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 Takaki Horigome. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Takaki Horigome. Show all posts
Happy Monday! After first introducing him on Friday's article for Mebae Miyahara's（宮原芽映）"Milky Cat", the suave if somewhat corpulent Mr. Calico is finally standing right beside Kayo Grace Kyoku. I figure that he can not only be Kayo's beloved pet but also her manager in all things business.
But getting down to brass tacks, the two of them are here with the usual J-C AI Gallery and this time, we are all covering three tracks from Kirinji's（キリンジ）grand 13th album"Ai wo aru dake, Subete" (Just With Love, Everything) from June 2018. The reason that we are focusing on this one album is that there are quite a few tracks with interesting and evocative titles, so therefore, to see what I've said about the three songs below, just click on the above link for the album. I'll be taking a look at some of their other songs in a future AI Gallery entry.
Well, it's been a pretty good couple of weeks when it comes to new music coming out from Japan. Last month, Tatsuro Yamashita（山下達郎）andKirinji（キリンジ）put out some of their fine latest material, and now I'm hearing that the mellow and groovy Tomita Lab（冨田ラボ）released his seventh album on June 29th, appropriately titled "7+". As has been the case throughout his career, he's collaborating with a number of other artists and the album includes one song that I have already written about, "Yogisha"（夜汽車）featuring rapper BASI & guitarist kojikoji.
Arguably, the biggest name among his collaborators in "7+" is the Haruomi Hosono（細野晴臣）for the track "Kemutagararete" which I will translate here as "Getting Smoked". When I checked out the root form（煙たがる）of the verb on Jisho.org, I found out that kemutagaru meant "to be sensitive to smoke" or "to consider (someone) a burden or nuisance". Assuming that the title is showing the passive voice of the verb, I did think that this was about someone being shooed away.
Sure enough, Takaki Horigome's（堀込高樹）(aka Kirinji) lyrics are a plaintive cry from an incorrigible smoker looking for someone...anyone...to just join him for small talk and maybe a puff or two in a Japan that is supposedly no longer all that friendly to Marlboro men or women. To be honest, I think that my old home-away-from-home is still more accepting of smokers than over here in Canada but I also realize that things have been changing over the past couple of decades in Tokyo at least with proper non-smoking sections being installed in the restaurants and cafés.
I've heard from Come Along Radio's Rocket Brown that Hosono is a long-time smoker who has somehow managed to avoid cancer, so I'm wondering if his humourously forlorn delivery in "Kemutagararete" is showing his real feelings and experiences of not being able to light up in the office or the café anymore. Perhaps he's also feeling the true pain of not having anyone willing to sit beside him as he does his best impression of a chimney stack.
Yet, there is Tomita Lab himself in the music video gloriously savoring his ciggy at a classy coffee house, speaking of whom, he was indeed the composer for the song. It starts somewhat weirdly before things soon settle down into an old-style jazz-pop vocal piece (maybe not so much Steely Dan as it is more along the lines of Donald Fagen). Joining Hosono in his nicotine dream as backing vocals are Isono-kun（磯野くん）from YONA YONA WEEKENDERS, AAAMYYY from Tempalay, musician TENDRE and vocalist Sara Yoshida（吉田沙良）from Mononkul（モノンクル）.
Before I finish off, let me mention that Hosono will be celebrating his 75th birthday in a few days on July 9th. All my best wishes to him.
Exactly a month ago, I put up an article on one of Masayuki "Martin" Suzuki's（鈴木雅之）earliest songs as a solo performer, "Tandem Run". Well this time around, I'm getting back to the relative present in his career by covering his March 2019 16th original studio album, "Funky Flag".
Arguably the most famous track for a lot of anime fans is "Love Dramatic"（ラブ・ドラマティック）as the opening theme song for the first season of the hit "Kaguya-sama wa Kokurasetai ~ Tensai-tachi no Ren'ai Zunousen"（かぐや様は告らせたい〜天才たちの恋愛頭脳戦〜）. Yup, this guy is now 65 years old and as a lot of the comments underneath the video have pointed out, Martin has charisma for kilometres.
