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.
I've had this one on the backlog for quite a while so it was good to have another fresh set of ears to listen to it once more. Always nice to hear something that doesn't easily categorize itself to one particular genre.
Perhaps it's just me, but I think that singer-songwriter and actress Mariko Fuji（藤真利子）has been one of those hidden jewels in Japanese popular music that would attract City Pop fans. In the past, fellow singer-songwriters Satoshi Kishida（岸田智史）and Yoshitaka Minami（南佳孝）have provided her with some cool urban contemporary melodies of the 1980s via "Chikashitsu no Party"（地下室のパーティー）and "Gemini Vs. Capricorn" respectively, so she's had some collaborative cachet. Well, encountering the fact that none other than Yellow Magic Orchestra member and future Oscar winner Ryuichi Sakamoto（坂本龍一）composed this particular track from her May 1983 album"Abura-Cadabura"（アブラカダブラ...Abracadabra） did get my attention.
As stated a couple of paragraphs back, "So Long" isn't a track that can be pegged immediately into any particular genre so I have put it in as a general pop tune. Yet, I hear a bit of Chet Baker trumpet and a mournful saxophone right from the get-go for that bit of jazz, but then there is also that bossa nova rhythm along with a sense of 60s French pop which is enhanced by Fuji's kittenish vocals. It's quite the mysteriously intriguing song...all hail The Professor! The lyrics were provided by Anri Bibi（微美杏里）which is the pen name for Fuji herself.
Looks like I'm being a little cute with my titles today since my previous article was "Twilight in the Memories" by Mayo Nagata（永田真代）. Now we have "The Light in the Memory" by actress/singer-songwriter Mariko Fuji（藤真利子）.
And may I say from listening to this track from Fuji's March 1981 2nd album"Romantic Game"（浪漫幻夢）, the Japanese really must have loved Michael Franks' "Antonio's Song". It's gotten onto AOR compilations sold in the country, Anri（杏里）even sang a duet of the song with Franks in the mid-1990s, and now we have "The Light in the Memory" which has quite the influence from "Antonio's Song", although it does take a different tangent.
One commenter for the above video, Mr. Fotakias, thought it was "...a blend of a Yuji Ohno composition along with "Antonio's Song"...", and yep, I can easily imagine that this could be part of any "Lupin III" soundtrack from that time. However, checking with the JASRAC database, neither Ohno nor Franks had anything to do with "The Light in the Memory". This was indeed written and composed by Fuji herself, and certainly listening to this one, I think that she's got quite the angelic music side to her when compared to the fact that she played the largest number of villainous roles on those NTV Tuesday night suspense dramas that I mentioned in her first article on KKP.
Since Halloween this year falls on a Thursday next week, I guess that the parties have been in full swing since last night. I checked the Shibuya live stream camera on YouTube and yep, it was busy in the main intersection with the costumed folks but it was much less chaotic than in previous years. Looks like the cops really clamped down on the raucousness this time around.
Never let it be said that "Kayo Kyoku Plus" lets an opportunity to celebrate a festival go by. I saved this one for this weekend due to its seasonal title. Titled "Halloween Kai Jiken" (The Halloween Mystery Incident), that opening groove sounded suspiciously like the beginning of Michael Jackson's "Billie Jean". Even before that, I had been wondering whether this would be the third kayo kyoku that was emulating the style of "Please Take Good Care of My Heart" by Whitney Houston and Jermaine Jackson after "Eien no Morning Moon" (永遠のモーニング・ムーン）and "Lonely Chaplin" (ロンリー・チャプリン）.
However, as it turns out, "Halloween Kai Jiken" most likely gets off scot-free since it was a track on Mariko Fuji's（藤真利子）final album to date, "Glass no Shokubutsu-en"（ガラスの植物園...The Glass Botanical Garden） released in August 1984, and the Houston and Jackson duet didn't appear until the former's debut album came out in 1985. Still, I can't blame whoever the songwriters and arranger were for using that opening riff since it sounds so cool. To be honest, though, it's not the most reassured delivery by Fuji, sounding almost child-like but maybe that was the point considering that it is Halloween. The other interesting thing is that the arrangement of the groove and synthesizers reminds me of how Yumi Matsutoya（松任谷由実）and her husband would later create for their pop tunes. But actually, the song is a cover of the original by a French singer named Lio.
