song about an old handbag would get such the funky City Pop treatment, but as commenter Brian Mitchell has told me, the Japanese will write a song on virtually anything. I can certainly believe it.
Case in point is indeed "Furui Handbag" (Old Handbag) which was a track on singer and seiyuu Mami Koyama's（小山茉美）1985 album"Vivid". Sharing space with "Distance no Manatsu"（ディスタンスの真夏）, the two songs also share the same composer Etsuko Yamakawa（山川恵津子）, and my personal SOP has been that whenever I notice a new song that has Yamakawa's fingerprints on it, I investigate it! Sure enough, "Furui Handbag" has the urban funk and stylings of what would become the Bubble Era City Pop a year or so early. Goro Matsui（松井五郎）took care of the lyrics here and I can imagine that a young woman has had plenty of adventures with that handbag all throughout the town.
Back on Wednesday, I wrote up an article based on the late Hiroshi Narumi's （鳴海寛）"Ame Agari"（雨あがり）and since I will always think of him and singer-songwriter (almost always the latter) Etsuko Yamakawa（山川恵津子）as the City Pop duo Tohoku Shinkansen（東北新幹線）, I decided to whimsically throw her name into the YouTube search engine to see if she might have popped up with anything on her own. After all, in Part 4 of that translation that I did of the liner notes for Tohoku Shinkansen's one-and-only "Thru Traffic" (1982) last year, it was noted that Yamakawa hadn't been too fond of being front and centre behind the mike.
Well, I actually hit an unexpected Bingo when I put her name into the search engine. In July 2024, she released a digital single called "Do Yah!" with her behind the melody with veteran Goro Matsui（松井五郎）behind the lyrics. Perhaps time and circumstances mellowed her out on the old unwillingness to sing out on her own. In any case, she sounds great in a cute and kittenish way while handling her own tune which is reminiscent of late 80s-early 90s Bubble Era City Pop with some of that funk intertwined in there. Plus, there are some nice subtle harmonies in the background. For me, "Do Yah!" is Oh Yeah! Nice to hear her behind the mike again after 42 years.
On the cusp of her 60th anniversary in show business, veteran singer Saori Yuki（由紀さおり）appeared on one of the last episodes of "Uta Con"（うたコン）for 2024 and performed this song.
"Jinsei wa Subarashii"(Life is Wonderful) is her 66th single from April 2024 and it seems to absorb a number of musical styles: a bit of bossa here, a bit of AOR there and some sweet orchestral pop. The title is a big hint but I gather that this is a song of reassurance for everyone which encourages folks to stop and smell the roses once in a while. It was written by Goro Matsui（松井五郎）, composed by Gioacchino Maurici and arranged by Masayuki Sakamoto（坂本昌之）.
It's now been one year since Junko Ohashi（大橋純子）died at the age of 73 on November 9th 2023. So, as I did with a couple of covers of her hits including Shiori Sasaki's（佐々木詩織）"Simple Love"（シンプルラブ）yesterday during Urban Contemporary Fridays, I would like to continue the tribute to the soul singer with the boomer voice by taking a look at her January 1988 album, "DEF", over two articles, beginning with Side A.
First off, allow me to apologize, since it might look like a couple of ghost hands are trying to strangle the lovely woman above, but thanks to my very unprofessional photography skills, the flash function also included my attempts to take the picture. In any case, "DEF" was Ohashi's first album after moving from Philips, which had been her label ever since she first began her career in the early 1970s, to Epic/Sony Records, and though the release isn't solely a City Pop album as we will hear, she and her fashion team really went down to town to get that "Vogue" look which makes her appear that she's ready to hit the streets of 80s Bubble Era Tokyo for some champagne and caviar...or maybe she's heading to the Kentucky Derby.
According to the liner notes, "DEF" stands for "Dream, Emotion, Fragrance", so I'm already getting that sophisticated night vibe. The first four tracks on Side A actually represent the Hokkaido singer's 22nd and 23rd singles from January and February 1988 which include the bright and Big City feeling of the first track "Nemurenai Diamond" (眠れないダイアモンド）, one of my very favourites by Ohashi. It was because of hearing this Camellia Diamonds commercial song on the "Sounds of Japan" broadcast that had me searching for the source album for a few years. I was able to track down "DEF" probably during my time on the JET Programme.
