J-Xmas Songs Without Anything Overtly Christmas-y In The Title

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to December. Not sure how it is meteorologically where you are, but here in Toronto, we woke up to a wind chill factor of around -7 degrees Celsius and a slight frosting of snow on the ground. Not surprisingly, the department stores and malls are in Christmas mode with the appropriate music, and sure enough, even KKP has entered the Yuletide spirit.

Of course, Christmas songs such as "Jingle Bells" and "White Christmas" are famous all around the world. And even the ones whose titles don't have a "Christmas" or "Santa Claus" or "Jingle" or "Eve" are well-known for their Xmas cheer including "Sleigh Ride" and "Little Drummer Boy". Now, in Japan, where Christmas has been taking hold of the population like icing on carrot cake for years and years and years (aside from the fact that it isn't a statutory holiday over there, and really shouldn't be), as we all know in "Kayo Kyoku Plus", many J-Xmas tunes have been created during the better part of the past century. And I'd add that perhaps around 90% of them have those special key words that I've mentioned above that would provide the big hint that Christmas is on the way. There are those tunes such as "Christmas Eve" and "December 24" that pretty much give the show away.

However, the remaining 10% don't have any of those Christmas-y buzzwords in the title. Therefore, for those listeners who have just gotten into Japanese popular music and are starting to discover the Xmas section of kayo kyoku and J-Pop, as a public service, I've decided to start December off with some of those J-Xmas songs that don't overtly include anything Christmas-y in the title. Perhaps they can make for some delightful discoveries for some. So without further ado:

(1985) Akiko Kobayashi -- Stardust Memories

(1988) Kazuo Zaitsu -- Fuyu no Main Street（冬のメイン・ストリート）

(1990) Crayon-sha -- Tokyo Yakei（東京夜景）

(1991) Miho Nakayama -- Tooi Machi no Dokoka de （遠い街のどこかで）

(1997) Caoli Cano & Hiroshi Takano -- First Flight

(2004) Masatoshi Hamada & Noriyuki Makihara -- Chicken Rice（チキンライス）

Ski Songs by J-Canuck

 

I remember this time last year when ski resorts in both Canada and Japan were major ugly crying the blues because they simply didn't have two snowflakes to rub against each other. There had been a serious lack of snow which caused the resorts to wonder about their livelihood for the 2024 season. But cue ahead nearly a year later and fate decided to give everyone a huge break and then some. The white stuff has been pretty much non-stop for the past few months and business is booming once more. Maybe it's booming a little too much since all those blizzards could also be making transportation to the slopes a tad difficult.

Considering I'm from the Great White North, my interaction with skiing has been minimal at best (generally, sports and I are not good friends). I did some cross-country skiing during one elementary school trip and then when I was in Gunma Prefecture on the JET Programme, I joined teachers and students on the annual one-day field trip to the slopes (northern Gunma is famous for skiing) and after a few minutes of trying to glide down the bunny slopes, I quickly retreated back to the warmth of the hut and drank down a few gallons of cocoa for most of the day. Additionally, I remember on Wednesday mornings on the local train as I was heading to the weekly visit to the smaller school when it was packed with skiers and had to be careful not to be poked in the eye with a ski.🎿

However, this won't deter me from the pleasure of presenting some of the kayo kyoku/J-Pop ski-themed tunes I've heard over the years. After all, back in the late 1980s with the Bubble Era, skiing became a huge hobby of the Japanese as they hit the slopes of Naeba or Gala Yuzawa. Moreover, although skiing isn't quite the trendy thing to do now, I'm sure that there are still many dedicated skiers taking advantage of the powder snow all over the nation. And as such, allow me to show just five of the many songs that have reminded me of skiing. Consider this the kissing cousin to "Snow Songs".

