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.
Showing posts with label Sheena & The Rokkets. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Sheena & The Rokkets. Show all posts
It's been a little over a year since the passing of guitarist Makoto Ayukawa（鮎川誠）at the age of 74 while his fellow bandmate and partner in life, Etsuko "Sheena" Ayukawa（鮎川悦子）left this mortal coil a little over nine years ago. But as cliché as it sounds, I'm sure that the music of Sheena & The Rokkets（シーナ&ザ・ロケッツ）has been living on within the survivors of the band and their fans.
Recently, I found this follow-up single to their 1980 hit "You May Dream". "Baby Maybe", which was written and arranged by Sheena and Makoto respectively with Yellow Magic Orchestra's Yukihiro Takahashi（高橋幸宏）, was released in October 1980, a little over ten months following the release of "You May Dream". To me at least, "Baby Maybe" sounds like a 1950s rock n' roller given that New Wave sheen with the synths and what also makes it work is Sheena's cute-as-a-button delivery. No, I'm not saying that she was being an aidoru about it; more like Marilyn Monroe.
The song was also a part of Sheena & The Rokkets' 3rd album"Channel Good"（チャンネル・グー）which came out on the same day as the single. And yep, the video below does have that 1950s look. They sure don't make music videos like those anymore.
It's been a pretty melancholy time over these weeks of January 2023 since I've witnessed the passing of many people. Of course, I've noted the deaths of well-known people in the music industry in both Japan and the United States, but in my neck of the woods in the past two weeks or so, we've lost someone who came to our small screens as a popular weather forecaster to become a Lieutenant-Governor of Ontario, and one of the feistiest and longest-serving mayors in Canada, Hurricane Hazel McCallion, who ran Mississauga, a city whose name that US President Obama had initial trouble pronouncing one time and whose sister city is Kariya in Aichi Prefecture. Today, we even lost a famous hockey player, Bobby Hull, and even while writing this article, I've learned that actress Cindy Williams from ABC's "Laverne & Shirley" left this mortal coil a few days ago.
Last night, I was writing about the death of David Crosby of Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young for a ROY article, and less than twelve hours later, I saw on NHK that rock guitarist and composer Makoto Ayukawa（鮎川誠）of Sheena & the Rokkets had passed away yesterday. He was 74 and suffered from pancreatic cancer. I had no idea that he had been ill but according to the report above, Ayukawa had kept a very tight lid on his sickness from the media.
Ayukawa hailed from Kurume City, Fukuoka Prefecture as the son of an American soldier and an employee at a ryotei. He got into the guitar as a Grade 5 student and would eventually get into Muddy Waters, Ray Charles and Elvis Presley for starters. In the 1970s, his region would become known as the Liverpool of Japan for its emerging rock scene and the local music would be labeled Mentai Rock（めんたいロック）, named after the regional delicacy of mentaiko（明太子）or spicy pollock roe. He joined the blues rock band Sonhouse（サンハウス）as a guitarist and composer before forming Sheena & the Rokkets in 1978 with his wife Etsuko "Sheena" Ayukawa（鮎川悦子）. Both bands are examples of Mentai Rock.
My first article on the Rokkets was for "You May Dream" in February 2015, and it was written because Sheena had herself passed away the week before from cervical cancer at the age of 61. However, I'd known about the band for some years before that; one reason was Ayukawa himself who cut a very distinct figure on television with his tall angular features and those sunglasses. In fact, I did put him alongside fellow musician Tomoyasu Hotei（布袋寅泰）as two of the cooler if somewhat intimidating Japanese guitarists out there. To be honest, the first time I saw him in a commercial, I was actually scared of the guy.
In 1981, Ayukawa put out his first solo album titled "Cool Solo"（クール・ソロ）and among the tracks is "JUKEBOXER". Written by Chris Mosdell (who was providing lyrics for Yellow Magic Orchestra) and composed by Ayukawa, the guitarist puts out a good ol' bluesy rock n' roll tune as he sings out about having a great time with his jukebox of 45s while looking pretty darn good.
