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.
Apparently, there have been a few songs known as "Minna Ii Ko". One is the Japanese title for rockabilly singer Carl Perkins' "Everybody's Trying to Be My Baby" from 1956, and the other is the Beatles' cover of said tune.
Well, this "Minna Ii Ko" isn't that "Minna Ii Ko". For one thing, it's a perfectly homegrown song with lyricist Shigesato Itoi（糸井重里）and composer Kunihiko Kase（加瀬邦彦）having created it for Kenji Sawada's（沢田研二）14th originalalbum "BAD TUNING" released in July 1980. Tsugutoshi Goto（後藤次利）took care of its arrangement as a somewhat New Wave piece. Not sure if the original Perkins' song title would apply for this "Minna Ii Ko". Perhaps we can go with "Everyone's A Good Girl" since although I couldn't track down any lyrics online, I get the impression that this one lass out of the usual flock that the song's protagonist runs around with is not only the one who doesn't fall for his charms, but she's the one that he's most interested in. Such is life and love. Maybe I ought to extend my translation to "Everyone's A Good Girl (Except You)".
I can't quite remember how records and tapes by the big artists were being distributed back in my teenage years, and the reason I'm starting out this way is that the first time that I'd heard Blondie's "Rapture" was actually through one of those K-Tel compilation records in which there was one quick cut of the music video where Debbie Harry was holding her head while she purred the title. Now, I would think by that point, the song had long been released as a single and as part of an album, and so I was wondering why I hadn't heard of this one before. Blondie was already big in the world so I should have heard this one already on the radio or television.
Well, in any case, I eventually did hear the totality of the song and caught the video after it had been released in January 1981. "Rapture" was basically the first time that I ever heard rap in any form. Harry was talking in some rhythmic pattern about eating Cadillacs and entire bars which struck me as being some sort of weird New Wave-y thing. I think the only time that I heard anything similar to that was when I was watching a segment on "Sesame Street" featuring a cartoon bear pattering the first five numbers to a beatnik jazz beat.
In any case, Harry apparently had two parts to the song: the first part had her singing in those fluffy light vocals which reminded me of "Heart of Glass" and then the rap part in the latter half had her utilizing those richer and lower tones from "The Tide is High". Looking back at the song after so many years, "Rapture" certainly doesn't strike me as the usual rap tune with the tubular bells and the disco rhythms in there. Plus, I'm sure when the video was first shown, maybe there had been a disclaimer stating that one shouldn't be under the influence while watching it. Aside from Harry, the one other character that I still remember is the so-called "Man from Mars" in his white suit and top hat.
"Rapture" hit No. 1 in the United States while it reached No. 3 in Canada. I also recently found out through the YouTube comments for the song that it had become part of the lore in "The Boys" with Soldier Boy doing a cover on "Solid Gold". Personally, I wouldn't mind seeing Captain America trying it out himself.
Anyways, right on the day that "Rapture" was released, these three songs were at the top of the Oricon chart.
A little over three years ago, I did a ROY article on Naked Eyes' "(There's) Always Something There to Remind Me" which was a New Wave version of an old Burt Bacharach and Hal David easy-listening ditty that I used to hear on AM radio all the time. Not only was I surprised but I was actually quite gobsmacked that a song like this could be made into a synthpop example of coolness.
Well, Naked Eyes pulled off another hit several months after that one. On April Fool's Day in 1983, they released "Promises, Promises" which I remember getting a lot of airplay on the radio and plenty of TV play on the music video shows. I will always remember that svelte young woman drying off her hair to the synthy jazz-soul. "Promises, Promises" hit No. 13 on Canada's RPM while in the States, it reached No. 11. On the Wikipedia article for the song, I read that Madonna even provided background vocals for the extended versions of it.
Up at Straw-Wara, I discovered that three hit tunes from Japan were also released on the same day as "Promises, Promises".
