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.
What was once the tallest free-standing structure on Earth, Toronto's own CN Tower, had the world's highest disco called Sparkles. It was also one of the smallest discos but for us in the Japanese-Canadian Students' Association at the University of Toronto, it was one of our go-to places although not to the extent of The Copa, The Diamond or karaoke bar Kuri. Had our fair share of cocktails and snacks at Sparkles, but I have to admit that I never went to the revolving 360 Restaurant. I did hear that it's a bit of a tourist trap but if anyone would like to correct me...🙏 Regardless, Happy 50th Birthday to the ol' CN Tower!
And we come to the song for this article, "Yozora no Menu"(Menu of the Night Sky). Written by Hiroko Tania（谷亜ヒロコ）and composed by Yasuko Kawakami（川上泰子）, this was recorded by aidoru Yukiko (Yuyu) Iwai（岩井由紀子）on her 4th and final album to date, "Kotteru ne!"（こってるネ!...You're So Particular!）, from December 1988. It's quite the high-flying romantic song and it has a smooth and refined arrangement by Ryo Yonemitsu（米光亮）that almost had me thinking City Pop. I just hope that the happy couple don't have any vertigo issues. As for the album, "Kotteru ne!" scored a No. 49 ranking on Oricon.
I hadn't been aware that an angel required a bodyguard. From what I've been hearing of angels recently, it's more that we mortals need bodyguards against angels. But perhaps things were very different in the late 1980s.
Anyways, here is this single by Yuyu（ゆうゆ）with Onyanko Club（おニャン子クラブ）...Yuyu being aidoru Yukiko Iwai（岩井由紀子）as a member of that super-huge aidoru group..."Tenshi no Bodyguard"(Angel's Bodyguard) from March 1987. This twinkly and oh-so-sweet teenybopper tune with a hint of 1950s girl pop was written by Yasushi Akimoto（秋元康）with melody by bassist Tsugutoshi Goto（後藤次利）and arrangement by Jun Sato（佐藤準）, and though I couldn't find the lyrics, I can imagine that some young high school girl is being gallantly protected by her good buddy and potential beau against all suitors. It all reminds me of some of the stuff that I witnessed in elementary and junior high school. Wasn't quite as sweet. Regardless, it scored a No. 2 ranking on Oricon. Also for your information, the Onyanko Club girls backing Yuyu up are Ruriko Nagata（永田ルリ子）, Mutsumi Yokota（横田睦美）and Tomoko Fukawa（布川智子）.
Ah, yes...the kids are out on summer vacation for the next several weeks. When we were little, we had the same attitude of fun and relaxation, too, and of course, we rued the arrival of Labour Day in September since beyond that was the beginning of another school semester.
I didn't know about this particular song by the 1980s aidoru supergroup Onyanko Club（おニャン子クラブ）titled "Natsu Yasumi wa Owaranai"(Endless Summer Vacation), but it's a pretty funky number by the gang. Written by Onyanko Club (and later AKB48) guru Yasushi Akimoto（秋元康）, composed by Ken Takahashi（高橋研）and arranged by Jun Sato（佐藤準）, "Natsu Yasumi wa Owaranai" was a track on the Club's 3rd original album, the Oricon No. 3-ranking"Panic The World" from July 1986. Just for the record, the four members fronting the song were Kazuko Utsumi（内海和子）, Ruriko Nagata（永田ルリ子）, Yukiko Iwai（岩井由紀子）and Marina Watanabe（渡辺満里奈）.
Actually, the first time I did hear of "Natsu Yasumi wa Owaranai" was from a cover insert song version done for the 2012anime "Natsuiro Kiseki"（夏色キセキ...Summer-Coloured Miracle）. This was a mere YouTube discovery by chance; I never caught the show myself and I don't recall my anime buddy ever mentioning it. However, it did have seiyuu who are now veterans of the art: Aki Toyosaki（豊崎愛生）, Ayahi Takagaki（高垣彩陽）, Haruka Tomatsu（戸松遥）and Minako Kotobuki（寿美菜子）. I get the impression from the premise that "Natsuiro Kiseki" was a mix of magic, slice-of-life and "Stand By Me". The animation style has me thinking a PreCure series without the PreCure powers or situations.
Whether it was by lucky happenstance or not, the four main seiyuu also happen to be members of the pop group Sphere（スフィア）and so they apparently handled all of the main songs including "Natsu Yasumi wa Owaranai". This version seems to have more of the dance beats and synthesizers going on full thrusters, thanks to Masaya Yamaguchi's（山口雅也）arrangement. For some reason, the song reminds me somewhat of "Futari no Kimochi no Honto no Himitsu"（ふたりのきもちのほんとのひみつ）, the ending theme for "Kill Me Baby" which was another 2012 anime.
