Yuko Kawai/Itsumi Osawa -- Shanghai Bojou Exotica（上海慕情exotica）

By King of Hearts via Wikimedia Commons

I've been to Hong Kong, Seoul and Taipei and all of them I enjoyed. Unfortunately, I never got the opportunity to visit Shanghai with all of its modern towers. Mind you, I did have Shanghai crab...or Chinese hairy crab...in Hong Kong when it was in season. Marvelous stuff that and I say this as a guy who usually isn't too crazy about eating crustaceans simply because I don't like having to eat my food as if I'm on a mining expedition.

Well, let us segue into Yuko Kawai's（河合夕子）"Shanghai Bojou Exotica" (Shanghai Yearning Exotica) which was a track on her March 1982 sophomore album "Fujiyama Paradise". With Kawai handling words and music and Masao Urino（売野雅勇）also having a go at the lyrics, it's quite the bouncy technopop exotic kayo of touring through the titular city in the People's Republic of China. It sounds like it can describe a fascinating and supremely cheerful exploration of the metropolis, old and new areas all included (although Kawai has apparently thrown in a lot of other cities into the lyrical mix).

A few years later, a cover of "Shanghai Bojou Exotica" was released as Itsumi Osawa's（大沢逸美）7th single in January 1985. Under the late Hiroshi Shinkawa's（新川博）arrangement, this version got a fair share of steroids including some snazzy horns. It's no longer an innocent stroll through Shanghai...it's more of a limousine tour on the main streets with the guests gallivanting from the roof. I can only imagine the ultimate destination is some expensive bar at the top of one of those Shanghai towers.

Yuko Kawai -- Persian Rouge（ペルシャン・ルージュ）

 

I may have mentioned this before but singer-songwriter Yuko Kawai（河合夕子）was someone that I discovered because of my work on the blog and the good folks at YouTube. Did not know of her existence in all my years in Japan. My impression of her thus far is that she was one of the more eclectic and fun-loving singers out in the pop field when it came to her showmanship and compositions.

Case in point: her "Persian Rouge", a track from her June 1983 4th and final album to date "Fumin Shoukougun"（不眠症候群）which basically means "Insomnia". She was behind words and music with Masao Urino（売野雅勇）also helping out on the lyrics, and "Persian Rouge" has that playful mix of technopop and exotic kayo as if Kawai was out on the Silk Road somewhere with her synthesizer and a camel.

Yuko Kawai -- 1959 Omoide no Dance Hall（1959 想い出のダンス・ホール）

 

It was a dozen years ago when I posted my first article on footloose-and-fancy-free singer-songwriter Yuko Kawai（河合夕子）with her "Tokyo-tique Girl"（東京チーク・ガール）from 1981. It was quite the summery and nostalgic pop tune from way back when in my kayo kyoku memories.

"Tokyo-tique Girl" was also a track in Kawai's May 1981 debut album "Little Tokyo"（リトル・トウキョウ）and also from there, I give you another song "1959 Omoide no Dance Hall" (The 1959 Dance Hall of My Memories). Written and composed by the singer with Masao Urino（売野雅勇）helping out with the lyrics, it's quite the interesting mix of reggae and Dixieland jazz within a matrix of New Music that had me thinking of Tin Pan Alley from the 1970s. Maybe it can also be considered to be an exotic kayo as well due to the mention of Singapore in there.

Yuko Kawai -- Toyo Bisho（東洋微笑）

 

OK, I'll have to confess it here. I'm one of the number of folks who have been catching the latest adventures of the various supremely cheerful weather forecasters at Japan's Weathernews on YouTube. I realize that I'm only catching bits and pieces of their broadcasts but sometimes I wonder if they're not so much giving out the weather information as they are chatting and giggling away. Still, during the darkest days of the pandemic, it's been quite the miracle to have our moods lightened by having them go through laughing fits over microwave ovens leading to alternate worlds, verbal slip-ups, and poking fun at some of the other staffers.

Well, just the preamble that I need to segue into "Toyo Bisho" (Oriental Smile), a song from singer-songwriter Yuko Kawai's（河合夕子）1982 album "Fujiyama Paradise"（フジヤマパラダイス）and also its own single from the same year. Though I haven't seen much of her performing through the YouTube videos, my take from what I have seen and that gorgeous cover of her looking rather ginger, I think that if Kawai had been born some years later and opted for a more meteorologically-based career, she could have easily slipped into Weathernews.

However as it is, I'm happy that she went into a more musical direction since "Toyo Bisho" definitely has that bouncy toyo disco feeling filtered through technopop that made me think YMO for a minute. Actually, though, it was written and composed by Kawai with Masao Urino（売野政男）also helping out on the lyrics. 

Yuko Kawai -- Fujiyama Paradise（フジヤマパラダイス）

 

OK, first off, for my fellow Canadians, Happy Victoria Day today! Because of the current COVID restrictions, there won't be any officially-sanctioned fireworks displays this year as well but I did hear some of those rascals being fired off near my home last night.