It's hard to believe that it's been ten years since music icon David Bowie left this mortal coil. Perhaps it's a mere guess from me, but I think fans and people who are just discovering Bowie are probably going through his discography and perhaps even his filmography right now to view his creations.
As I mentioned in my first ROY article on Bowie, "Ashes to Ashes" was the first time I'd seen him in a music video, following my first ever sighting and listening to him on the Martin Sheen-hosted "Saturday Night Live" episode. Bowie Boy, did he make an impression! Music videos were just at the beginning of their lifetime as a pop culture force and this one for "Ashes to Ashes" was kinda like one of my dreams if I had a little too much spicy food the night before.
I will leave the interpretation of the song to better people at Genius and Wikipedia, but suffice it to say, it was something that left me somewhat shaken considering that I'd seen it on some video show late at night and it was something that I'd never seen before with all of those special effects and Bowie taking on multiple characters. I also read that "Ashes to Ashes" has been lauded for its distinct structure and I could attest to that with the melodic shifts in direction knocking me around for an absolute loop. Art pop and art rock were the right labels for this one, along with New Wave. At the time, I was ready to use avant-garde.
"Ashes to Ashes" was released on August 1st 1980. It did OK in Canada by scoring a No. 35 ranking on RPM and in the United States, it actually hit No. 21 on the Billboard Disco chart, but it reached No. 1 in the UK and France. Let's see what was up at the top of the Oricon charts a few days later on August 4th.
I just wanted to leave things off with Jason Shulman's wonderful paean through his video for Bowie's 1972"Starman". The song wouldn't fit for ROY because I frankly didn't hear it for the first time until much later into my adulthood but this video probably has had fans weeping for joy.
I had never heard of the British band Re-Flex before this song and I never heard from them again. But this one song by them, "The Politics of Dancing", has gone down as one of my favourite dance-pop tunes of any decade. I mean, this one could actually induce me to hit the dance floor and make an unrepentant fool out of myself once I heard those familiar opening notes.
Released in February 1983, I first discovered Re-Flex's debut single when their music video appeared on one of the local shows here, and its theme of the little guy going up against the evil authorities is a well-worn one but one that fits the lyrics here. And why not let it all go and just have a grand ol' time flailing away in the disco once in a while? That's especially true with the extended version.
Burbling bass synthesizer, simmering jangly electric guitar and relentless percussion...what's not to love? In Canada, "The Politics of Dancing" reached No. 13 on RPM and then No. 24 on Billboard in the US. I had actually been thinking of posting this as a second ROY article last week on New Year's Day to signify all of that dancing that must have been done the night before, but I figure that today is as good a day as any.
So, which singles were coming out in Japan in that month? Here are three of them.
Maybe I'm a little late at 25 years putting this one up onto the blog. "Nijuu Seiki no Owari ni" (At the End of the 20th Century) is the debut single for rock and technopop band Hikashu（ヒカシュー）. Released in October 1979, it's quite the jangly New Wave number by leader Koichi Makigami（巻上公一）. According to his lyrics, apparently love demanded quite a lot at the end of 1999. Luckily, we were all consumed with Y2K to worry about that one.
There is a fellow Blogspot blog titled "Hikashu Appreciation Society" which has a post dedicated to "Nijuu Seiki no Owari ni", and it has the English translation of the lyrics along with a very brief excerpt of an interview done by singer-songwriter and producer Haruo Chikada（近田春夫）who contributed his expertise to the production of the early Hikashu material. From it, I gleaned that the band was trying for something quite different from other outfits such as Yellow Magic Orchestra, and I would say that Makigami and company succeeded.
For the longest time up to around university, I was a regular purchaser of "MAD" and "Cracked" satirical magazines since I enjoyed especially reading the parodies of TV shows and movies. Of course, the mascot for "MAD" was Alfred E. Neuman, the redhead goofball with his favourite saying "What, me worry?".