Strange thing, though. Although I loved "Nemurenai Diamond", the other tracks on "DEF" didn't spark the same emotion initially and so it stayed on the shelf for many years without me taking it out. I gather that I wasn't quite ready. However, I am ready now and have been smacking myself up the back of my head for not being ready early enough. By the way, unless noted, the main lyricist, composer and arranger on "DEF" are Goro Matsui（松井五郎）, Ken Sato（佐藤健）and Nobuyuki Shimizu（清水信之）respectively.
Above is Track 2 and Side B to the "Nemurenai Diamond" single, "Aru Yoru no Wonder"（ある夜のWonder...A Wonder One Night）. Beginning with a sumptuous lone trumpet that would make the folks at Swing Out Sister swoon, the uptempo song keeps the good times of Side A rolling in Tokyo as a young lady contemplates the new love and life in the megalopolis. It's too bad that the album never came out with a list of the musicians but I wouldn't be surprised if the trumpet player was Shin Kazuhara（数原晋）.
Track 3 and Ohashi's 23rd single is "Futatoori no Kokuhaku"（ふたとおりの告白）is pure soul balladry...absolutely her wheelhouse. Not sure whether the translation would be either "Two Confessions" or "Two-Way Confession", but perhaps it really doesn't matter in the end, since both participants in a couple are slowly getting the gumption to make their feelings known to each other. I like how the pre-chorus melody shifts into minor-key doubt mode to reflect the kids' uncertainty about their love before the ship is back on an even keel. Nice solo with the urban guitar and the keyboards, too.
The next track and Side B to "Futatoori no Kokuhaku" is "Sayonara to Onaji Rain"（さよならと同じRain...Rain Like Goodbye）, a rhythmically propulsive song of lost love as Matsui's lyric of "an August rain" hints at the change of the seasons meaning the potential end of romance. There is a bit of Latin and disco strings, and we get to hear that amazing Ohashi boomer voice that I was surprised by when I finally got to hear her 1970s material.
The final track for Side A of "DEF" stands out since it's more of a pop/rock piece titled "Sasayaki ni Utaretai"（ささやきに撃たれたい...I Want to be Shot by a Whisper） with Hideya Nakazaki（中崎英也） handling the melody this time while Sato takes care of the chorus arrangement. Although I couldn't quite understand the lyrics here in their entirety, I did get an impression of another complicated time with love.
I realize that Ohashi had always kept her hair pretty short although obviously she never looked like a Marine recruit, but when I noticed that she grew it out a little for the album's back shot, I think she looked pretty darn hot there. Anyways, Side A is done. I'll have Side Bup and running either next Friday or Saturday.
As I've probably mentioned in the past, when I first really got into music at the turn of the decade going from the 1970s into the 1980s, my vocabulary for describing music wasn't all that bountiful. "Funky enka" was the best I had to describe City Pop at the time. I can now also add that my appreciation for a lot of music by Japanese singers that I had only just discovered back then hadn't been all that evolved either. It's kinda like when I was little and at the time, I couldn't stand pickles in my McDonalds hamburgers. Why would anyone put something so sour between meat and bun? Well, now I do appreciate pickles as something that provides another taste angle and cuts through the heavier meatiness of the burger.
For me, as I was learning to navigate through what I enjoyed in Japanese and Western pop music as a high school student, I was more drawn to the "sweet" and "meaty" stuff: the hit songs and/or those tunes that just had that irresistible hook. If I were to focus my analysis on the works of one particular singer, I can do so with singer-songwriter Mariko Takahashi（高橋真梨子）. I first fell for the former vocalist of Pedro & Capricious（ペドロ&カプリシャス）when I heard her on "Sounds of Japan" in the early 1980s, and it was the sophisticated pop balladry of songs like "My City Lights" and "...for you" and that amazing voice from my favourite album of "dear" that grabbed me hook line and sinker.
However, there were other songs of hers that didn't quite grab me at the time just because the 80s instruments seemed so pedestrian (as I used to hear them ad nauseum on television shows of the decade) and the arrangements were a little too out of touch. One such song was "Shinkirou" (Mirage) which first appeared on her September 1985 album"Mellow Lips" but also got its own single release in January 1986.
Of course, now that the 80s are decades back and with my musical anatomy getting further seasoned over the years, those synthesizers and arrangements don't sound as pedestrian or as weird as they once did, so I now have gotten a second wind as it were with something like "Shinkirou". At one point, I was ready to give this one the technopop label but I realized that the song wasn't about the novelty bloops and bleeps; it was more about getting this song out as a pretty dramatic pop or City Pop number that could have adorned any Japanese cop show. And in fact, "Shinkirou" was used as the theme song for Fuji-TV's "Natsuki Shizuko Suspense"（夏樹静子サスペンス...The Shizuko Natsuki Mysteries）.