(1990) Hiroshi Takano -- Niji no Miyako e （虹の都へ）

(1980) Yumi Matsutoya -- Surf Tengoku, Ski Tengoku （サーフ天国、スキー天国）

(1993) Kohmi Hirose -- Romance no Kamisama （ロマンスの神様）

(1986) Anri -- Innocent Time

(1996) globe -- DEPARTURES

Hiroshi Takano & Taeko Ohnuki -- Silent Song

 

I gather that for this Xmas season on KKP, we've had a bit of a running theme coursing its way over the past several weeks thanks to Masamichi Sugi's（杉真理）1997 compilation "Winter Gift Pops" album and Scott's podcast "Holly Jolly X'masu". I've already taken care of a couple of tracks there: Caoli Cano & Hiroshi Takano's（かの香織・高野寛）"First Flight" and Miwako Saito's（さいとうみわこ） cover of "Anata dake I Love You"（あなただけ I LOVE YOU）.

Well, it continues here as well with Takano coming back to do another duet...this time with the illustrious singer-songwriter Taeko Ohnuki（大貫妙子）. Together they perform "Silent Song" which is a fairly languid and intimate tune about spending that special night. Another running theme within "Winter Gift Pops" is that Scott himself even mentioned that not all of the tracks on the album (45:26 on the podcast) strictly adhere to a Christmas theme (it's Winter Gift Pops, not Christmas Gift Pops after all), and "Silent Song" can also be considered to be a more general winter tune.

Still, despite there not being any mention of Christmas in "Silent Song", all sorts of romance can happen on Christmas Eve in Japan (hotels are very busy on the 24th) so why not have "Silent Song" be an honorary Yuletide tune? Takano was responsible for everything in the song with Ohnuki in charge of the chorus arrangement. One more point is that I think this might be the first tune that I've ever encountered that has both a euphonium and a didgeridoo being performed in a song.

Yutaka Kimura Speaks ~ Japanese City Pop Masterpieces 100: Hiroshi Takano -- Yume no Naka de Aeru desho（夢の中で会えるでしょう）

 

Number: 087

Lyricist: Hiroshi Takano

Composer: Hiroshi Takano

Arranger: Ryuichi Sakamoto

From Takano's 1994 single "Yume no Naka de Aeru desho"

A song originally offered to The Kingtones（ザ・キングトーンズ）, "Yume no Naka de Aeru desho" is a distant relative to Sugar Babe's（シュガーベイブ）"Downtown". In all likelihood, the song was created with the gentle approach of Kingtones' vocalist Masato Uchida（内田正人）in mind, and its clear and amiable melody paired with its timeless lyrics especially shine within Hiroshi Takano's（高野寛）discography. Ryuichi Sakamoto's（坂本龍一）arrangement is also a highlight.

The above comes from "Disc Collection Japanese City Pop Revised" (2020).

Hiroshi Takano/The Kingtones -- Yume no Naka de Aeru desho（夢の中で会えるでしょう）

 

This song is due to be a Yutaka Kimura Speaks entry in a few weeks so I decided to jump ahead of it with my own take. Honestly speaking, I hadn't heard of this one by singer-songwriter Hiroshi Takano（高野寛）but it has been included in the Top 100 in "Japanese City Pop", so I had to take a gander, especially with the late Ryuichi Sakamoto（坂本龍一）handling its arrangement.

"Yume no Naka de Aeru desho" (We Can Meet in Our Dreams) had actually been meant as a Takano contribution to the vocal group The Kingtones（ザ・キング・トーンズ）as one of their singles, but as circumstances permitted, it ended up getting out as a Takano single in October 1994. Sakamoto and Takano have made it an early 1970s soul single and I can also hear why the latter had wanted to offer it to The Kingtones with their doo-wop balladry. The single reached No. 67 on Oricon and has been included as a track on his March 1995 album "Sorrow and Smile" which peaked at No. 49.

The Kingtones' take of the song did come out in April 1995 as their 29th single. Couldn't find an original recorded version but I did find this concert footage of the guys doing their doo-wop best. As heard here, it sounds a bit more lighthearted but the story is the same: a couple greatly enjoying each other's company on Earth and in the stars.

