Hi-Way -- Girari Netsuai（ギラリ熱愛）

 

I have to say that the above ad is a pretty clever take on a key scene from Dustin Hoffman's "The Graduate", and it was all done for Nissin's Menkoku（めんコク）instant noodles. When it comes to passion in Japan, there is the significant other and there are noodles. Oh, by the way, the Hoffman character here was played by a future governor of Chiba Prefecture.

I'm not sure when the Kensaku Morita（森田健作）-starring commercial above was broadcast but in 1981, for another commercial featuring Menkoku, there was a pretty kickass jingle accompanying it titled "Girari Netsuai" (Glaring Passionate Love) by the band Hi-Way（ハイウェイ）. Hi-Way already has one article up on the blog for their 1982 "Black Coffee"（ブラック・コーヒー）which made it onto "Light Mellow ~ City", part of the compilation of City Pop and J-AOR created and sold in the 2010s.

So, I gather that there was a foodie thing with Hi-Way during its brief time. Anyways, how "Girari Netsuai" became part of instant ramen folklore was that there had been a contest sponsored by Nissin called "Happy Folk Contest" which Hi-Way vocalist and songwriter Yoshimitsu Kamiura（上浦容充）had won with one of his own entries, thereby leading to the group's major debut which was this very song. in 1981. "Girari Netsuai" was actually written by Yukinojo Mori（森雪之丞）and composed by Kisaburo Suzuki（鈴木キサブロー）and it's a pop-rock song whose lyrics by Mori talk of love but can also be interpreted as something to be eaten with a whole lot of gusto as well. And when we're talking about a big hot heaping bowl of ramen...😋

In 1982, Hi-Way released their debut album "Age" and a slightly rearranged version of "Girari Netsuai" was recorded there. It kept its rock edge but there was more of a City Pop feeling in there as well, and I can't help but hear a little of Billy Joel's "The Stranger" in some of the guitar riffs. In addition, it was a guest vocalist, reggae singer Kaja（カジャ）instead of Kamiura, who was behind the microphone for some reason. 

Hiroshi Moriya/KAJA -- Arigata ya Bushi（有難や節）

There have been a couple of articles featuring the late actor and singer Hiroshi Moriya（守屋浩）who had passed away in September 2020, including "Boku wa Naichicchi"（僕は泣いちっち）, an enka ballad by songwriter Kuranosuke Hamaguchi（浜口庫之助）which may have been the first of his songs to get recorded.

However, I have neglected to provide some background information on Moriya who was born in Chiba Prefecture in 1938 as Kunihiko Moriya（守屋邦彦）. In his late teens, he got his first taste of showbiz when he joined the rockabilly band Swing West（スイングウェスト）as a roadie in 1957 and then got involved with the Nichigeki Western Carnival（日劇ウエスタンカーニバル）the following year at the Nihon Gekijo Theatre in Tokyo.

At around the same time, Takeo Hori（堀威夫）, the founder of Hori Productions, later to become the talent agency Horipro tacked on the stage name of Hiroshi Moriya to young Kunihiko so that he could be promoted along a couple of other Hiroshi-tagged actor/singers, Hiroshi Inoue（井上ひろし）and Hiroshi Mizuhara（水原弘）to become known as Sannin Hiroshi（三人ひろし）, aka The Three Hiroshis, during the late 1950s going into the early 1960s. With the rockabilly boom in full swing (no pun intended), Moriya began to grow his fame.

Still, the song that I have here by Moriya tonight doesn't sound anything like a rockabilly tune. In fact, I'd say that "Arigata ya Bushi" (The Thank You Tune), his hit single from November 1960 is definitely in the traditional Japanese vein, although with a mix of festival-loving minyo, a bit of Latin even, and an arrangement that also feels like it could easily be played by an old-fashioned chindon'ya band. The interesting thing, though, is that the composer is unknown, although according to the J-Wiki article for "Arigata ya Bushi", it may have originated from a song devoted to the Buddha on the island of Shikoku, although it's been also said that it had been sung as a folk tune all the way over in Nagoya.

Whatever the origin legend may say, "Arigata ya Bushi" was written by the aforementioned Hamaguchi basically as someone's somewhat snarky theory of life (yeah, yeah, thank ya, thank ya, whatever!) as unnecessary hustle and bustle while the fellow himself is more than happy to go or lay about at his own sweet pace. Considering the times, the famed lyricist even installs a note about a woman he likes spending her time attending university demonstrations. "Arigata ya Bushi" may have been about the joy of fecklessness, but it really hustled in the sales department, selling around 140,000 records a few months after its November debut.

(I'm sorry but the video has been taken down.)

The J-Wiki article also mentions that "Arigata ya Bushi" had its cover versions including one by Yujiro Ishihara（石原裕次郎）via one of his movies in 1963. Speaking of that, the success of the song also led to a movie based on it, "Arigata ya Bushi Aah Arigata ya Arigata ya"（有難や節 あゝ有難や有難や...Doing What I Please） that was released in May 1961 with one of the stars being Moriya himself. In the above video, lyricist Hamaguchi himself gives his own song a go.

Another rollicking cover was provided by reggae singer KAJA as the ending theme song for the fourth season of the TV Asahi assassin series "The Hangman"（ザ・ハングマン）in 1984. Incidentally, KAJA shouldn't be confused with the obscure band Kaja that I'd already written about a couple of years ago. As such, I'll keep the reggae singer listed in Labels with "(reggae)" next to it. The pronunciation is also different in that the band Kaja sounds like "ka-ya".