It does make me wonder whether Yellow Magic Orchestra drummer, singer and songwriter Yukihiro Takahashi（高橋幸宏）had been a "MAD" fan himself since his 4th album from June 1982 was titled "What, Me Worry?". However, his visage on the cover looks far more serious and less fancy (or thought) free.
The last time I had Takahashi up on the byline by himself was back in 2023 when I posted his giddy "Kanashiki Blue Colour Worker"（悲しきブルーカラーワーカー）. That was just after hearing of his untimely death on January 11th that year. This time around, I have his track "Disposable Love" from "What, Me Worry?" which is more contemplative yet whimsical at the same time. Written and composed by Takahashi with Peter Barakan also helping out on the lyrics, it seems the man in this story is wrestling in his mind whether the ardor he's had for someone was real or imagined. Sounds like the premise for a sci-fi flick.
On vocals, Takahashi is helped out by singer and producer Tony Mansfield. On the Wikipedia article for the album, he's been listed for his backup vocals, but I think his contribution was more than that, so I'm treating "Disposable Love" as a duet. As for the album itself, it reached No. 35 on Oricon.
I took one look at that cover of Kei Ishiguro's（石黒ケイ）1985 album"Mont Saint-Michel no Kodoku"（モン・サン・ミッシェルの孤独...The Solitude of Mont Saint-Michel ）along with the singer's very artistic appearance, and figured that this was going to be a different animal compared to my usual impression of her as a jazzy City Pop singer through songs such as "Hearty" and "Misty Night"（ミスティ・ナイト）. Even the title hints at the Gallic-ness of it all and when it's produced in the mid-1980s, it's just gotta be somewhat avant-garde and/or New Wave.
And yep, the first track on "Mont Saint-Michel", "Ame no Freeway" (Rainy Freeway), strikes me quite different for an Ishiguro song, but not so much that I consider it to be way out from left field. Written by Yasushi Akimoto（秋元康）and composed by Masahiro Ikumi（幾見雅博）, there are the synthesizers and syn-drums that remind me a bit of Asami Kobayashi's（小林麻美）"Ame Oto wa Chopin no Shirabe"（雨音はショパンの調べ）along with the breezy je ne sais quoi arrangement. Still, even with Ishiguro's vocals that hint at a certain feeling of chaise lounge behaviour, I can pick up on some of the old urban contemporary and sophisticated pop.
Welcome to the penultimate Sunday in November. Over here, we know the Holidays are just around the corner when American Thanksgiving is a few days away and the Santa Claus parade is taking place in downtown Toronto as I type this. Mind you, the stores and malls have already been playing Christmas music for a few weeks.
Nothing Xmas-y here since I won't be starting anything of the Yuletide variety until November 25th. In fact, even for singer-songwriter Kuniko Fukushima（福島邦子）, this is something out of the ordinary. I've already put up a fair number of her songs over the years onto KKP and they've usually been of bluesy City Pop.
This time, though, I bring you to her track "Magical House" from her October 1982 fourth album"Mugen"（夢幻...Visions）. And this time, Fukushima's creation is more New Wave peppy with a hint of Asian exoticism as if we're being treated to a whirlwind tour of Hong Kong or Taipei. Plus, Kuniko herself sings "Magical House" as if she's the sultry mistress of the residence. And that's as far as I will go with my insights.
Back in 2022 and 2023, I wrote up a couple of articles on the singer Yuriko Ohmori's（大森有里子）1981 single"Rai Rai Mirai"（来・来・未来）along with its B-side "Fuyu no Hito"（冬の人）. I could quickly realize that Ohmori was trying for something different with her two songs that skirted with Fashion Music and exotic kayo territory.
Well, the former NHK announcer only released two singles with the second and final one being "Mahou" (Magic) in 1982. For it and its B-side "Night Train", Ohmori was responsible for composition, while Masako Arikawa（有川正沙子）took care of the lyrics and Tsugutoshi Goto（後藤次利）arranged everything. By the way, just from what I've heard in the lyrics, it sounds like "Night Train" starts off the YouTube video with "Mahou" starting up at 3:18.