The first time that I saw the title "Chikashitsu no Party" (Basement Party) as performed by actress/singer Mariko Fuji（藤真利子）, I received some rather bad vibes in terms of the implications of that location. Yes, I realized that a lot of my friends when we were all younger had parties in house basements that all seemed to have that mandatory pool table, bar and couch. However, I couldn't help but go "Hmmmm...".
Listening to this ballad, though, the red alert was almost instantly canceled. "Chikashitsu no Party" is something along the lines of classy Fashion Pop/City Pop with Fuji singing ironically and sadly about being in this underground cafe with no windows all alone as she muses about the lost guy. And I was actually in a Renoir cafe in Tokyo which was indeed an establishment in the basement with no windows...and lots of cigarette smoke.
With the bluesy sax and mellow keyboards in there, images are conjured up of sighing most dramatically while nursing a drink for a few hours in the big rainy city. Singer-songwriter Satoshi Kishida（岸田智史）wrote and composed this track on Fuji's 2nd album"Romantic Game"（浪漫幻夢）from March 1981. He actually found fame for his "Kimi no Asa"（君の朝）back in 1979 which kinda goes to show that trend back then of folk singers finding their inner urban contemporary music.
Not sure if I will ever be able to enter those high rooftop hotel bars, one of those venues that I often associate with City Pop, but when it comes to cafes, underground or otherwise...heck, I spent half of my life in Japan in those places.
I think I may have heard the name Mariko Fuji（藤真利子）before but it doesn't quite coalesce in the sieve that is my mind. According to her J-Wiki bio, she is an actress, singer and songwriter from Tokyo whose biggest claim to fame is that she has played the largest number of villain roles on the Tuesday night suspense dramas on NTV.
Her father was writer Shinji Fujiwara（藤原審爾）and as such, her childhood was filled with memories of movie directors and famous actresses coming to the house with the effect being that she once told her Dad that she wanted to become an actress too. Fujiwara put his foot down and forbade his daughter to follow the thespian route only for her to walk the path anyways. Teenage rebellion in action, folks.
Music was also another path for Fuji, and a couple of years after her debut as an actress, she released her first single, "S-C-E-N-A-R-I-O"（シ・ナ・リ・オ）in June 1979. However, it is the B-side for her 4th single from March 1981 that I discovered this singer. "Gemini Vs. Capricorn" may sound like an epic battle between the constellations but it's actually a cute little City Pop tune that I've taken a liking to like a puppy because of Fuji's just-as-cute voice (reminds me of Kyoko Endo) and the way she pronounces "Capricorn"(ka-puri-kon). I've also gotta say that I like the harmonica at the beginning and therefore give my tribute and condolences to the legendary Toots Thielemans who left this mortal coil a little over a week ago.
The song was also a track on her 2nd album which also came out in March 1981, "Romantic Game"（浪漫幻夢）. It was actually written by Fuji under her pen name of Anri Bibi（微美杏里）and composed by one of the great City Pop princes, Yoshitaka Minami（南佳孝）. As for that unusual pseudonym, the singer-songwriter was absolutely enamored by Yumi Matsutoya（松任谷由実）, and she may have gone into paroxysms of joy when her first single was composed by Yuming（ユーミン）herself under her own pen name of Karuho Kureta（呉田軽穂）which when read in the Japanese way sounds similar to Greta Garbo. Fuji, inspired by the idea, came up with the name Anri Bibi which when also read in the Japanese way amounts to Vivian Leigh. As Bibi, she has written songs for singers such as Kenji Sawada（沢田研二）and Yu Hayami（早見優）.
