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.
Often within the grand sphere of kayo kyoku, there are those songs that deal with heartbreak and the need for some change in scenery, accomplished through travel. Off the top of my head, there is the example of Sayuri Ishikawa's（石川さゆり）"Tsugaru Kaikyo Fuyu Geshiki"（津軽海峡・冬景色）in which the protagonist leaves for her old hometown in Hokkaido after breaking up with her boyfriend in Tokyo.
Well, singer-songwriter Masaki Niwa（丹羽応樹）has come up with a similarly-toned song but it's not an enka and the message of love gone wrong isn't quite as intense in this one.
This is "Le Ladies Hotel" which is essentially the title track from her 1979 album"Ladies Hotel"（レディース・ホテル）. With music and arrangement by Niwa and lyrics by Mieko Arima（有馬三恵子）, the song isn't so much about a geographical area but a specific special hotel somewhere where women who are suffering from the romantic blues can go, relax and recover. I'm assuming that the place has a really good restaurant, bar and an onsen.
As I mentioned, this isn't an enka at all and in fact I would posit that this is more of a New Music tune with a folksy French twist (the French article in the title pretty much bonks that theory right into my head). I actually got some Mayumi Itsuwa（五輪真弓）vibes from listening to it. Moreover, it doesn't really sound very maudlin. Instead, it just comes across as worthy of a sigh and one "C'est la vie!" after checking in at the hotel and then immediately enjoying the fancy amenities that such an establishment would offer.
Singer-songwriter Masaki Niwa（丹羽応樹）made her first appearance on "Kayo Kyoku Plus" through her brassy composition of "Chinatown" for singer-actress Mari Natsuki（夏木マリ）back in 1978.
Later that year, the native of Ishikawa Prefecture released her 5th EP, "Koorogi Bashi" (Cricket Bridge) whose title track was used for a TBS drama of the same name that ran from October 1978 to March 1979. Incidentally, there is indeed a Koorogi Bashi located by Yamanaka Onsen（山中温泉）in Niwa's home prefecture. Niwa was the composer while Kenji Kadoya（門谷憲二）was the lyricist. Kadoya has also written for singer-songwriter Mieko Nishijima（西島三重子）, a lady for whom I also think has some similarities with Niwa in terms of song stylings.
"Koorogi Bashi" the drama was an afternoon show sponsored by Pola Cosmetics. Incredibly, I still remember seeing at least the opening credits for a typical Pola drama when I was a kid gallivanting around my grandfather's home in Wakayama Prefecture, and Niwa's "Koorogi Bashi" sounds like the type of song for such a drama. There is that wistful combination of piano, flute and strings as Niwa gives this beautifully lilting performance as Kadoya's lyrics relate all of the emotions and stories related to this most dramatic bridge.
Niwa is also an arranger who graduated with a degree in piano from the Tokyo College of Music. Her father is composer Keio Iida（飯田景応）while her mother is singer Hiroko Misaki（岬ひろ子）. While releasing 8 EPs and a couple of full LPs between 1970 and 1982, she has also provided her fair share of television themes and songs for people including Hitomi Ishikawa（石川ひとみ）, Teresa Teng（テレサテン）and Yujiro Ishihara（石原裕次郎）.
The above is a photo of Amausaan Uji Matcha located in downtown Chinatown in Toronto. It served up various matcha tea desserts and drinks. I went there with a friend around a year ago to try it out; it had apparently been open for a year by the time we got there, and I was surprised that it was empty although it was a weekday and classes at U of T (only 10~15 minutes away on foot) were well under way. The mille-feuille matcha cake was pretty good although the toilet seat in the men's washroom was pretty much unhinged.
Well, I found out that it's now permanently closed. Was it because the matcha hadn't been good enough for the students or was it COVID-19? Whatever the case, Amausaan now joins the growing group of restaurants that have been kicked to the curb because of the pandemic. I heard a couple of days ago that Furama Cake & Desserts Garden in the same neighbourhood will be closing down within a few days after about 30 years. I haven't visited that place in decades since a lot of that time was spent in Japan but I believe that I did enter the place a few times during university days. Rather sad sign of the times when longstanding shops have to give up the business. Well, if I can do so, I hope that I can go back to some of those other places with friends to dine once more.
Come to think of it, I probably haven't visited downtown Chinatown in nearly a year. Perhaps the Amausaan trip was the last time. When I was in my twenties, it was pretty much a given that my friends and I would visit the area at least a couple of times a week due to its proximity from the university and the fact that it had great food often at starving-student prices. But Chinatown was just that...a much-appreciated area of scrumptious dim sum and Japanese records.
For some reason, Japanese pop culture's take on the various Chinatowns treated the area as if it were a mystical and wonderful foreign land of strange goings-on. There have been several songs pinpointing the neighbourhood such as Yasuha's（泰葉）classic City Pop"Fly-Day Chinatown"（フライディ・チャイナタウン）, along with ones by Yuming（ユーミン）and Naoko Kawai（河合奈保子）although I can't come up with the titles right now.
Veteran bon vivant Mari Natsuki（夏木マリ）has also given her contribution to the Chinatown ethos with "Chinatown", her 13th single under her stage name. She was actually born Junko Nakajima（中島淳子）and had even released a couple of singles in the early 1970s under her real name (will have to check those songs out soon enough). But getting back on track, "Chinatown" was released in April 1978, and it's a mix of straight kayo and that exotic kayo that had been the thing in the late 1970s. In fact, I'd say that "Chinatown" partially reminds me of Mayo Shouno's（庄野真代）"Tonde Istanbul"（飛んでイスタンブール）, although it really only took a relatively short train trip even back then from Tokyo to head over to Yokohama's Chinatown. No planes needed.
"Chinatown" was written by Yoshiko Miura（三浦徳子）and composed by singer-songwriter Masaki Niwa（丹羽応樹）. At this juncture, this would be my first Natsuki song in her early days although I did write an article about one of her much later tunes from 2013. As I said, I will tackle her earliest songs under her real name (provided that they exist on YouTube) but would also like to check out some of those other kayo under her name of Natsuki.