I just want to take care of some of my own highlights from "Funky Flag", including the title track, "Ai no Funky Flag"（愛のFunky Flag...Funky Flag of Love） which, not surprisingly, has dollops of funk and even some Motown sprinkled in there. One big observation is that the album has a lot of big songwriters involved in the album and that includes lyricist Yukinojo Mori（森雪之丞）and composer/musician Tomoyasu Hotei（布袋寅泰）coming up with this quintessentially Martin tune (and yep, Hotei is on the guitar here) as the singer exhorts folks to get ready for a good party night. Martin and Hotei also provide the background vocals along with R&B songbird Harumi Tsuyuzaki（露崎春女）.
Good golly Molly! Suzuki has so much charisma that he needs five bodies to hold it all!
"Secret Boogie"（シークレット・ブギー）by Kiyoshi Matsuo（松尾潔）and Yoshihiro "Maestro-T" Toyoshima（豊島吉宏）is sultry and snaky as the lyrics go into somebody lusting for that target of desire. To be honest, the first time I heard "Secret Boogie", I almost did a double-take at one of the lyrics (if I'd been drinking water, I would have made Danny Thomas proud) but reading the liner notes for the song, I saw that it was "Funk with me"! Ah.
Not sure whether Martin or anyone else involved saw something at that massive Shibuya intersection, but "Scramble Kousaten"（スクランブル交差点...Scramble Intersection） is pure love across the rain-slicked pavement. I mentioned those famous songwriters and here, we've got Takaki Horigome（堀込高樹）from Kirinji（キリンジ）and Tomita Lab（冨田ラボ）, aka Keiichi Tomita（冨田恵一）, on lyrics and melody respectively. There's something so very 60s Bacharach about the style and arrangement of "Scramble Kousaten" that the joy-filled fellow in the story is willing to do a Fred Astaire pirouette during the crossing.
"Turn off the light" was composed by Yasuhiro Abe（安部恭弘）and written by Goro Matsui（松井五郎）. Abe has been involved in creating a number of songs for Martin over the years such as the 1989 "Kuu na"（くーな）, and here, he and Matsui weave a melancholy mid-tempo song with a bit of bossa nova about how although love can bring a lot of wonderful things, it can also trap someone in a time-stopped room of woe if it's broken. Martin really can wear his heart on his sleeve.
One more song that I'll put up here is "BAZOOKA" which was all created by Gota Nishidera（西寺郷太）of the band NONA REEVES. It also has tons of funk but in the intro, I think that I even heard some New Jack Swing. "BAZOOKA" fairly percolates all throughout as Martin buzzes about getting that first blast of fall-in-love right between the eyes.
Hopefully, I'll take care of the remaining tracks in the months to come but for those who have discovered the wonders of Suzuki as the King of Love Songs through "Kaguya-sama", then have a go at "Funky Flag" which peaked at No. 8 on Oricon. In addition, you can take a gander at his most recent "ALL TIME ROCK 'N' ROLL".
"There are eight million stories in the naked city. This has been one of them."
That was a quote for the 1948 movie "The Naked City" which has been considered to be one of the earliest examples of the now common TV genre of the police procedural. I got to see some of this on the Turner Classic Movies channel on cable and it was interesting to see actor Barry Fitzgerald, who for those old movie fans is famous as Father Fitzgibbon in Bing Crosby's "Going My Way", as the wise detective lieutenant in charge of a homicide case in New York City.
For a film like that or perhaps any of the film noir that were coming out at the time, a good boss jazz score always enhances the experience. I was kinda thinking of those old movies of the 40s and early 50s when I was listening to this marvelous song by Kirinji（キリンジ）titled "Kage no Uta" (Shadow Song). This was actually released as the band's first digital download single in December 2005.