Caoli Cano & Hiroshi Takano -- First Flight

 

Admittedly, I'm beginning the KKP Xmas season a tad early but it's just for this song and I won't be officially getting into Christmas season until November 25th.

About a couple of weeks ago, I mentioned Scott's podcast, "Holly Jolly X'masu", regarding Masamichi Sugi's（杉真理）1997 compilation "Winter Gift Pops" from which I posted one of the tracks, Miwako Saito's（さいとうみわこ）cover of "Anata dake I Love You"（あなただけ I LOVE YOU）. The album itself may have that feeling of enjoying the wintry life but it isn't specifically Xmas-based for all of the tracks, according to Scott.

Case in point, we have another track which shows up at about 26:57 on the podcast titled "First Flight", a bubbly duet with Caoli Cano（かの香織）and Hiroshi Takano（高野寛）. One reason that I got impatient enough to put this one up is that neither Cano nor Takano have popped up all that much on "Kayo Kyoku Plus", so I wanted to further add to their files on the blog. Written by the two singers, composed by the aforementioned Sugi and Kiyonori Matsuo（松尾清憲）and arranged by Yasuharu Ogura（小倉泰治）, "First Flight" dances on the line whether it's a Xmas tune or a general winter tale of cool and breezy romance punctuated by the appearance of an aurora. Regardless of that short argument however, it's the story of two friends meeting up for the first time in a while and having the time of their lives with the potential promise of a more permanent relationship. 

You can take a gander at my first article for Cano for her song "Gensou Game"（幻想ゲーム）. Cano also contributed another track to "Winter Gift Pops" but unfortunately it hasn't shown up on YouTube, so I'm glad that at least "First Flight" is available. As for Takano, he's also done another winter-themed duet which got out several years earlier with Takao Tajima（田島貴男）, "Winter's Tale ~ Fuyu Monogatari"（冬物語）.

TECHNOBOYS PULCRAFT GREEN-FUND featuring Hiroshi Takano -- Book-end, Happy-end

 

Golly! I had never been to a Tokyo book apartment before and I probably never will because the above facility is apparently closed down now. According to some of the images online though, it looked like a stylish and relaxing (and probably expensive) place to browse through those books. When I was in Japan, I used to really enjoy visiting the conventional bookstores including the big brands of Maruzen, Kinokuniya and Yaesu. But I also dropped in on the neighbourhood places across from my subway station on the way home where a lot of office workers shared my idea and were browsing through the variety of weekly and monthly magazines. The staff were always wearing Business Casual with those aprons.

Maybe I should have caught this 2018 anime "Gaikotsu Shotenin Honda-san"（ガイコツ書店員 本田さん...Skull-face Bookseller Honda-san） when it had its run near the end of the year. From what I've seen above, it's a pretty hilarious slice-of-life comedy with zany staffers of a bookstore wearing various masks while dealing with some just-as-hilarious situations. I guess it didn't really fit my anime buddy's aesthetics, though. Incidentally, that first foreign customer in the video above made me wonder whether retired NCIS SAC Gibbs had opted to take a vacation in Japan for a few weeks.

I'd also been wondering how both singer-songwriter Hiroshi Takano（高野寛）and the technopop unit TECHNOBOYS PULCRAFT GREEN-FUND have been doing these past few years because I hadn't heard too much from either of them. Well, at least back in 2018, the two acts got together to collaborate on the ending theme for "Gaikotsu Shotenin Honda-san", "Book-end, Happy-end". With lyrics by Takano and melody by TPGF, it's got the plummy and groovy arrangements that I have recognized the latter band for, and the overall tone fits a nice long visit to a beloved bookstore where customers can pick their favourite tomes or manga to flip through for hours.

Madonna -- Vogue

Chika Dance, meet Kaguya Vogue!