"Night Train" is a bit of old-fashioned sophisticated Latin-tinged pop mixing in some New Wave. Think of a tropical nightclub on an island that was partially designed by Syd Mead...anyways, that's what I envisage here. As for "Mahou", there is some tango in the urgent arrangement with some of those sound effects thrown in.
One more PS...I mentioned about the website idol.ne.jp in the article for "Fuyu no Hito". I'd been using that as a reference for some of the more obscure aidoru and other female singers over the years. However, it seems as if it's been taken down for some reason.
Welcome to another Reminiscings of Youth where I go for some of the songs from my adolescence. The Go-Gos were just one of the many acts that awakened my interest in pop music. As I mentioned in the ROY for their "Vacation", I was awfully tempted to get their 1981 album "Beauty and the Beat" when it was playing over the speakers at the record corner of the local Hudson's Bay department store back in my high school days. Strangely enough, I was passing by the now-closed down Bay store earlier today as it was being prepared as a liquidation base for another store. I could see the old LP corner off in the back.
Along with "Our Lips Are Sealed", "We Got the Beat" was another Go-Gos hit that hit hard with Gina Schock's drumming rolling in like a Mac truck at full speed. Until Belinda Carlisle and company suddenly showed up on television screens everywhere, I hadn't known any girl bands before armed with full instruments, so listening to these two songs were a revelation as they rocked it out. And apparently, they partied as hard as they worked. I saw one YouTube comment stating that even Ozzy Osbourne had dropped his jaw at how the Go-Gos went medieval on his tour bus (not sure how they would have met, but the band was punk back in those days).
Speaking of punk, I didn't know until yesterday that there had been an original version of "We Got the Beat" that came out as a single in May 1980. From the few times I've listened to this one, the rock and punk roots show more prominently here. The 1982 single version hit No. 2 on US Billboard for three weeks while in Canada, it peaked at No. 3.
Well, for some reason, I ended up putting up the Top 10 Oricon singles chart for September 8th 1980 instead of the one for May 9th and I've already gone to the trouble of getting the relevant Top 3 postings for the comparative Japanese singles. Ah, heck...too tired to change back.
Today is a rather drab and dreary November day which is often par for the course here as the season starts changing. Quite appropriate for Hump Day, I imagine.
Let's go with something a bit off the beaten path, especially for singer Rie Nakahara（中原理恵）. When the name is mentioned, I usually get thoughts of City Pop by songs such as "Disco Lady"(ディスコ・レディー) back in 1978.
However, her final original album to date was "Un Art de Vivre" from September 1985 and judging from that title and this particular track from it, perhaps she was trying for something quite different. "Kon'ya Escape"(Escape Tonight) is a bit more avant-pop and New Wave. Written by Kenzo Saeki（佐伯健三） and composed by Saeki Suzuki（鈴木さえ子）, it almost sounds like a slower take on Little Eva's "The Loco-Motion" with some synths and weird horns that might have popped out of a David Bowie production. The desired effect has definitely been reached, though; this is no City Pop song. It's something that could have popped from the country that came up with the words "Un Art de Vivre".
I'll never trade anything for my many years in Japan. It was a fun and educational experience and adventure. But at the same time, I have to admit that there were some things that I missed out on, and one of them was "The Late Late Show" with Craig Ferguson. His brand of sudden inspired lunacy was my type of humour and I learned that he had at least some affinity with the legendary German band Kraftwerk, as you can see at 56 seconds of the above video.
Craig and his skeletal buddy traded some Kraftwerk songs' lyrics including "She's a model and she's looking good" which I found out originated from "Das Model", a track from their September 1978 album "The Man-Machine". Man, do I love that Micromoog and Polymoog. It's so Kraftwerkian, hypnotic, glacial and crystalline! Just watching the performance by the guys makes me think that they've just out-sprocketed "Sprockets"!