However it was also the final track from the band's October 2006 CD album"DODECAGON", I'm not sure what the rest of the album sounds like, but "Kage no Uta" is definitely different from the romantic balladry of "Aliens" back in 2000 and the spacey synthpop of the band's music for "Ai wo aru dake, Subete"（愛をあるだけ、すべて）in 2018. Written and composed by Takaki Horigome（堀込高樹）, it's smooth-as-top-whisky jazz and with those strip club-friendly horns and silky piano, one of those famous detectives such as Sam Spade would be crazy not to come into a place playing "Kage no Uta". It almost demands a detective's voiceover.
Along with the jazz melody, Horigome's lyrics rather describe the lone-wolf nature of the private eye in these movies. With betrayals real and potential all around him, the only thing that he can trust is his own shadow. But what about his gun? In any case, "DODECAGON" got as high as No. 20 on Oricon. And to wrap up, I don't know whether the above thumbnail for the video was actually the photo for "Kage no Uta", but it isn't the only time that the cover for Donald Fagen's classic "The Nightfly" was imitated.
I was never in the situation that the protagonist for this song has found themselves in. During my Japan days, whenever I found myself missing the final subway of the night on a Friday, and that was surprisingly easy back then because transit closed up shop tragically early for a cosmopolitan city like Tokyo (and even now, I think folks from other big cities on the planet may find the final trains and subways in the megalopolis coming and going at a little past midnight somewhat scandalous), I had little choice but to get a taxi. For the record, I've had no problems with cabs or cab drivers. The service is absolutely safe, clean and polite but the fare can add up, and I often had to compete with several dozen other folks who missed their own trains home. However, I was never alone; I just had to be patient.
Well, in singer Chocolat's "Uchuu no Tunnel" (Space Tunnel), the person involved here has just missed their easy commute home one night: all of the taxis are occupied and there's nothing at the bus stop so it's time to light up a cigarette there to figure out next steps. Somehow, though, the idea gets into the protagonist's head that the entrance to the subway downstairs is the portal to space. Methinks somebody may have hit one too many Lemon Sours at the izakaya.
Still, "Uchuu no Tunnel", the first track on the singer's 2nd album"Hamster"（ハムスター）from August 1999, is great fun to listen to. Written by Chocolat and her husband, Akito Katayose（片寄明人）of GREAT3, and composed by Takaki Horigome（堀込高樹）of Kirinji（キリンジ）, the song sounds like a magical carpet ride through the Shibuya-kei filter and going from a mundane subway entrance into the Twilight Zone. I think that there is also something rather kid-like about the whole thing in that the out-of-luck adult gets changed into a ball-of-energy child once they have penetrated the barrier. It may all be drunken fantasy but I've heard of worse ways of spending the night than conked out on the bus stop bench.
The brothers of Kirinji themselves did their own cover of "Uchuu no Tunnel" in their 2002 album"Omnibus" (while J-Wiki says 2002, other sites such as Amazon say 2007). Their jazzier take is more on the adult side with some more of the old sci-fi creeping in via a 70s-sounding synthesizer, a good extra dollop of groove, and the more button-down vocals, but the high tempo is also present so that carpet ride can still be had. Perhaps this version of "Uchuu no Tunnel" is more appropriate for the earlier hours of the night when transit is still active.
I wrote about singer Shiho Nanba（南波志帆）a little over two years ago through her "Cobalt Blue"（コバルトブルー）of 2016, a mellow pop song whipped up by one of the current crop of J-AOR darlings, Blue Peppers（ブルー・ペパーズ）.
One thing that I found out about Nanba through her J-Wiki bio is that she'd been described as someone with that "magic voice" which was airy but clear. However, she'd initially held onto the mantra that a singer's voice had to be powerful which, considering how she has sounded, gave her a bit of a complex. But then an author and a drummer/music producer by the name of Hiroyasu Yano（矢野博康）from the band known as Cymbals offered some advice in which she ought to just take that breath and sing with a lot of air to help her...somewhat like whispering.