I hope wherever he is now, Ayukawa has reunited with his wife and they're back making wonderful music together once more. My condolences go out to the Rokkets, the Ayukawa family and friends, and their many fans.
In the last number of days, I've been hearing some rather sad news about musician/producer (among other hats that he wears) Ryuichi Sakamoto（坂本龍一）. Remembering a few years ago that he had been diagnosed with throat cancer, something that he eventually did beat into remission, it was heartbreaking news on reading that he has now been diagnosed with rectal cancer. He is undergoing treatment and on his website, he has left a message for fans to keep everyone's spirits up. Of course, I am hoping that The Professor will defeat this one, too.
One song that he composed was for the rock band Sheena & The Rokkets back in 1979 as the final track for their 2nd album, "Shinkuu Pack"（真空パック...Vacuum Pack） released in October. Titled "Rocket Koujou" (Rocket Factory), it's a brief robotic instrumental coda to wrap things up but although I can hear some of that New Wave among the bleeps and bloops, I think it was a bit of an odd way to finish "Shinkuu Pack" for a band of the mentai rock vein.
I mentioned in the article for The Rokkets'"You May Dream" which is also a part of the album that Haruomi Hosono（細野晴臣）, Sakamoto's bandmate in synthpop legend Yellow Magic Orchestra, had produced "Shinkuu Pack" and that there were some conflicts between him and the band about the direction that the album was taking. Perhaps "Rocket Koujou" was one of the points of contention. Still, it was also stated that any arguments were all for getting the best out of the project, and the song was in there at the end.
Sakamoto and YMO did a cover of "Rocket Koujou" as a track for their May 1991 album"Faker Holic" which consisted of their live appearances in London, Paris and New York City in October and November 1979 (which is why I threw in the two years in Labels). Considering the brevity of the song, the video above has the first two-and-a-half minutes devoted to who I think is Sakamoto introducing the band members through his vocoder before going into "Rocket Koujou". If anything, the YMO version isn't too different from the one for The Rokkets except for a sudden onrush of YMO-esque beats. I think especially for this version, there is a feeling that the factory isn't producing rockets but a robo-Frankenstein of Asian design. The album reached No. 50 on Oricon.
Once again, I'm wishing for Sakamoto's complete recovery.
It's been over 3 years since the untimely passing of Etsuko "Sheena" Ayukawa（鮎川 シーナ 悦子）from Sheena & The Rokkets（シーナ&ザ・ロケッツ）so I wanted to explore some more of the band's work. And so I went to the very beginning. Their debut single in October 1978 was "Namida no Highway" (Highway of Tears) which was written by Kotaro Aso（麻生香太郎）and Sheena and composed by band guitarist Makoto Ayukawa（鮎川誠）, Sheena's husband. The lyrics are about someone trying to flee from someone or a relationship gone sour as quickly as she can.
Looking at the title for the first time, I thought "Namida no Highway" sounded atypically kayo-esque for an identifier for a rock song. J-Wiki pegged it as a song with New Wave, punk and 60s pop elements. I also saw it as a tune that could have launched a thousand ideas for inspired younger folk wanting to create their own bands. Lindberg was the first one on my mind followed by other acts such as Princess Princess. When I think of the late 1970s in Japanese pop music, I usually think of enka and aidoru sharing the TV stage and Oricon charts while New Music/City Pop/Folk were genres streaming nicely underwater, but Ramones-style rock wasn't something that I would have heard much about in those times, unless I were frequenting the live houses.
As I said in Part 1, I have been trying to find something about how the late lyricist Yu Aku（阿久悠）managed to create all those hits. Well, with a bit of further digging, there are a couple of YouTube videos which include a 2011 interview with Yasushi Akimoto（秋元康）, currently the No. 1 lyricist for top-selling singles in Japanese music history with Aku in 2nd place, in which he talks about what made the earlier lyricist tick.