If the description for this video is correct, then Fuji will appear in the 2nd commercial at 30 seconds. In any case, her music career wasn't too long ranging between 1979 and 1984 with 8 singles and 5 albums under her belt. But the meeting with her idol, Yuming, has developed into a close friendship and Fuji can also boast being good buddies with singer Ann Lewis（アン・ルイス）.
When I think of my favourite aidorus from the 1980s, Seiko Matsuda and Akina Nakamori （松田聖子・中森明菜）will always take the top two places. The bronze medal then could be split between two cute singers from Osaka, Naoko Kawai （河合奈保子）and Yoshie Kashiwabara（柏原芳恵）. But while Matsuda and Nakamori, and to a certain extent Kawai, broke out of their aidoru mold a few years into their respective careers to head into full-blown pop superstardom, I always thought that Kashiwabara was the one who kept things close to her aidoru roots although the melodies that were given to her stretched things out more than would be the case for the average teenybopper Japanese singer.
Back in my U of T days, as I did my regular shopping at Wah Yueh, I made my biggest purchase at the Chinese record shop by getting "Yoshie Kashiwabara -- The Best", the 2-LP album which cost 4,000 yen in Japan....I've completely forgotten how much I paid for it in Canadian bucks. All I know is that I didn't say anything to my parents that day. In any case, after having listened to her "Haru Nanoni" on the 1983 Kohaku Utagassen, I knew the opportunity was there for me to get it. And why not? Looking like the most elegant bartender on the cover with that elaborate penmanship on the upper right had me parting with my money quickly.
LP 1
Side A
1. No. 1 2. Mainichi ga Valentine 毎日がバレンタイン 3. Dai Nisho Kuchizuke 第二章・くちづけ 4. Otome Gokoro Nani Iro? 乙女心何色？ 5. Glass no Natsu ガラスの夏 6. Melancholy Hakusho めらんこりい白書
Side B
7. Hello, Goodbye 8. Koibito Tachi no Cafe Terrace 恋人たちのカフェテラス 9. Nagisa no Cinderella 渚のシンデレラ 10. Ano Basho Kara あの場所から 11. Karin 花梨 12. Haru Nanoni 春なのに
1. Saiai 最愛 2. Lonely Canary 3. Machikutabirete Yokohama 待ちくたびれてヨコハマ 4. Taiyo ga Shitteiru 太陽が知っている 5. Shinobi Ai し・の・び・愛
Yep, even for a BEST album, that's a pretty big chunk...almost all of her singles between 1980 and 1985.
My first entry here is from Side A of LP1, "Mainichi ga Valentine"(Everyday is Valentine's) which was her 2nd single from September 1980. Written by Yu Aku （阿久悠）and composed by Makoto Kawaguchi（川口真）, the song has that mix of 70s aidoruand some of that American 50s sound that was getting pretty popular at the time. It only got as high as No. 64 on the weeklies and sold a little under 30,000 copies.
It has been many years since I've listened to this 2-LP set due to the fact that I hadn't had access to a working phonograph during all that time. So it was great to listen to Yoshie-chan's old hits once again. But I have to admit that on hearing the first few singles, I felt that there had been a little work to be done in terms of matching her voice with the right material.
(the above is a karaoke cover)
I think things started looking up with this ballad, "Melancholy Hakusho" (Melancholy White Paper). Her 6th single from September 1981 was once again written by Yu Aku with music this time by Katsuo Ono（小野克夫）. As a prelude to her most famous ballad, "Haru Nanoni", "Melancholy Hakusho" had the strings-led romantic sweep with Kashiwabara taking on that certain breathy quality as she sang about a budding romance that quickly went south for some reason. This tune hit higher at No. 23 and sold a little over 50,000 records. Bigger things would be waiting around the corner for her with her next single, "Hello, Goodbye" which became the biggest-selling single of her career.