A couple of years later, in February 1980, Japanese technopop bandHikashu（ヒカシュー）provided a cover of "Das Model" called "Model"（モデル）via their debut album "Hikashu" with leader Koichi Makigami（巻上公一）providing the Japanese lyrics. The synthesizers are there but there is also a layer of twangy guitar which adds the New Wave aspect. Makigami's delivery has that certain holy and haunting quality.
I think one of the lasting images of pop culture in Japan in the 1980s is the one showing all of those young folks dancing in Harajuku while garbed in that wild clothing. Given the opportunity, I would have loved to have been there on the sidelines looking on, but at the same time, I would also have been terrified if any of those punks were to have accosted me. I bruise easier than a five-day-old banana.
There were those same 1980s Harajuku vibes when I first listened to this song called "GO! GO! POP-TOWN" which leads the December 1982 album "Yoroshiku Saretai!"（ヨロシク♡されたい!...Wanna Be Nice!）by Sayaka Ito（伊藤さやか）. With that name, I'd assumed that she was already up on the blog, but nope, this is her first entry.
"GO! GO! POP-TOWN", which was written by Heart Box aka Hitoshi Shinohara（篠原仁志）, and composed by Kenji Omura（大村憲司）, has that light and bouncy rock n' roll and New Wave feeling. In fact, I was also reminded of the West Coast girl group The Go-Gos and strangely enough, they and this song title share a couple of words. At the same time, there is that Toni Basil vibe as well.
Ito, who hails from Aichi Prefecture, was born Mitsuko Ito（伊藤美津子）in 1963. She practiced the piano and the cello, but her dream was to become a rock n' roll singer so in her freshman year at high school, she started up a band called 39. During a trip to Okinawa with her friends, Ito was scouted by the president of a talent agency who had been looking for a new model in commercials, and in 1980, she ended up in a Shiseido ad. Acting and music came her way, but Ito gave a hard NO when approached about taking the aidoru route. The music part of her career went as far as 1986 with nine singles and six albums under her belt including "Yoroshiku Saretai!" which was her 2nd effort.
Have you heard that old-fashioned standard, "The Lion Sleeps Tonight"? Well, I only found out today that it had evolved from a song known as "Mbube" which was first released in 1939 by South African musician Solomon Linda and an acapella group known as The Evening Birds. I also read that Linda never got his due accolades or remuneration for his creation according to the Wikipedia article for the song. I think his descendants are still fighting on that one.
As the decades passed by, the song got transformed into pieces covered by various artists such as the American doo-wop group The Tokens with their 1961 "The Lion Sleeps Tonight". The song was also titled "Wimoweh" in other versions. I first heard it many years ago and I think The Tokens' version is the one that is most cited among the covers.
I also remember one cover that was done by a fairly obscure UK pop group called Tight Fit back in 1982. The music video showed up on an episode of the local music show "The New Music" here in Toronto.
Recently, I read that the song had a pretty important role in the both of the "Ace Ventura" movies starring Jim Carrey. Although I enjoyed him in "The Mask" and "Liar, Liar", maybe he just got a little too "carrey-ed" away in those for my liking (I will see myself out for the rest of the paragraph, thank you😁).
Anyways, the Japanese music industry was also aware of "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" since I managed to find out that there were at least two recordings of the song. One was by musician and singer-songwriter Noriyuki Asakura（朝倉紀行）with his group GANG, also in 1982. Asakura has provided a lot of songs to aidoru and other singers since he basically switched over to composing and arrangement but back in those early days, he came up with his own very frantic version of "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" under the ironic title "Lion wa Okiteiru"（ライオンは起きている...The Lion is Awake）, although the original English title is also clearly labeled at the top of the single cover. As would befit the times, Asakura's version feels New Wave but somewhere in the middle, things slow down significantly for a bluesy turn.
The GANG cover was used as the theme song for the dramedy "Keiji Yoroshiku"（刑事ヨロシク...Detective At-Your-Service） starring comedian and future movie auteur Beat Takeshi（ビートたけし）. And yep, those opening credits for the show may have inspired the man. By the way, the translations into Japanese were done by Arisu Sato（佐藤ありす）.