One kernel that I managed to understand from the first part of the interview above (and it comes at 3:29) is that according to Aku himself "....the song is of the era..." which is pretty interesting since a number of his songs have become timeless. But then again, unless the fellow is supremely arrogant, I couldn't see any budding songwriter exhort, "Yes, I will write a song that will live throughout the ages!! MWAHAHAHAHAH!!" (cue thunder and lightning) He really just wanted to write lyrics that would address the times and conditions in the years that he also existed in.
But the big thing I found out in the second part (2:59) is that Aku had left "Yu Aku's 15-Condition Constitution for Lyricists". Namely, it was a list of 15 guidelines expressed as a series of contemplative questions (I wonder if he was deeply Buddhist) when approaching his work to create the words, and I found the list at another blog for which I am grateful. I'll do my best at a translation and provide it at the end of this article below. However, I will refer to some of the fifteen questions when I take a look at some of the songs.
When picking songs out of the massive Aku collection, I just went with my gut. And with that visceral guide in mind, I found veteran Akiko Wada's（和田アキ子）"Hoshizora no Kodoku"（星空の孤独）whose English title is "The Stars in the Sky" although I think it's probably more evocative to go with the direct translation of "The Loneliness of a Starlit Sky". This was the then-18-year-old Wada's debut single from October 1968, and true to the singer's love for Ray Charles, the song is romantic and bluesy. This was a joint collaboration between Aku and Robbie Wada（ロビー和田）with Wada composing the song as well.
Mune ni hirogaru, kodoku no tsurasa Yozora ni dakare, hitori no nemuri Ai wo shinjita, yasashii mune no Kizu wo atatame, hoshi ni namidagumu Hoshi yo omae ga matataku kagiri Ashita wo shinjitai The pain of loneliness that spreads in my heart Embraced by the night sky, sleeping alone I believed in love, the scar in my gentle heart is warmed, I come close to tears toward the stars Stars, as long as you twinkle I want to believe in tomorrow
I have to admit on hearing the song and reading the lyrics, "Hoshizora no Kodoku" kinda got me right here. One thing that Akimoto mentioned in the interview was that Aku wanted to cut to the chase when it came to the picture that he painted for the listener which chimes in with his quote (in Part 1) that he wanted to pack the same power of a 2-hour movie within a 3-minute song. So, with this particular song, we all seem to have been thrust into the middle of this melancholy scene with the heroine sitting by her open bedroom window, perhaps several hours after a breakup, and trying to recover emotionally. And No. 6 from Aku's treatise seems to apply here: Can't a popular song describing one woman be rewritten to include all women? Well, the rule seems pretty obvious today but back then perhaps it was quite novel. And it is interesting to note since singer-songwriter Yumi Arai（荒井由実）who debuted in the early 70s has been known to rely on the feelings of women to come up with her own catchy tunes. Could there have been some influence?
The song, by the way, got as high as No. 70 on Oricon. And to commemorate Wada's 25th year in show business in 1993, she sang this song at that year's Kohaku Utagassen.
Gonna jump over a few decades into the 90s. When I wrote up the first entry on rock band Sheena & The Rokkets, I referred to a Japan Times article in which the late Sheena and her husband Makoto Ayukawa（鮎川誠）praised Aku for his storytelling prowess through his works. They'd had a long desire to work with the lyricist but never thought that he would ever deign to work with a rock band. Happily, he proved them wrong....and one song he wrote was "Rock no Suki na Baby wo Daite" (Hug That Rock-Lovin' Baby) in 1994 as the band's 15th single. Guitarist Ayukawa took care of the thrashing melody.
And this brings up No. 9: Isn't it also necessary to shift the singer from a storytelling role to that of the subject in the drama? In "Rock no Suki na Baby wo Daite", Sheena is the one growling out the lyrics but considering that she's using the masculine "omae" meaning "you", I'm wondering if hubby Makoto is the one voicing his feelings.