Written by Goro Matsui（松井五郎）, composed by Toshio Kamei（亀井登志夫） and arranged by Keiichi Oku（奥慶一）, "Shinkirou" the single managed to reach No. 31 on Oricon. As crazy as it sounds, the song got an even deeper 80s revamping (including orchestral hits) when it was presented as one of the tracks on Takahashi's BEST compilation "Voice ~ Special Best" from March 1994.
By the way, it looks like I'm going to end up reviewing "Mellow Lips" piecemeal rather than in one article so you can also take a look at some of the other tracks: "Jun"(ジュン）, "New York, New York", and "Mayoi Bato no You ni" （迷い鳩のように）.
Along with JUN SKY WALKER(S)'"START", I heard another song that got my attention on Tuesday night's "Uta Con"（うたコン）. It's from a completely different genre, and in fact, I'm wondering whether this particular song belongs in a hybridized genre or a 21st-century version of an old genre.
The song of note here is "Nocturne", enka singer Yukino Ichikawa's（市川由紀乃）36th and latest single which was released in March 2024 this year. As written by Goro Matsui（松井五郎）and composed by Kohei Miyuki（幸耕平）, it's quite the dramatic number about a dangerous romance, and at points, I was wondering whether this could have been the ideal theme song for a Japanese James Bond movie. But let's not get too crazy about this, I'm telling myself.
It's the arrangement that has gotten my attention nonetheless and with the music video having Ichikawa in her traditional get-up while singing so elegantly and delicately, the enka tropes are in there. On the other hand, there are those shimmering strings and piano that give "Nocturne" that Western orchestral feeling. Of course, there is the title which is definitely non-Japanese. So it does beg the question whether we can call this No. 23-ranking song that mix of enka and pop known as New Adult Music, or considering that enka has evolved and experimented over the past few decades with slightly different arrangements and instruments, could this be an example of Neo-Enka? Or despite the traditionalism, is it just pop?
For my last article yesterday, I wrote about Daigo Ichinomori's（一之森大湖）debut single"Ichinomori Daigo desu"（一之森大湖です）, and in it, I noted that young Daigo (well, not that young...he's 46 years old) cut a figure on "Uta Con"（うたコン）that reminded me of dashing bidanshi enka singer Keisuke Yamauchi（山内惠介）.
Haven't seen Yamauchi for a few weeks but I know that he did show up probably back in February or January to showcase his latest single,"Beni no Chou" (Crimson Butterflies), which was officially released on February 28th. With the music video, it looks like Yamauchi wanted to have images matching his own flamboyantly good looks along the lines of his single last year, "Kokoro Mangekyo"（こころ万華鏡）. Looking at the video, I was wondering whether the song had been partially inspired by the anime "Kimetsu no Yaiba"（鬼滅の刃）.
Lyricist Goro Matsui（松井五郎）and composer Takatsugu Muramatsu（村松崇継）were behind the creation of "Beni no Chou". The music is definitely not standard enka. Is Yamauchi trying to bring in a new form of the genre in the 21st century or is it something that I would call New Adult Music? Enka jazz, perhaps? Matsui's lyrics seem to paint a picture of high drama in a couple bedding down for the night in a traditional setting. If there were a sequel to "Beni no Chou", it may involve assassination.
Well, this guide vocal karaoke video is showing a modern-day couple in a similar situation so it could just be all about an affair in a hotel. In any case, "Beni no Chou" scored a No. 5 ranking on Oricon.
I've already spoken of obscure City Pop artist Sumiko Toyohiro（豊広純子）twice on "Kayo Kyoku Plus": once for her torch song single "Tawamure no Koi no Mama ni"（たわむれの恋のままに）and then the classy "Night Flight".
Both songs also ended up on Toyohiro's lone album"Water Heart" from 1983, and this new addition to her file actually starts off the album. As with "Night Flight", "Namida ga Kawaku made" (Until the Tears Dry) takes things even further into Keiko Maruyama's（丸山圭子）romantic bossa nova realm, and I think Maruyama herself could cover this one. Written by Goro Matsui（松井五郎）and composed by Toyohiro, the silky strings by themselves are able to transport listeners to far warmer and more comfortable climes.
Commenter Mike, who gave me the tip on Toyohiro in the first place, has certainly opened up my eyes on "Water Heart" as an album which should be a welcome addition on any Japanese City Pop fan's shelves.
I guess this enka would come under the thesis of "Love is such a fleeting thing".