Japanese doo-wop vocal group The Kingtones（ザ・キング・トーンズ）had given their own cover of "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" back in 1969 in one of their albums.
During my browsings through YouTube, I encountered this September 2018 single, "Kimi to Tsuki to Cider"(You and the Moon and Cider) by the unit Neco Asobi because of its spacey 1980s technopop leanings; I also picked up on some urban groove in there, too. I suddenly got all of these memories of skinny ties, techno cuts and Day-Glo neon from over forty years ago.
There's not much information on Neco Asobi (which translates as "Cat Play") but apparently the duo, which started with the vocalist Yuniko Takano（高野ユニコ）and trackmaker TAOISM, launched in 2018 and went on until 2023 when they opted to go on hiatus. New vocalist sino entered the scene and TAOISM changed his moniker to u.u. By the way, the below video was actually filmed at a Shimo-Kitazawa live house in June 2025 so I'm assuming that it's sino singing alongside u.u.
Welcome to Labour Day and September 2025! Hopefully, things are swell wherever you are. Haven't really complained with the weather here in Toronto; it's been brilliantly sunny and not too warm or cool. To start off this day's round of articles on "Kayo Kyoku Plus", we have the usual holiday edition of Reminiscings of Youth.
I've read that Soft Cell's"Tainted Love" is one of the iconic songs of the 1980s. I would not disagree. That rhythm track and the sultry vocals fairly scream New Wave and synthpop extraordinaire. Used to hear this all the time on radio and occasionally I got to see one of the music videos for it including the one above. "Tainted Love" was released in July 1981 and became a huge hit all around the planet including Canada which had a No. 1 ranking for it as was also the case in Australia, South Africa and Soft Cell's native UK. In the United States, it peaked at No. 8 on Billboard.
Reading up on the story of "Tainted Love", I found out a couple of things which surprised me. One is that this was released in July 1981 (as mentioned above); I'd assumed that this was a 1982 hit but I guess with all of the chaos surrounding my trip to Japan as a high school student in that very month, it was probably easy to suffer mental time shifts. The other thing is that once again as was the case with Kim Carnes' "Bette Davis Eyes" and Joan Jett's "I Love Rock 'n' Roll", Soft Cell's biggest hit wasn't an original by the synthpop duo but a cover version of a song done many years previously. In fact, "Tainted Love" was originally recorded by Gloria Jones in 1965 as a soul B-side for a single that didn't become particularly successful. Remakes were made between then and 1981, but it was Soft Cell's synthy version that put it over the top.
So, what songs were at the top of Oricon in July 1981?
Welcome to another Thursday edition of Reminiscings of Youth. What I remember from the music video for Blondie's October 1980 hit"The Tide is High" are two things. First, there was the close-up of Debbie Harry's pretty face singing the song in a lower register compared to the high and floaty vocals she demonstrated with the band's first big breakthrough "Heart of Glass" in 1979. Second, I recall seeing a rocket ship on the pad ready for launch. Looking over the video again for the first time in a long time, I was reminded of what I'd thought was the Dark Lord of the Sith admiring the singer through some video effects.
"The Tide is High" is quite the different animal from "Heart of Glass". Both have been categorized as New Wave but with the former, there are a few more genres that have been thrown at it: reggae, calypso, rocksteady and pop. And as for me, contrasting with those reggae and calypso labels, I couldn't help getting some of those mariachi vibes from Mexico because of the horns and strings.
"I'm going to be your No. 1"? Wow, no better prediction could have been made. Blondie's take on "The Tide is High" actually got to be No. 1 in Canada, America, New Zealand and the UK. The song is also available on the band's 2nd album from November 1980, "Autoamerican".