Rock no suki na baby wo daite Kawaii mama ga iku Kono ko ga nijuusai ni naru to Kono yo ga kitto yoku natteiru Dakara shibaraku mama to omae de Ganbarou ne, ganbarou ne! Rock de warau omae wo miteiru to Yuuki ga itsumo waiteiru kara Hug that rock-lovin' baby Cute Mama is on the way When this kid reaches 20 The world will have become a better place So just for a while, with you and your Mama Let's do our best, do our best! Since when I see you laughing to rock My courage always comes to a boil
In the middle of all that head-bouncing rock, there's a poignant and heartwarming story for a daughter or son to do well in childhood/adolescence. The message could apply to any heartrending ballad or lullaby but it was done in the Rokkets way! However it was Aku who wrote the words...I recall writing in Part 1 that his experience as a copywriter was probably useful in sizing up the idea behind the message and the artist. Maybe the lyricist and the rock band had some heart-to-heart talk about family.
As I mentioned above for Sheena & The Rokkets, even that band thought that Aku wouldn't give them the time of day since they thought that the sentimentality of kayo would never mesh with the rock sound. Well, let's get back to the sentimental stuff. Actually, the resident enka/Mood Kayo writer for "Kayo Kyoku Plus", Noelle, suggested this one: Hiroshi Uchiyamada and Cool Five's"Koi Uta"（恋唄...Love Song） from July 1972 (which peaked at No. 14). The solid and slightly heartbreaking vocals of Kiyoshi Maekawa are in there, along with the background vocals of The Five and the reliable horns. But unlike some of their other hits, the horns are somewhat more subdued and there's an air of melancholy gratitude.
Aku's penchant for making movies out of songs is in here, too. Against Kunihiko Suzuki's（鈴木邦彦）somber melody, the lyricist, through Mae-Kiyo, relates that bittersweet farewell to that brief but lively affair.
Honno mijikai yume demo Totemo shiawase datta Aete honto ni yokatta Dakedo kaeru anata It was merely a short dream but I was truly happy It was really great to have met you However you're going away
1972 was a very busy year for Aku. I counted the number of songs that he had concocted at his website, and it came to about 110 or so. And looking at the other years in that decade, he didn't slack too much for those either. Considering that he wrote so much in his heyday, he may have been the one fellow to have created the forlorn love song that I often associate with in kayo kyoku. Perhaps in another life, he would have been the ultimate country-&-western songwriter. In any case, another rule of his pops up, and it's interesting: No. 2: Isn't the sentiment or mentality of the Japanese regret and masochism? Not exactly the most optimistic insight here. Maybe he's trying to intimate that the Japanese relate more to having loved and lost.
Above in the Akimoto interview, Aku said that the song is of the era. Well, with 5,000 songs under his belt, perhaps a lot of them were only meant for their respective eras or decades, but with the three songs that I've talked about, the lyrics seem to transcend any barriers of time. I think any of those sets of words could apply to situations today, and personally the lyrics to "Koi Uta" could also apply to an old flame I knew a long time ago.
Kenji Sawada（沢田研二）was sporting earrings even before I realized that men who were not pirates could wear them. He was an iconoclast, an artist who went to the beat of his own drum. I think that's how Aku sized him up when he wrote the lyrics to Sawada's 22nd single from January 1978, "Samurai"（サムライ）. Perhaps "ronin" (masterless samurai) would have made for an even better title, but the samurai tag was good enough to create that image for that wafuu lone wolf in the 20th century.