I don't think that Nanba has a voice which will blow out speakers in any concert hall, and that's perfectly fine since I find her singing perfectly fine. From what I've heard of her music so far, that light breathy voice of hers fits marvelously with those relaxing melodies.
Take for example, "Pool no Ao wa Uso no Ao" (The Blue of the Pool is the Blue of Lies) which is a track from her 2nd album in her indies days "Kimi ni Todoku ka na, Watashi."（君に届くかな、私。...Will I/It Get to You?）released in September 2009. That's quite a ways back from "Cobalt Blue" but it looks like Nanba took Yano's advice to heart in those days as well. Takaki Horigome（堀込高樹）of Kirinji（キリンジ）fame, another light and mellow veteran, wrote and composed this heartwarming mid-tempo number which seems to deal with someone perhaps visiting the ol' alma mater and reminiscing of past days.
As for the title, even Nanba and Horigome treat the title with something far less than the philosophical seriousness that it might initially feel like. Perhaps the protagonist was more pompous/pretentious in the teenage years but with the passage of time, things have mellowed out considerably. The melody by Horigome, by the way, has kinda struck me as being somewhat reminiscent of a modern version of Sunshine Pop. We can certainly make do with some of those tunes right now.
Earlier this year, just before COVID-19 swamped the planet, I was able to give my thoughts on the two most recent albums by the band Kirinji（キリンジ）: "Ai wo aru dake, Subete"（愛をあるだけ、すべて）from 2018 and "cherish" from 2019. Both had their wonderful charms with the former being a trip to that spacey disco above the ionosphere while the latter also brought in some breathing time in the VIP lounge. Then, in late May, I came across "Koi no Kehai"（恋の気配）which was a track on Kirinji's third-most recent album released in August 2016. After listening to it a few times with singer-songwriter Kotringo（コトリンゴ）behind the mike, I knew that I had to get that album once I was gainfully employed once more. That album is "Neo".
Well, I became gainfully employed again sometime in midsummer so once I got my first real paycheck in a season, I used some of that salary to get a few albums including "Neo". My first impression on hearing the album a couple of times is that "Neo" is a bit less spacey than the next two albums with this release being the last one featuring Kotringo after being with the band between 2013-2016. However, that doesn't mean that Kirinji was on the straight-and-narrow pop path; they tried out some intriguing things. By the way, unless specified, leader Takaki Horigome（堀込高樹）was responsible for words and music.
And already I'm going to specify something here. Right from the first track, "Neo" launches with a full blast with "The Great Journey" which invites one of the oldest Japanese hip-hop acts, RHYMESTER to add their writing contributions and singing chops to Horigome's own work. It seems from the lyrics by RHYMESTER's Utamaru（宇多丸）and Mummy-D and the Kirinji leader that it's a hyped-up theme for the evolution of life from the Ice Age to the Space Age. There is plenty of rapping in there by the two acts but "The Great Journey" is not a pure hip-hop tune and though there is some of that wonderfully whimsical Kirinji sound in there, it's not a pure Kirinji tune either. It's something that's perhaps a sum bigger than the total of its two parts. Certainly, everyone in the video above probably wanted to chug-a-lug a good cask of beer following the concert.
Then, we come to the second track, "Mr. BOOGIEMAN". As soon as I heard the first few bars, I figured that this was going to be guitarist Erino Yumiki's（弓木英梨乃）turn behind the mike since it sounds not only like something from the Doobie Brothers but also something which comes across as being so adorably cute. I also think that "Mr. BOOGIEMAN", who probably isn't scary at all but someone attractive and out for a good time on the town, could be great for a techno aidoruto tackle. Heck, Yumiki's performance at the concert above has her pulling off that old-fashioned showmanship technique of "making the rounds" except that it isn't through the seated audience of a restaurant-ballroom but just around the band members.
Creamy-voiced Kotringo is behind the lyrics and Horigome is behind the music for what I think is "Hibi Kore Kanko"（日々是観光）. Not 100% on the kanji reading of that middle character and as for the translation, I think it's meant to say "Sightseeing Through These Days". Not going to worry too much about it, though, since this track is also quite soothing and quirky with the synth notes and the light samba as the two songwriters also perform "Hibi Kore Kanko" as the musical recipe in how to live happily for each day and not get too worked about stuff.