As with many 1980s hits, "The Tide is High" by Blondie is actually a cover of the original 1967 song by the Jamaican group The Paragons and is known as a rocksteady song. According to the Wikipedia article regarding the genre, rocksteady seems to have been a transitional type of music between its precursor ska and then its successor reggae.
So what also got to be our No. 1...No. 2 and No. 3 on Oricon just a few days before Blondie's "The Tide is High" was released on Halloween 1980? Let's take a look.
Today is supposedly the last day of our current heat wave and yep, it was a hot one as I walked the concrete in midtown Toronto to meet up with a couple of friends for lunch at Kinton Ramen. I had a pretty tasty if spicy mazemen and I found myself having to deal with my own "ring of fire" issues later on in the day.
Anyways, to keep on with this summer theme, I have here "Summer Tour" by rock band RC Succession（RCサクセション）as their 12th single from June 1982. Written and composed by vocalist Kiyoshiro Imawano（忌野清志郎）and guitarist Reichi Nakaido（仲井戸麗市）, the arrangement is appropriately New Wave sinuous and salivating as the late Imawano sings not of his own band making the rounds around the nation during the hot season but of waiting for a beautiful young lady to walk past his way again so his eyes can get their fill. The song peaked at No. 6 on Oricon and there's something in that underlying rhythm which reminds me of an upbeat take on The Animals' cover of "The House of the Rising Sun" that got especially featured in the Martin Scorcese movie "Casino".
Happy Canada Day and all that! I'm hoping that my fellow Canadian viewers of KKP are enjoying their July 1st from coast to coast to coast. Of course, being a statutory holiday today means that I've got a special round of Reminiscings of Youth.
This all starts with my regular bus ride to high school all the way back in 1982. One of my classmates hopped onto the TTC and saw me. We often commuted together and he always nattered on something irrelevant like one of those "Seinfeld" side characters. This time around, he asked me whether I had ever heard of this song called "The Safety Dance" and proceeded to speak out the first verse:
We can dance if we want to
We can leave your friends behind
'Cause your friends don't dance
And if they don't dance
Well they're no friends of mine
He was rather obsessed about those lyrics as I recall. Anyways, it was some time later when this Montreal-based band called Men Without Hats who had recorded "The Safety Dance" showed off their music video.
In the years to come, whenever I have seen the video, I always wondered whether my university's Society for Creative Anachronism had anything to do with it. Anyways, this was Men Without Hats' 2nd single released sometime in that year of 1982 and at the time, I wasn't all that impressed with it. I guess I was no friend of theirs.
But then as I got more into extended remixes and began hearing them on Saturday night radio broadcasts, I realized that the remix version of "The Safety Dance" sounded pretty good with the focus on the underlying rhythm, the famous bleeping riff (I'm not trying to be profane here) and the singers spelling out "SAFETY". After that, I became a convert to the cause. America became even more of a convert than Canada did in its initial release, since Billboard recorded it reaching No. 3 while in Canada, it didn't even crack the Top 10...it just scraped by at No. 11.
"The Safety Dance" is also one of the best pop culture examples of turning a negative into a positive. Songwriter and singer Ivan Doroschuk had apparently been ousted from a dance club for doing some pogoing or slam dancing one time which he felt was rather unfair. So, in what would perhaps be a form of revenge and therapy, he created "The Safety Dance". As a personal aside, a bunch of us tried some pogoing at a university dance. The results were unfortunately mixed and painful...especially when I jumped in to move my weight around. But in any case, Doroschuk's creation became his band's most famous song...something whose popularity and fame has continued right to this day.
It's been given the affectionate mention in cartoons on either side of the Pacific.
There was even a Men Without Hatsconversation channel on Conan!
Heck, even movie and TV dance compilation videos have used it. "The Safety Dance" may have become the most famous Canadian song to be utilized on social media. Wouldn't it be nice if the song got some coast-to-coast-to-coast tributes tonight?
In any case, since I couldn't find out in which month "The Safety Dance" was released, let's just go with July 1982 to find out some of the singles that were released back then.
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