Katate ni pistol Kokoro ni hanataba Kuchibiru ni hi no sake Senaka ni jinsei wo Aaa aaa aaa Arigato, Jenny Omae wa ii onna datta Hanpa na wine yori yowasete kureta yo Dakedo Jenny abayo Jenny Ore wa ikanakucha ikenain dayo In one hand, a pistol In my heart, a bouquet of flowers Firewater on my lips My life on my back Aaa aaa aaa Thank you, Jenny You were a great girl You got me drunk on half a glass of wine But Jenny, farewell Jenny I gotta go, y'know
Yup, there's another movie in there. And there are a couple of other Aku rules, the ones about having regrets and the singer becoming the protagonist in the story. Listening to "Samurai", I know that it isn't Julie singing about a lone wolf gangster...it's Julie singing about HIMSELF being that lone wolf gangster in the same way that Harrison Ford IS Indiana Jones. I can't imagine anyone else in the part when he sings the song. I mentioned that whenever Aku comes to mind, Pink Lady pops up as well. Well, I only realized not too long ago that Sawada should also be popping up when I think about Aku in the 70s since he has written a number of songs for him during those days. And in "Samurai", the lyricist pegged the singer's foppish tough guy persona to a T, even putting in that theatrical Sawada cry.
I also have to mention Katsuo Ono's（大野克夫）music for the song since it also reflects that lone wolf character. There seems to be a hint of Spanish matador behind the first verse before the music settles into a 50s-style ballad reminding me of James Dean and early Marlon Brando. "Samurai", by the way, hit No. 1 on the Oricon weeklies and finished 1978 as the 13th-ranked song.
Before I talk about the final song here, allow me to show the Top 10 Yu Aku singles in terms of sales as of 2012 (from the good folks at J-Wiki):
See the pattern? You can imagine why I've always put Pink Lady and Yu Aku together like bread and butter. The other interesting thing is that the lyricist seemed to have usually put Mie and Kei in some sort of thriller element whether it be cops and robbers or aliens and monsters with the ladies musically throwing in their lot with them or battling them.
One song by Pink Lady and Aku that is not up on the above list is "Toumei Ningen"（透明人間...Invisible Man）. Released in September 1978 as their 9th single, the usual upbeat Pink Lady song sounds like some tokusatsu theme song (those fanfare horns) with a rumbly 50s guitar.
Masaka to omotteiru desho ga Jitsu wa, jitsu wa Watashi wa toumei ningen desu Shock... Seken wo sawagasu fushigi na koto wa Subete wa toumei ningen nano desu Tenka muteki no champion Totsuzen down wo kutta no mo Spoon wo magetari, nejittari Nenriki boom mo watashi desu It's impossible to believe but The tr..truth is I am the invisible man Shock... The strange thing rocking the world is That everyone is invisible Champions without peer Absorbing sudden blues Bending and twisting spoons The psychokinesis boom...that's me
At first, I wondered if any of Aku's guidelines really applied here. Perhaps the lyricist just wanted to have a bit of vacation but still keep his words within the Pink Lady lyrical groove. I mean, I don't think No. 2 about the Japanese penchant for regret and masochism would come in here; if anything, "Toumei Ningen" comes off as the opposite. And try as I might, even with Mie and Kei singing about everyone being invisible, I just couldn't imagine the ladies invisibly jumping about the streets of Tokyo . As I mentioned, the melody sounds like something out of a tokusatsu or anime superhero series...the lyrics certainly hint at someone similar.
However, being an old fan of superhero comics and the need for titans like Superman and Batman here in North America and Ultraman and Kamen Rider in Japan, I wondered if Aku was subtly channeling No. 3: Shouldn't we be gradually focusing on human relationships within the urban lifestyle?
Neither J-Wiki nor the Q&A section at Yahoo.jp divulged any insights into the lyrics, and perhaps this is a leap for me but I mused about the rapid economic modernization and urbanization of the country during the 50s-70s and their benefits and consequences, especially the latter. Was Aku, however comically, addressing the usual urban problems such as isolation and crime? Maybe he was being somewhat sarcastic about the abundance of folks in the big city becoming faceless and invisible, and therefore gaining these wonderful new powers. Come to think of it, that brings up No. 7: How do the maintenance of telecommunications, the development of transportation, an automobile society, the Westernization of housing, changes in diet and the modernization of lifestyles affect the emotions?