It should be a most interesting talk with my anime buddy on the phone tonight when it comes to the latest episode of "Kaguya-sama wa Kokurasetai"（かぐや様は告らせたい）which is approaching the end of an eventful Season 2. My impression on the show in general has been that it's been hitting me as a mix of "The Big Bang Theory", "Frasier" and "Family Guy", and Episode 9 which I caught on Saturday has especially struck me as that last show with all of the pop cultural references ("Peanuts", for heaven's sake!). In fact, I think even Seth MacFarlane might have gone "Whoa!".

But as I hinted at the top of the article, a lot of fans of the anime had been wondering whether there would be another cute little dance by one of the characters to level up with or even top The Chika Dance that surprised viewers at the end of Episode 3 in Season 1. Well, what it lacked in length (all of 20 seconds) was more than compensated by the main character's stab at voguing just to get that calming ritual to be able to stand up to Miyuki's perceived advances. Heck, there was no coyness in hiding that it was indeed a parody of Madonna's "Vogue" if the viewers caught that image on Kaguya's smartphone (the feather boas opening the sequence sealed the deal). Lady Donna and "Pose" indeed! Certainly, the reactors in the reaction videos were once again delightfully caught off-guard.

Not surprisingly, the space under the music video for Madonna's "Vogue" on YouTube have been liberally peppered since the weekend with comments about the fact that "Kaguya-sama" had sent the writers there. So, once again, I have another Reminiscing of Youth article.

To be more precise, though, it should be a Reminiscing of J-Canuck's 24th Year since that was how old I was when "Vogue" was released in March 1990. Knowing about her since she came up with her early 1980s hits of "Holiday" and "Borderline", Madonna kept on hitting home runs out of the park throughout the rest of the decade, and she did it again at the beginning of the final decade of the 20th century with this song accompanied by a newfangled hand jive.

I was in Gunma, Japan at the time and naively (capital N) tried to incorporate "Dick Tracy", the 1990 film starring Warren Beatty, Al Pacino and Madonna based on the original comic, into my lessons at the junior high schools that I was teaching at. But, really, it was no dice with the students. It was even hard with "Batman" the previous year. "Vogue" did end up on the soundtrack for the movie, which I think is an underrated work considering how much effort was placed into the setting, costumes and makeup, etc., and yep, along with the CD single of the song, I did buy that soundtrack and it's on the shelf behind me. I will have to listen to that one again this week sometime.

"Vogue" hit No. 1 in Canada, America and even Japan, and ended up as the No. 5 song on the US Billboard Hot 100 for the year.

So, what were the Top 3 singles on Oricon for March 1990 when one of Madonna's most famous songs was released?

1. Lindberg -- Ima Sugu Kiss Me

2. Dreams Come True -- Egao no Yukue (bring down the volume for this one)

3. Hiroshi Takano -- Niji no Miyako e

As much as the three chart-toppers for that month enjoyed performing live, nope, they didn't get into the Vogue thing.

Hiroshi Takano -- Besten Dank（ベステン ダンク）

Hiroshi Takano's（高野寛）5th single "Besten Dank" isn't quite as catchy as his previous song, "Niji no Miyako e"（虹の都へ）which for a certain generation probably meant hitting the ski slopes in short order. Still, it's not too bad.

I think one reason is the arrangement for Takano's creation which is so 90s J-Pop that all sorts of nostalgia popped in my head such as my two years in Gunma Prefecture and all those videos that I caught on "MTV Japan" while living there. Plus, his lyrics about getting through all of the obstacles to reach that goal (or lady) are nice to hear during a currently uncertain time. Takano even gives a shoutout to that metropolis of rainbows, the translation of that previous single's title. My other observation is that some of his melody reminds me of another sunshine-y song, "I Can See Clearly Now" by Johnny Nash.

Released in October 1990, "Besten Dank" reached No. 3 on Oricon and was the 73rd-ranked song of the year. It's also been included in Takano's 4th album "Awakening" which peaked at No. 8. As for the meaning of the title, it's apparently German for "Thank You Very Much".