I've heard and read the word Fujiyama a number of times. There is the Kome Kome Club (米米クラブ) song "Funk Fujiyama" and of course, there is the late singer Ichiro Fujiyama（藤山一郎）who sang a number of the old kayo chestnuts including "Aoi Sanmyaku" （青い山脈）. Then, there is the roller coaster called Fujiyama at the famous amusement park, Fuji-Q Highland in Yamanashi Prefecture; I do remember all of those commercials for the place.

Now, I can add a new entry and that would be "Fujiyama Paradise", a song by singer-songwriter Yuko Kawai（河合夕子）. A 1982 single that was also the title track on her album of the same year, it does hit all those nostalgia nerve clusters because of that rumbling guitar and keyboard work which reminds me slightly of Blondie's "Call Me" (I wonder what Richard Gere has been up to recently). This song written by both Kawai and Masao Urino（売野政男）and composed by the singer won't enter my list of Top 10 favourite songs per se but it still does have some of that old sparkle. 

Strangely enough, before I looked up the songwriters for "Fujiyama Paradise", I did wonder whether Urino had something to do with the song, and it turned out that he did. Usually when there is a good ol' rock n' roll-sounding tune from the 1980s, his name often shows up.

Yuko Kawai -- Little Tokyo（リトル・トウキョウ）

 

When I went over to Japan on that eye-opening Summer 1981 trip, just from watching TV and spending those three days via a homestay with the students at Tezukayama High School in Nara, it would seem that the popular hairdos among young women at the time could be split among the long & straight a la Hiromi Iwasaki（岩崎宏美）and the bouncy Seiko-chan cut after debut-era Seiko Matsuda（松田聖子）.

Now, mind you, I didn't discover singer-songwriter Yuko Kawai（河合夕子）until only a few years ago but she made her debut around the turn of the decade from the 70s into the 80s, and so I can imagine that the lass made quite an impression with her ready smile, the large round glasses and notably that ebulliently frizzy hairstyle which absolutely distinguished itself from the long & straight and the Seiko-chan cut.

Well, my first two sentences have walked like paragraphs so let me get into the nitty-gritty and write about Kawai's debut album "Little Tokyo" released in 1982. All of the tracks were either written and composed by Kawai herself or had additional co-writing help from lyricist Masao Urino（売野政男）. I've already provided a couple of tracks in separate articles: the summery "Tokyo-tique Girl"（東京チーク・ガール）and the Doobies-esque "Television Trip"（テレビジョン・トリップ） which starts the album.

I think "Little Tokyo" would be an interesting album to get if available since Kawai and Urino have crafted a pretty solid pop album. If I were to bring in singers via analogy for comparison, I would say that the album has the music for very early Mariya Takeuchi（竹内まりや）with Kawai's vocals sounding a bit similar to a slightly toned-down Kohmi Hirose（広瀬香美）, about whom we will not hear from for another decade.

For the first several tracks, the sound is very much pop with hints of other genres thrown in like disco and 50s without actually diving full bore into them, as Kawai decides to travel globally just from what I've read of the track titles. Also, another characteristic of at least some of the tracks is that they don't melodically match what the title says. For example, Track 2 is "Jamaican Climax"（ジャマイカン Climax） at 3:10 doesn't have any hints of reggae or ska or calypso. Instead, it's a breezy West Coast pop song that also has some feelings of Kazuhiro Nishimatsu（西松一博）in his techno-jazz phase.

Track 3 at 7:03 is "1959 Omoide no Dance Hall"（1959想い出のダンス・ホール...Memories of 1959 at the Dance Hall） and although when I think of the year 1959, I'm always going to imagine sock hops and Bill Haley, there's something more jazzy in there from an earlier decade, and as Kawai sings in the lyrics, it looks like the setting isn't a Midwest American town but Singapore.

The 1950s do come back with "Hollywood Vacation"（ハリウッド・ヴァケーション）at 13:21 whose melody not only brings memories of that early Mariya but also "Happy Days" and dates at the local diner with malt shakes and a happy ending of sorts at Inspiration Point...or maybe the Hollywood sign.

The last couple of tracks on the original album is where Kawai decides to press into other genres although that custom of title and melody difference still holds firm. Track 9 at 27:36 has the title that might say in Japanese "Peking Zasetsugai"（北京挫折街）although the official English translation is "Peking Kneedrop City". It doesn't sound completely East Asian...more pan-Asian a la those exotic kayo of the late 1970s and it's arranged through that sheen of technopop and maybe some Boney M.

Track 10 at 30:57 is "Seikimatsu. Kamigami no Cha-cha-cha"（世紀末。神々のチャチャチャ...Century's End. The Cha-cha-cha of the Gods） that might be the musical representation of deities having one mighty kegger but not settling for ancient Japanese court music for the post-dinner dancing segment. Instead, maybe it's got more of that disco reggae beat and the synths in there. There's also a certain repeated passage that reminds me a lot of the aforementioned Iwasaki's "Cinderella Honeymoon"（シンデレラ・ハネムーン）.