I could pick up some of the Beatles in the happy-go-lucky "Nen-neko"（ネンネコ）which could be a mashup between two words: nenne for baby blanket and neko for cat. All of those feline fans can do with a few listens of this track since it seems to be relaxing while viewing a cutely sleeping cat. I was bopping my head from side-to-side. It just goes to show that a cat's life can truly be the life of Riley. It would seem that every Kirinji album has that one truly quirky and catchy song; I'm reminded of "Pizza VS. Hamburger" from "cherish" for instance.
My final track here is a sad but beautiful ballad about love not finding the way. "Ano Ko no Birthday"（あの娘のバースデイ...That Girl's Birthday） by Horigome deals with a relationship that isn't meant to be due to too wide a gap in terms of things such as class. Both Kotringo and Yumiki share the microphone, and in the video above, Yumiki even shows her prowess with the violin. It's all very baroque but there's a part of the song that reminds me of some of the early love songs of Yumi Arai（荒井由実）.
In all honesty, of the three albums that I've written about here tonight, I think "Neo" has been the one that's taken a little longer to grab onto me. There's not as much of the spacey Jamiroquai feeling here on this album that was imbued into "Ai wo aru dake, Subete" and "cherish", and being a fan of Jamiroquai, I guess that's the thing for me. However, having said that, I'm happy to say that with repeated listenings to "Neo" over the weeks, the album has become as comfy as a pair of slippers. It's just another phase that I've experienced of this amazing band called Kirinji.
But as I've mentioned in the "Koi no Kehai" article, "Neo" has been the most successful of their albums so far in terms of the Oricon charts since it topped off at No. 11.
Like Kazuhito Murata's（村田和人）"TRUST", this song is another entry in "Light Mellow ~ Avenue". A lot of gems in that particular compilation.
"Itsumo Dokodemo" (Always Someplace) is that concoction of silky sophistication that I've come to expect from Tomita Lab（冨田ラボ）. His stuff usually demands that flood of endorphins to wash through my brain. This time, his collaborator is singer-songwriter Yu Sakai（さかいゆう）and the two of them create this song of healing from a romantic breakup and perhaps even a lesson for the guy when the next relationship comes along.
The song was originally a track from Tomita Lab's 2013 album"Joyous". The Lab took care of the music but it was Kirinji's（キリンジ）Takaki Horigome（堀込高樹）who provided the tender lyrics. When I saw Horigome's name in there, I knew the partnership would be wonderful. "Joyous" also has Sakai helping out on another group effort, "Kono Yo wa Fushigi"（この世は不思議）.
I came for the "Jikan ga nai"（時間がない）but I ended up staying for the rest of the album. This CD with the cover of what looks like two teaspoons in love belongs to Kirinji's（キリンジ）13th album"Ai wo aru dake, Subete"(Just With Love, Everything...which seems to be the final line from "Jikan ga nai") from June 2018. Having fallen for the band's 2003"Sweet Soul" e.p. single and the aforementioned "Jikan ga nai", I opted to get both of them for the Holidays.
Quite amazing how Kirinji has evolved its sound between its start as a fraternal duo in the late 1990s and its current incarnation as a full group including anchor/songwriter Takaki Horigome（堀込高樹）, and singer-songwriters Erino Yumiki（弓木英梨乃）and Kotringo (the latter having left in 2017 after a 4-year stint). My introduction to Kirinji was through their 2000"Aliens", a love song so tender that I could have cut it with a fork, and from listening to some of their early work including "Sweet Soul", I could have been forgiven if I had assumed that Kirinji was a specialist in contemporary AOR balladry.