Hiroshi Takano & Takao Tajima -- Winter's Tale ~ Fuyu Monogatari（冬物語）

Y'know...this can drive a man to drink!

And yep, that was the point for "Winter's Tale ~ Fuyu Monogatari" (the Japanese and English have the same meaning) since this was a campaign song for a Sapporo brand of beer that was being sold just in the winter in the early 1990s called Fuyu Monogatari.

And double yep, "Winter's Tale" is one song that can be given the sommelier's treatment although the product was a beer and not a wine. Sapporo should have been properly flattered for Fuyu Monogatari getting such a cool theme, thanks to this duet involving singer-songwriters Hiroshi Takano（高野寛）on lyrics and Takao Tajima（田島貴男）of Pizzicato Five/Original Love on music. It's got some snazzy and jazzy spark of sophisticated pop by way of British 1980s soul, disco/post-disco bits, and simply some happily familiar Tajima horn arrangement.

It's all about good times as the commercial shows. Hit the slopes and then savor the apres-ski with some beer and stuff. Released in November 1992, "Winter's Tale" peaked at No. 21, and also ended up on Original Love's "The Very Best of ORIGINAL LOVE" from April 1995. That album went all the way up to No. 4 and became the 78th-ranked album of that year.

Takano is no stranger to cool winter-based music.

Hiroshi Takano & Ryuichi Sakamoto -- Kimi to Boku to Kanojo no Koto（君と僕と彼女のこと）

This was another one of my accidental yokatta discoveries through another traipse through YouTube.

Frankly, I'm not sure whether Ryuichi Sakamoto（坂本龍一）had lost his battle with that titanic chamois but someone took a picture of it for the cover of his 11th solo album "Sweet Revenge"（スウィート・リヴェンジ）from June 1994.

On it, there is a very pleasant and dreamy track titled "Kimi to Boku to Kanojo no Koto" (You and Me and Her) which is officially known in English as "Water's Edge". It's a duet between Sakamoto and singer-songwriter Hiroshi Takano（高野寛）in which the lyrics by The Professor's ol' collaborator, Taeko Ohnuki（大貫妙子）, talk of a love triangle involving two men and a woman, only that it is a truly closed triangle since the two men have feelings for each other as well, according to the J-Wiki write-up for the album. And according to the YouTube description, Towa Tei took care of the drum programming while Takano was on guitar.

Sakamoto's melody conjures up a peaceful sunset stroll involving the trio along perhaps that titular water's edge. It would make for a nice ballad to listen on a Friday night after all of the week's trials and tribulations.

Happy End -- Kaze wo Atsumete （風をあつめて）

A couple of days ago, I met up with a fellow translator who has also become a good friend at one of the Touhenboku Ramen shops in Toronto...specifically the one at Yonge St. north of Eglinton which has come to be considered to be a second and less grungier downtown. I have to say that the chicken broth for the chain's ramen is quite good; I'd always been accustomed to having the customary pork soup for the noodles. The photo above is actually from September when I went there with another friend but the bowl I had on Wednesday afternoon was still just as tasty and even more satisfying since it was a cold day.

Anyways, my friend told me as we were slurping away that he was a big fan of the legendary band Happy End (はっぴいえんど). He had mentioned this once before a few weeks ago after that talk on translation that we had given at University of Toronto but he went into more detail about how he came to appreciate the short-lived 1970s group.

Years ago, he was accompanying a fellow friend in southern Japan in his car and on the stereo happened to be a tape playing of Happy End. From the way my friend was describing it, the weather must have been quite warm and sunny, and he told me that the playing of Happy End's music made for the perfect melodic accompaniment to their journey.