Well, in this case, l'amour could be compared to the relatively quick cycle of flowers budding, blooming and dying away. The title of Yukino Ichikawa's（市川由紀乃）latest is even called "Hana Wazurai". Looking up that second word on Jisho.org, I found out that wazurai is a fancier term for illness but I'm not sure whether anyone would want the translated title to be "Flower Illness" unless one was the most doctrinaire of botanists. Maybe "The Sweet Agony of Flowers" might be a bit more poetic if a bit florid since wazurai can also be defined as agony or worry.
But I digress. Ichikawa's 35th single from April 2023 is indeed a comparison of the brief and fragile nature of love, most likely from someone who's just finished another cycle of falling in and out of love. The drama has certainly been imbued into Kohei Miyuki's（幸耕平）melody and if this had been the old days, it probably could have actually been adapted into a film or TV drama. Goro Matsui（松井五郎）, who had once been a frequent collaborator on Anzen Chitai's（安全地帯）songs about forty years ago, was responsible for the lyrics.
The above video comes from King Records which produced "Hana Wazurai" and it's boasting that in the three months since it was posted onto YouTube, it's smashed the million-view barrier, and I guess for an enka song, that's a big thing. I probably wouldn't be surprised if Ichikawa got the invitation from NHK to come aboard the Kohaku Utagassen once more in a few months' time.
Around Christmas time last year, I contributed my second article to 80s aidoru Ryoko Yano（矢野良子）who didn't have such a long career behind the microphone: only four singles and her own contributions to compilation albums rather than her own album. However, I've noticed that the music thus far that I've discovered has melded the innocent aidoru and the urbane City Pop such as the second article's "Downtown de Tsukamaete"（ダウンタウンでつかまえて）which was her third single from September 1981.
Well, I've found the same thing within the B-side for her final single"Lyrical na Sayonara"（リリカルなさよなら...A Lyrical Goodbye） which was released in February 1982. "Monochrome", which was written by Goro Matsui（松井五郎）and composed by Kyoko Matsumiya（松宮恭子）, as is the case with "Downtown de Tsukamaete", has quite the classy bent to it as if it was time for a cocktail in an oh-so-refined hotel bar. At the same time though, the arrangement also reminds me of some of the aidoru tunes by singers like a very young Akina Nakamori（中森明菜）with the songwriters being Takao and Etsuko Kisugi（来生たかお・来生えつこ）. The Kisugi siblings tended to bring in a lot of sweeping strings into some of their tunes to heighten the drama.
I've stated this in the previous Yano articles and I'll state it again. I'll have to check out those remaining songs by the aidoru to see if they maintain the mixture of aidoru and City Pop. Fun times will always be had clambering down this rabbit hole.
The above video was provided by the YouTube channel HDCOLORS - Colorful Kaleidoscopes with Added Value. It's titled "Splendor of Color Kaleidoscope Video v1.3" and indeed it is rather soothing and peaceful although I cannot say that I'm a dedicated fan of kaleidoscopes. You are getting sleepy...😴
Continuing on from my earlier article today on Kaela Kimura's（木村カエラ）"MAGNETIC", "Uta Con"（うたコン）had an even more variegated lineup on its extended special episode last night, and it felt at times like a mini-Kohaku Utagassen. So I am definitely glad that Kimura and some others did make their presence known.
However, some Kohaku veterans also appeared and that included enka singer Keisuke Yamauchi（山内惠介）. This time, he appeared to showcase his latest single which came out only a week ago, "Kokoro Mangekyo" (Heart is a Kaleidoscope). His 24th single, this one stands out in his discography which started out in 2001. It was composed by Takatsugu Muramatsu（村松崇継）who has worked on scores for movies and the stage along with commercial jingles, classical music and pop. With "Kokoro Mangekyo", it not only sounds like something that Ringo Shiina（椎名林檎）would create, it almost deserves its own slot as an opening or ending theme for a historical adventure anime such as "Kimetsu no Yaiba"（鬼滅の刃...Demon Slayer） or even one of the cinematic versions of the show.
The enka is supplied in there thanks to the koto but there is also a grand lushness especially in the intro which also had me thinking a modern version of Fashion Music. It's undeniably Yamauchi singing it but I also noticed that he's plumbing the lower depths of his vocals some more this time around. Veteran lyricist Goro Matsui（松井五郎）supplied the words for this very interesting addition to his list of singles. I've been having this ongoing conversation with a commenter about the evolution of enka over the decades, and this could be a prime example of how the basic structure of an enka tune can be stretched further.
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