A bonus track that has been added in later re-releases of "Little Tokyo" is "Route B-Flat Minor"（ルートB♭m）at 33:54 which is a pleasant kayo and a nice way to end the album, especially with that electric guitar solo. In a way, there is also a bit of Ami Ozaki（尾崎亜美）there, too.

Yuko Kawai -- Television Trip（テレビジョン・トリップ）

Yuko Kawai（河合夕子）is a musician-singer who I first found out about back in the summer of 2013 and then I wrote about her debut single "Tokyo-tique Girl" （東京チーク・ガール）from 1982. She cut quite a striking figure from her fashion sense along with her glasses, frizzy hair and the wide smile.

Judging from some of the other tracks on her 1982 debut album "Little Tokyo"（リトル・トウキョウ）, I think Kawai had quite the thing for successfully merging a couple of genres that were hot back in those days almost 40 years ago (ouch!): City Pop and 50s pop.

The first track, for example, is "Television Trip" which was created by Kawai with co-lyricist duties given to Masao Urino（売野政男）. Launching with a Doobie Brothers piano riff and the shoutout of the actual title as if it were a gloriously cheerful and harmonious television/radio announcement of the call letters, it weaves some happy doo-wop and wraps it around that Doobies riff as Kawai sounds like she's describing her joy of surfing the channels with her remote (whether it was still corded or not, I'm not quite sure). No mention of whether the song was actually used in television commercials.

Incidentally, "Tokyo-tique Girl" is also a part of "Little Tokyo" which you can hear at 17:16 in the above video.

Junko Hirotani, Yuko Kawai, Eri Sugai and Yasuhiro Kido -- It's a Merry Christmas to You

Merry Christmas to everyone out there! I'm hoping that all of you are enjoying presents, each other and the eventual feast (turkey or ham or KFC).

Let me begin with something that was pricking the curiosity of my mind like pine needles for the past couple of years. It must have done quite a lot of pricking to a lot of folks globally since it has become quite the meme in both the Xmas and anime/gaming fields. There is something called "Padoru" which involves a cute little anime girl in a Santa Claus outfit singing the first several words of "Jingle Bells" in Japanese before yelling out "Padoru Padoru". It's gotten mention in the "Know Your Meme" website a couple of times now including an article just a few days ago.

Well, I found out that the excerpt came from the PlayStation game "Fate/Extra" with the character of Nero Claudius (Red Saber) doing the cute thing. It's the "Padoru Padoru" that was making me wonder all this time. I'd initially assumed that it had something to do with paddling, but apparently it's the Japanese onomatopoeia for the reindeer clopping their hooves on the roof. Other information I found was that the seiyuu is veteran Sakura Tange（丹下桜）. Plus, the original Japanese lyrics for "Jingle Bells" were written by the late poet/lyricist Shoichi Miyazawa（宮澤章二）shortly after the end of the Second World War.

Now that this mystery has been solved, let me show you an original J-Xmas tune that would make The Manhattan Transfer swoon with holly-covered happiness. I found this video containing a track called "It's a Merry Christmas to You" from the 1995 album "Christmas Mail ~ Voice Fill".

Some nice jazzy vocals are provided by singer-songwriters Junko Hirotani（広谷順子）, Yuko Kawai（河合夕子）, Eri Sugai（菅井えり）and Yasuhiro Kido（木戸やすひろ）with music/arrangement by Sugai and lyrics by Lynne Hobday. As I said, there's something quite Manhattan Transfer about it and I am even reminded of The Andrews Sisters (of course, I also think about the vocal groups in Japan such as Hi-Fi Set and Circus). Along with some scatting, there's even a bit of tap dancing which had me humorously wondering if one of the singers decided to adopt comedian/actor Billy Crystal's technique at 3:10 above. Hearing it a few times now, I can envisage someone like Kohmi Hirose（広瀬香美）covering this one, too.

Anyways, let me leave you with a dance remix of "Padoru Padoru". I wonder whether Tange ever thought about getting this whole thing trademarked.

Yuko Kawai -- Tokyo-tique Girl （東京チーク・ガール）

I only found about this song just within the last few minutes as I was going through my Mixi (a Japanese SNS) account. One of my Mixi friends put up this song by popster Yuko Kawai（河合夕子）who had debuted in 1981. "Tokyo-tique Girl" was written and composed by Kawai, and the reason I put it up was it just had that cute and catchy Seiko-ish summery melody that I get all nostalgic about.

There is only a brief article written about her at J-Wiki, but it looks like "Tokyo-tique Girl" was her debut single, and the cover for her first album "Little Tokyo" has her looking like she does in the video above as she appeared in an episode of "Yoru no Hit Studio Deluxe". With that frizzy hair and the leopard-print shirt, she looked like a middle-aged lady walking through the Sugamo district of Tokyo (known as the Harajuku for people of a certain age), although Kawai was actually in her mid-20s at the time.