Most likely there are Aku songs that better highlight Nos. 3 and 7 but I have yet to come across them, and when I heard "Toumei Ningen" and read its lyrics, I just thought that there was some sly message about city life. To be honest, when I did read those two rules, I initially assumed that Aku even had something to do with City Pop, but I think they now perhaps hint more at anti-City Pop. In any case, let me stop my ramblings here. The song, by the way, did hit No. 1 on the Oricon weeklies and eventually became the 6th-ranked entry for 1978.
Yu Aku passed away at the age of 70 in August 2007 from cancer. With all of those 5,000 or so songs that he wrote lyrics for, and for all those Pink Lady and Kenji Sawada entries among his most successful hits, the one song that is my favourite by him is "Shishuuki"（思秋期...The Autumn of My Years）, as sung originally by Hiromi Iwasaki（岩崎宏美）back in 1978. I've already devoted an article on this song, but what I wanted to add here is that I think the evergreen and bittersweet ballad is that message which still echoes through the generations about the passing of time and the loss of youth. Whether he wrote it as an inevitable realization or as a warning to the young to cherish those moments of vitality and camaraderie before it's too late is not something I can answer definitively, but the way the song is delivered melodically and lyrically has that color of Aku sepia. It can still relate to today but there is still that nostalgia for a type of song that will most likely never be re-created.
Now, as for that constitution...as I mentioned way up above, I'm not 100% confident on the translations so for those who are better than me, please let me know.
1. Isn't there a different path to the usual one for popular songs that were thought to be completed by Hibari Misora? (I'm not sure if this was a slight indictment against the maxim that songs which could only pass muster by the Queen of Kayo Kyoku were proper songs.)
2. Isn't the sentiment or mentality of the Japanese regret and masochism? 3. Shouldn't we be gradually focusing on human relationships within the urban lifestyle?
4. Isn't there a meaning applied to the simultaneous separation of the musical world and the ideal image of a musical person? (not totally sure here)
5. While writing about the modest happenings for a person and the truth of that person, is sending a message to society at the same time impossible? 6. Can't a popular song describing one woman be rewritten to include all women? 7. How do the maintenance of telecommunications, the development of transportation, an automobile society, the Westernization of housing, changes in diet and the modernization of lifestyles affect the emotions? 8. Are the expressions, behaviour and bad habits of a human being everlasting? Are there things that he/she will absolutely not want to do depending on the generation? 9. Isn't it also necessary to shift the singer from a storytelling role to that of the subject in the drama? 10. A close-up of the singer will not reveal everything but with the technique of thrusting that singer into a larger space, isn't it acceptable to demand an image up to that point?
11. Won't a song be created even if the words "douse" (anyhow) and "shosen" (the beginning of a conflict) are eliminated? (I had no idea what Aku was on about here, but apparently lyricists before his arrival on the scene were using those two words to such an extent that it seemed like they had a patent on them, according to this Japanese blog entry.)
12. Other than the seven-and-five-syllable meter, isn't there a set number of words that evokes a pleasant aural sensation? 13. There is nothing that cannot be made into a song. For example, a short story, a movie, a speech, an amusement park. Can't any of these fill up 4 minutes at the same volume? 14. An era is not something that can be seen so that you can see it. However when you face that age, can't the reasons for things specific to that age be seen? 15. A song is playing catch with that era. Doesn't a hit song pierce the sense of hunger of that era?