Onyanko Club（おニャン子クラブ）, as Marcos V. and I have been explaining all throughout the past decade, was the first massive aidoru conglomeration that songwriter and producer Yasushi Akimoto（秋元康）created, years before the alphabet aidoru groups such as AKB 48. As such, there were going to be offshoots from the mother group in the form of individual teenyboppers and small units coming up with their own tunes. Marcos wrote on one trio, Ushirogami Hikaretai（うしろ髪ひかれ隊）which had Shizuka Kudo (工藤静香) , Akiko Ikuina (生稲晃子) and Makiko Saito (斉藤満喜子) and their contribution, "Anata wo Shiritai" (あなたを知りたい). That unit had their time between May 1987 and July 1988 with five singles and two original albums under their belt.
Well, there was another unit in the form of a duo, Yukiko Iwai and Mamiko Takai（岩井由紀子・高井麻巳子）, called Ushiroyubi Sasaregumi（うしろゆびさされ組）, which began even earlier in the era of the Onyanko Club and had a longer time at it from October 1985 to February 1987. They released a total of six singles and two original albums, all of which broke into the Top 10.
Their second single, "Banana no Namida" (Banana Tears), was released in January 1986 and it served as the second ending theme for the Fuji-TVanime adaptation of the manga "High School! Kimengumi"（ハイスクール!奇面組...High School! Funny Face Club） which had a long run paralleling Ushiroyubi Sasaregumi's career. In fact, some of their singles and non-single tracks were tied at the hip with the show.
From the synopsis of "High School! Kimengumi", it seems as if the series may have been the grand ancestor of all those secondary school-based anime crazy comedies with misfit students in a club. "Banana no Namida" is itself a fun and light-hearted tune with a tropical beat thrown into the mix. With Akimoto behind the lyrics and Tsugutoshi Goto（後藤次利）composing and arranging everything, the song hit No. 1 on Oricon and later became the 17th-ranked single for 1986. "Banana no Namida" was also a track on Ushiroyubi Sasaregumi's first studio album"Fu-Wa-Fu-Ra"（ふ・わ・ふ・ら）which came out in June that year and peaked at No. 2.
If this scene is typical of an episode, then I think the high school club was well-named.
One of the YouTube videos that I always go back and watch just to put me in a good mood is "Old Movie Stars Dance to Uptown Funk" on the Nerd Fest UK channel. Like a lot of the commenters for this masterpiece, I think that it does deserve some sort of award for the hard work, long hours and genius editing that must have gone into it, and I think that it even overshadows the original music video featuring Mark Ronson and Bruno Mars. Fred and Gene would probably be grinning from ear to ear wherever they are.
Last night, I was doing the exact same thing but then I noticed this video on the right with the title of "20's Charleston Dance - 'Black Bottom'" on the JazzyFeet channel. I marveled at how choreographer and performer Maria brought back the vivaciousness of this (19)20s dance into the (20)20s. Talk about being light on one's feet!
Through a past article here, I already knew that the Charleston was about to celebrate 100 years of folks cutting up a rug, but when I checked up its Wikipedia article, I learned that the dance was popularized from 1923, thanks to pianist James P. Johnson's "The Charleston" song from the Broadway show "Runnin' Wild". Now if I figure that it had become popular in 1923, perhaps the dance would have existed for at least some months back in 1922, so it could very well be the case that the Charleston can celebrate its first century this year.
So I was thinking whether I could find aCharleston-themed kayo. After I had a couple of them already up on "Kayo Kyoku Plus": Shojotai's（少女隊）"Motto Charleston"（もっとチャールストン）and Toshihiko Tahara's（田原俊彦）"Charleston ni wa Mada Hayai"（チャールストンにはまだ早い）, I was kinda hoping beyond hope that could be a third such song that I could track down, but I got lucky.
Yukiko Iwai's（岩井由紀子）"Dotten Charleston" is a short-and-sweet jazz tune that was a part of NHK's "Minna no Uta"（みんなのうた）TV music vignette series for children, and the song had its run between December 1990 and January 1991. Lyricist Kumiko Yoshizawa（吉沢久美子）and composer Ayahiko Hara（原礼彦）were responsible for this entry although I admit that I'm not sure what the word dotten means; maybe it's a form of onomatopoeia? Regardless, it's too bad that the original animated video isn't around on YouTube, but I'm happy enough with the song.
As well, certainly it's nice to have former Onyanko Club（おニャン子クラブ）member Iwai, who was also known affectionately as Yuyu（ゆうゆ）in her aidoru days, on the blog at last. Her number in the club was 19 by the way. Along with her work with Onyanko Club, she also had her own solo singles between 1987 and 1989 plus four albums and as many BEST albums. She was born in Yokohama but was raised in Funabashi City, Chiba Prefecture, just down the Tozai Line from my old neighbourhood in Ichikawa City. To be honest, I didn't notice her singing work but I do remember her for her appearances in television commercials back in the day (such as the first one to start off the video below).
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