Well, some time down the line, the band increased their membership and started going more for some catchy spacey disco beats along the path of Jamiroquai which got me further interested. "Jikan ga nai" was just the bait for me to get hooked (line and sinker) onto "Ai wo aru dake, Subete". The entire album has had me already playing it a couple of times with the power middle of the (baseball team) order starting from Track 2. "AI no Touhikou"（AIの逃避行...AI Flight of Freedom） has that cool spacey sound with plenty of bass groove as Horigome's lyrics read like a synopsis out of a movie for a couple of androids who have discovered the concept of love and have taken off from minders who don't particularly like their discovery. Cyber-Romeo and Cyber-Juliet, so to speak. Kotringo has apparently come back to help out on backing vocals according to the liner notes, and special guest DJ Itsuka from rap group Charisma.com makes her own contribution. Have this on the car stereo while bombing down the more futuristic lanes of Tokyo. "AI no Touhikou" was actually released as Kirinji's 16th digital download single from November 2017.
Track 3 is "Hi Zero Wa Game"(非ゼロ和ゲーム...Non-Zero Sum Game) is my new favourite song...maybe for the entirety of 2020! Rather bold prediction, I know, but man, this is one supremely catchy number even more than "Jikan ga nai". One commenter referred to it as very Doobie Brothers while I've compared it to Steely Dan, and since both bands have a very close connection with each other, I'm good with both descriptions. Out of all of the tracks, this has been the one that I've listened to the most. Another commenter was wondering what the song was all about. Even Horigome has playfully stated in the lyrics that even he isn't sure what all the caterwauling is about, spitting out "Go Google it!" in one of the lines.
Then comes "Jikan ga nai". I realize that it already has its own article but I just had to include the song here. Since I've written about it, it looks like the music video has garnered a lot of compliments due to the now-famous dancing salaryman, identified as choreographer Reijiro Kaneko. I'm a couple of years older than the guy and seeing him trip the light fantastic in the video has made me wonder about getting some more exercise in. But then, I see the Pringles...
Unfortunately, those are all of the videos that I could find representing the various tracks on "Ai wo aru dake, Subete", but you can check out excerpts from all of them in the summary video above. Yup, plenty of stuff for Doobie Bros./Steely Dan fans. And may I say that the secret sauce here is that splendid synthesis of the voices of Horigome and Yumiki?
The album peaked at No. 17 on Oricon. Now that I've gotten a lot of fun from "Ai wo aru dake, Subete", I would very much like to give Kirinji's latest album"Cherish" that came out late last year a try as well.
May 15, 2021: Because of some interesting developments over the past 12 hours that will be explained at the end of that article, we now have two articles on this album.
It's been almost a year since I put up a Toko Furuuchi（古内東子）tune so I was rather wondering what to put up when I encountered this groovy number by her on YouTube called "Somewhere in Tokyo". Released as the coupling song to her 25th single"Coat wo Katte"（コートを買って...Buy Me A Coat） from November 2005, it was written by Furuuchi and composed by Takaki Horigome（堀込高樹）of Kirinji.
Furuuchi's lyrics talk about that regular Joe or Jane (or should I say Ichiro or Ichiko?) in the titular megalopolis who is ready to settle down and probably knows who he/she wants to settle down with, but gosh darn it, doesn't quite know how to express those feelings to the target of love. The words might sound melancholy but they're all lightened up by Horigome's playful melody which had me thinking of folks like Steely Dan. And since it's been a while, it was nice to hear the singer's velvet vocals once again.
The above video is by a tribute group by the name of Furuuchi Bukai（古内部会...The Furuuchi Subcommittee） giving their own nice version of "Somewhere in Tokyo". The song didn't get put on an original album by the singer but it is on her second BEST compilation "middle and mellow of Toko Furuuchi" which was released in February 2009.
Those lyrics in the song mentioned about renting that DVD late at night which reminded me of my old habit of getting together with my good Aussie buddy now and then in his old neighbourhood of Jiyugaoka for an overnight round of watching movies on his TV. The store Tsutaya was truly a good friend and it was nice to stop off at the local konbini for snacks and sweets on the way back to his place.
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