Last week via Mixi, I discovered that Etsuko "Sheena" Ayukawa（鮎川悦子）of Mentai Rock band Sheena & The Rokkets had passed away from cervical cancer at the age of 61...way too young. I was not a fan of the band but, boy, they were a group that I had heard about over the years and my biggest impression of them was their physical presence. There was Sheena Rokket in that leather getup looking every bit the Hard Rock Queen while her husband, actor and guitarist Makoto Ayukawa（鮎川誠）struck an epic lanky and angular figure with those sunglasses, that guitar and his height. Mind you, 5'11" isn't exactly seen as supremely tall in my country or Stateside, but in Japan, that's still fairly stately. In any case, I saw him as the J-Rock equivalent of James Coburn's character in "The Magnificent Seven", Britt the quiet but deadly cowpoke with the knife. To finish off the group, there is Toshihiro Nara（奈良敏博）on bass and Kazuhide Kawashima（川嶋一秀）on drums.
I mentioned Mentai Rock at the top. Well, according to Wikipedia, it was the name for a group of musicians from Fukuoka City during the late 1970s and early 1980s. The Mentai part came from the name of a Fukuoka delicacy, mentaiko, or marinated cod roe. Although I don't eat it too much as it is, I do love mentaiko spaghetti. One of the first bands representing Mentai Rock was SONHOUSE which ended its run in 1978. Makoto Ayukawa was part of that band and once it ran its course, he asked his wife Etsuko to come and join his new project. The missus took on the moniker Sheena in tribute to a Ramones' song "Sheena is a Punk Rocker", and Rokkets was a fusion of "rock" and the first four letters of Etsuko's name. Sheena & The Rokkets were born (by the way, another Mentai Rock group is ARB).
From what I've heard and read about the band, the above video for "Lemon Tea" (originally sung by SONHOUSE) seemed to represent what Sheena & The Rokkets was all about. On the relevant J-Wiki article there is a long list of katakana names associated with the group including Yoko Ono, blues guitarist Albert King, and British singer Wilko Johnson who was one of the influences behind the whole English punk sound, and US punk legends The Ramones.
I have one song by the band that was part of the "Seishun Uta Nenkan"（青春歌年間）series for 1980. It's "You May Dream" which was their 2nd single from December of that year and was also a track on their 2nd album, "Shinkuu Pack"（真空パック...Vacuum Pack） which had been released a couple of months earlier. SONHOUSE vocalist Toshiyuki Shibayama（柴山俊之）and Chris Mosdell took care of the lyrics while Makoto Ayukawa and Haruomi Hosono（細野晴臣）of Yellow Magic Orchestra fame composed the music. Hosono also produced "Shinkuu Pack".
Although I get a hint of that growly rock sound in "You May Dream", there is also another layer of synths that brings the song into New Wave territory. And taking a look at the performance video a little higher up, the band certainly looked like a mix of 50s and New Wave with Sheena voicing her words somewhat like a Valley Girl (yup, I just aged myself). And Makoto looks like a fusion between Elvis Costello and the late Harold Ramis from "Ghostbusters". It's no wonder that they had become the opening act for Costello during his swing around Japan in 1978.
I read in an online article in the Japan Times that Hosono and the band had some fights over the production but Makoto graciously stated that the conflicts all benefited the final product. This is just my opinion but with YMO and their runaway success at the time, Hosono and his two compatriots were bringing some of their technopop influence via their works for other singers...i.e. techno kayo...and I'm wondering if Sheena and the Rokkets was just getting a little spooked at the time that Hosono was trying to transmogrify the Mentai Rock band into something that they didn't want to be.
However, "You May Dream" was the band's first hit. The lyrics were basically on the same well-worn path about a girl who has the hots for a guy, but I like that one line where Sheena repeats "yume"（夢...dream） which sounds similar to the first two words in the title.
That new project of a husband-and-wife team-up has now lasted nearly 40 years. As much as it's hard to believe the dynamic Sheena has left this world, it's also hard to believe that Makoto is one year past retirement (if he were a Canadian resident). Still, they released their latest album just last year, "Rokket Ride" and I don't hear anything yet about Sheena & The Rokkets packing it up.