"Karin"(Rosewood) was her 13th single from October 1982. I mentioned at the top that although Kashiwabara pretty much remained an aidoru, her songs took on different melodies. "Karin" was one such example as it was written and composed by Shinji Tanimura （谷村新司）from the folk group Alice. Tanimura may have performed some pretty muscular folk songs when he was part of the group, but when he went solo or wrote/composed for other singers (such as "Ii Hi Tabidachi" for Momoe Yamaguchi), he created some tenderhearted ballads. And I could clearly hear Tanimura's lilt through Kashiwabara's higher delivery which brought a certain innocence to the proceedings.
"Karin" peaked at No. 10 and ranked No. 97 on the Oricon annual chart. It also won a Gold Prize at the Japan Record Awards that year.
(karaoke cover)
Following her hit Miyuki Nakajima-penned ballad, "Haru Nanoni", her next (15th) single from April 1983 abruptly changed direction with "Chotto Nara Biyaku" (A Little Aphrodisiac). I'm continuing the Momoe Yamaguchi（山口百恵）association here since the creators of this song were Ryudo Uzaki and Yoko Aki（宇崎竜童・阿木燿子）, the husband-and-wife team behind many of Yamaguchi's harder-edged songs from the latter half of her career. Compared to the lovelorn good girl from her previous single, Kashiwabara is the bad girl in this single as the lyrics mention the title drug being dissolved in a glass of something, running away and smoking. The song does remind me a bit of the tough-and-cynical Momoe of the late 70s although seeing Yoshie performing it in a debutante's dress as above and the Beatles' lyric of "Love me do" easily take the edge off. I'm not sure whether the Japanese authorities cried foul over the contents of the song, but it did hit No. 10 on the weeklies and sold over 120,000 records.
Single No. 16 was "Natsu Moyo"(Summer Pattern) from June 1983, and it was back to the tenderhearted ballad for the singer. Kazuhiko Matsuo（松尾一彦）, Off-Course member, created the music while singer-actress Mariko Fuji （藤真利子）under her pen name of Anri Bibi （微美杏里）provided the lyrics. Once again, the theme is of a girl who has lost or is about to lose that favourite guy of hers. Perhaps the stories in her ballads aren't exactly novel, but hey, I'm still a sucker for a lot of old 80s J-ballads.
"Natsu Moyo" broke the Top 10 and reached No. 8 and later became the 81st-ranked song of 1983, selling about 160,000 records. Now, as for that pen name that Fuji created for herself, maybe the actress was a fan of Vivian Leigh (try reading the name as the Japanese do).
My final song for this article is "Taiyo ga Shitteiru"(The Sun Knows) from July 1985 in which Yoshie sings about desiring to explore the more sinful side of romance. Kazuhiko Matsuo also composed her 24th single which has a bit of summer spice as if the singer is having those desires somewhere in the Caribbean...or Guam. Goro Matsui （松井五郎）provided the lyrics. Although it peaked at No. 10, "Taiyo ga Shitteiru" only sold a little less than 60,000 records.
It was good to go over this particular record set, especially since "Yoshie Kashiwabara - The Best" doesn't seem to exist anymore. I couldn't find it listed in the J-Wiki article for her discography so I could only guess that it was released in 1986 (the last track of "Shinobi Ai" was released in September 1985) and I have no idea how it fared on the Oricon charts. There are, of course, other BEST compilations for the singer; in fact, I bought one such CD a few years ago in my phonograph-less desperation.
But listening to all of the songs again over a couple of days, I wondered what would have happened if Yoshie had decided to push the envelope a bit more and break out just as Seiko and Akina had, or taken a brief detour into something like City Pop or AOR asNaoko Kawaihad. Perhaps she would have entered the higher echelons of superstardom (I'm not weeping here since she has been able to carve another career as an actress and photobook model) and earned somewhat more than the modest rankings and sales she did make. Still, the "What If" doesn't take away from some of the nice tracks I re-discovered on her first BEST release, and those songs were able to take me back to those early days of exploring anything and everything of the old stuff.
Still a few more songs on that LP list to explore in individual articles in the future.
