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.
Veteran comedian and tarentoKen Shimura（志村けん）passed away earlier today at the age of 70 due to pneumonia brought on by COVID-19. I had heard that he contracted the coronavirus as the first Japanese celebrity to announce it several days ago, and when I did, I feared the worst due to his age and the fact that whenever I saw him on TV in interviews, he almost always had a cigarette in his hand. And tragically, the worst came to pass.
Shimura has already gotten some attention on "Kayo Kyoku Plus" through his work with the comedy group The Drifters（ザ・ドリフターズ）. As a kid, I got to know him through videotapes of The Drifters' long-running Saturday-night variety show "Hachi-ji da yo! Zen'in Shuugo"（8時だヨ！全員集合）. He had replaced member Chu Arai（荒井注）and although I don't remember Arai's temperament and comic skills with the group, I'm pretty sure that he didn't quite match Shimura's level of lunacy that probably often had the TBS switchboard lighting up with complaint calls about some of the naughty bits that characterized the segments introduced by him and his group partner Cha Kato（加藤茶）, although their famous "Hige Dance" sketch above wasn't one of them.
Shimura's ballerina with swan head probably was, though. I mentioned this before in a past article but I saw him as Japan's Jerry Lewis and maybe even Jim Carrey, years before Jim Carrey was Jim Carrey. As for some of his comedy, one of my students who belonged to that English conversation circle that I had taught for a decade remarked rather tersely that she considered The Drifters to be offensive and never allowed her children to watch "Hachi-ji da yo!" because of him and Kato.
However in recent years after The Drifters had their heyday, Shimura's most famous character was Bakatono-sama（バカ殿様）, a hedonistic and moronic feudal lord who simply wanted to have fun for the rest of his days, usually at the expense of his long-suffering court. Not surprisingly, Shimura brought some of his bawdiness to his character and the situations around him.
Being in variety for decades, Shimura would also do his fair share in music although he was never a recording artist per se. However, from time to time, he did release songs but almost always in collaboration with another celebrity. One such tune was "Ginza Atari de Gin! Gin! Gin!" which I think may translate as "Shine Shine Shine in Ginza".
Released in December 2001 as a maxi-single duet with longtime buddy, singer-actress Naoko Ken（研ナオコ）who often showed up with him in various skits, "Ginza Atari de Gin! Gin! Gin!" is a crazy Mood Kayo with some Boney M. disco about a corporate newbie played by Shimura and supervisor Ken possibly falling for each other. Written and composed by Hello Project head honcho Tsunku（つんく♂）, even the footage above is styled like a Morning Musume music video. Officially, the duo name was Ken♀♂ Ken（けん♀♂けん）.
Going over the announcements on the various Japanese TV channels about his passing, there have been stunned and very grief-stricken reactions among the other tarento. I can't even imagine how this is striking folks in Japan right now since I believe that they are only starting to enter the beginnings of their own rising COVID-19 wave.
At the time of his death, Shimura was hosting two regular programs. One was a late-night program and the other was the Saturday-night NTV series "Tensai! Shimura Dobutsu-en"（天才！志村どうぶつ園...Genius! Shimura's Zoo）, a variety show based on animals. According to a sports journalism website, part of the program scheduled for Saturday April 4th will be adjusted although it's not currently known what will become of the show going forward.
My condolences go out to his family and his many fans. I will finish this article with one of his many favourite catchphrases: "AIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIN!"
Yup, today is indeed the day of the total solar eclipse and as I am writing this, it is proceeding to get darker although here in Toronto, we will only be getting just 70% of totality. To be honest, I'm not all that enthused about something that I have seen on TV often enough and if I did see directly, I would go blind. But, I still thought I needed to get that out of the way.
In the past several months, I've written about the deaths of a few kayo songwriters but this time, I will be paying tribute to someone from Old Hollywood. Jerry Lewis passed away yesterday morning at the ripe old age of 91. Back when the United States had plenty of comedy duos on stage and in the movies, I was born early enough to remember folks like Hope & Crosby, Abbott & Costello, Meara & Stiller, etc.
Then, there was Martin & Lewis. I saw Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis as the younger version of Bing Crosby and Bob Hope. Hope and Lewis were the doltish halves of their respective teams but while the former was known for his glib tongue, Jerry Lewis was Jim Carrey before Jim Carrey. He was all about the physical funny: gangly extremities and rubber face. My brother and I always threatened to laugh up our insides like sea cucumbers watching Jerry. In fact, the above video is a scene from "Money From Home"(1957) which is the one scene that defined the comedian for me.
Now, the one fellow in Japan who still reminds me of the crazy antics of Lewis is Ken Shimura（志村けん）of the comedy troupe The Drifters（ザ・ドリフターズ）. He was the one guy that we always looked forward to seeing on their long-running TV show "Hachi-ji da yo! Zen'in Shuugo"（8時だョ!全員集合...It's 8 o'clock! Everyone Assemble） because he would always pull off the funny face or do something outrageous...often to the point where the TBS switchboard would light up like a Christmas tree due to parents calling in to complain.
Shimura has been around forever now and I think he's greatly toned down his stuff due to age but today I found a song that he covered back in the heyday of "Hachi-ji da yo!". With the elongated title of "Shimura Ken no Zen'in Shuugo Higashimurayama Ondo" (Ken Shimura's "Everyone Assemble" Higashimurayama Ondo) , this was his cover of "Higashimurayama Ondo", a traditional march that was first created by Chuuji Tsuchiya（土屋忠司）and Junichi Hosokawa（細川潤一）for the city of Higashimurayama in Metropolitan Tokyo back in 1963.
The comical version by Shimura was divided into three different parts called "-chome" with the 4th chome (done first) being the most similar to the original song in style but then going down into the 3rd chome and 1st chome (no idea why there is no 2nd chome), things get progressively wackier. The 3rd chome was actually whipped up by Drifters leader, the late Chosuke Ikariya（いかりや長介）, and the 1st chome done by Shimura himself. The song was the B-side to the single "Kato Cha no Hajimete no Boku desu"（加藤茶のはじめての僕デス...Cha Kato's First Me） which was released in September 1976.
To give credit where credit is due, though, here is the original version. A number of singers have covered it over the years. J-Wiki has mentioned veteran singer Michiya Mihashi（三橋美智也）and minyo singer Fumiko Shitaya（下谷二三子）, and here they are performing "Higashimurayama Ondo" together.
And to wrap it all up, at Higashimurayama Station, a brief snippet of the song is used to signal the train's impending departure.