Although he didn't tell me the title of the song, I could imagine that it was most likely "Kaze wo Atsumete" (Gather The Wind) as originally sung by member Haruomi Hosono（細野晴臣）. nikala was the first "Kayo Kyoku Plus" collaborator to provide a Happy End article and though I also like "Hana Ichi Monme"（花いちもんめ）, "Kaze wo Atsumete" is my ideal tune by the band. It is a song that I had heard before back in Japan as part of a commercial, I believe, and I was charmed by it back then, too.

Hosono was the one who composed the perfect-for-a-summer-drive song with fellow member Takashi Matsumoto（松本隆）providing the lyrics. Now, I've never considered the future one-third of Yellow Magic Orchestra to be a great vocal interpreter of his own music but there is something about that low droning voice of his which fits the overall atmosphere of "Kaze wo Atsumete". That video of him and his bandmates in weird clothing performing the song in a huge arena to a poppier beat might have been fun but I think the original version from Happy End's 2nd album from 1971 "Kazemachi Roman"（風街ろまん...Wind City Romance）is absolutely fine. The album was produced to evoke the more serene days of Tokyo just before the 1964 Olympics in the city, and "Kaze wo Atsumete" might have been seen as the nucleus of that theme. That one image is of kids running around on the field under a huge blue sky trying to catch those butterflies.

Little did I know that the song was also part of the soundtrack for the 2003 movie "Lost In Translation" starring Bill Murray and Scarlett Johansson. I saw that movie on DVD in my old Ichikawa apartment with my Aussie movie buddy, and to be honest, I didn't pay too much attention to the songs that were used in it since I was paying closer attention to the folks and the scenes. But all I can say is good on you, Sofia Coppola.

Of course, covers of the song by succeeding musicians were a foregone conclusion. Singers KAN and Hiroshi Takano（高野寛）gave their own whimsical take.

YUKI of Judy And Mary plus Kaori Mochida（持田香織）of Every Little Thing also performed their own lovely cover of "Kaze wo Atsumete".

Although with all things being equal, there are probably a number of folks who never cottoned onto Happy End, I still marvel at the fact about who was in this group: YMO member Hosono, prolific lyricist Matsumoto, crooning Eiichi Ohtaki（大瀧詠一）and veteran composer Shigeru Suzuki（鈴木茂）.

Now with the winter not too far away, a little musical warmth and a good bowl of ramen will always be appreciated.

Hiroshi Takano -- Niji no Miyako e （虹の都へ）

Again, one of my reminiscings as a semi-pro couch potato will help me launch this profile. During my 2 years in Gunma Prefecture, late Saturday nights were sometimes spent watching Fuji TV's "Neruton Beni Kujira Dan"（ねるとん紅鯨団...Nelton Red Whale Party) or as it was called more easily, "Nelton Club". Hosted by the very zany comedic duo The Tunnels, this was a 30-minute view of a weekly matchmaking party with 5 guys wooing 5 gals. In any case, for a while, one of the sponsors, Mizuno Skiware, showed a commercial with a pretty catchy song:

Ahhhh, yes.....young, beautiful and urban folk traipsing around Tokyo in their Kelvin Thermos. And that song. That was "Niji no Miyako e"(To The Metropolis of Rainbows) by Hiroshi Takano（高野寛）. Originally, the song was meant to be just that 30-second jingle for Mizuno, but being played for 6 months during "Nelton Club" helped it evolve to single status and get it released in February 1990. No surprise there....it just had this infectious refrain that got me awake after 11 p.m.

Written and composed by Shizuoka-born Takano, I don't consider "Niji no Miyako e" as a technopop tune, but there is enough of a happy synthesizer in there that reminds me a bit of the ol' Yellow Magic Orchestra. Not surprisingly, according to the J-Wiki writeup, YMO is listed as one of Takano's influences along with The Beatles, late rocker Kiyoshiro Imawano（忌野清志郎）and American musician Todd Rundgren. In fact, Rundgren was also responsible for the production of this song.

"Niji no Miyako e"was Takano's 4th single and his most successful song. It peaked at No. 2.