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.
I guess one can be forgiven if they assumed that the aidoru during the 1970s only consisted of Candies（キャンディーズ）, Pink Lady（ピンクレディー）and Momoe Yamaguchi（山口百恵）. It just seemed to me for example that though the 1980s also had the big guns of Seiko Matsuda（松田聖子）, Miho Nakayama（中山美穂）and Akina Nakamori（中森明菜）up on top, it was also very evident that there was a noticeable bank of revolving doors underneath where many an aidoru star wannabe walked through weekly. That didn't look as obvious in the preceding decade.
However, there were young ladies trying their luck and hard work at becoming that next teenybopper heroine on TV and radio. One such lass from Tokyo was Hiroko Ikeda（池田ひろ子）. From her early childhood, she'd studied all sorts of dancing ranging from ballet to traditional Japanese dance to build up her strength which hadn't been all that great back then.
Then, in 1975, she made her debut as an aidoru with "Koi no ABC" (The ABCs of Love) under the CBS/Sony label. Written by Kazumi Yasui（安井かずみ）and composed/arranged by Yusuke Hoguchi（穂口雄右）, "Koi no ABC" showed all that heavy Japanese love for the rock and roll of the 1950s may have arrived earlier than expected. Along with Ikeda's chirpy vocals, I think that may also have been her tap dancing in the background since that was the first form of dance she'd tried out according to her J-Wiki profile.
Ikeda would release three more singles up to 1977 with no albums. She also appeared on a number of TV shows with the latest entry being in 1980 when she was the assistant on a TV Tokyo game show. After that, I don't know.
Well, I gotta say...for a Japanese music listener who's faced his fairly large mountain of English expressions within lyrics for decades, I was truly surprised by this one. I didn't think I would ever hear any singer utter the words "shrewd" and "forestall" separately, let alone within the same kayo kyoku. Mind you, when I heard "forestall", it came out more like the name for a famous American aircraft carrier.
Yes, I am talking about Momoe Yamaguchi's（山口百恵）"Shrewd Fellow", a track from her 16th album "Manjuu Shaka"（曼珠沙華）from December 1978. In fact, it follows right after the first track and one of my favourite Momoe songs of all time, the poignant "Ii Hi Tabidachi" (いい日旅立ち), and yet I had never heard of "Shrewd Fellow" until within the last few months. The lyrics by Hiromi Kanda（神田広美）under her pen name of Rika Nohara（野原理香）tell of one really hot romance...the second line of the song has a lady pretty much jumping onto her paramour's lips on his second word! Personally, I usually like to go it a bit slower through a few dates and dinners before that step. Anyways, the melody by Yusuke Hoguchi（穂口雄右）and its arrangement by Makoto Kawaguchi（川口真）is good ol' downtown City Pop and disco. Once again, Momoe gives it further swagger through the delivery of her own vocals.
Wildly popular 70s aidoru trio Candies（キャンディーズ）announced their retirement together in 1977 (with the breakup becoming official the following year in April) which was probably a body blow to all of their fans. However, their supervising production company, Watanabe Productions, wasn't willing to give up the ghost quite yet. They gathered together another trio of young aidoru wannabes and perceiving them to be the proteges of Candies, the new group was initially called Candies Jr. This new group consisted of Mitsuko "Micchi" Mori（森光子）, Mayumi "Mami" Ueno（上野真由美）, and Akie "Aki" Kato（加藤明恵）.
The most ardent and dedicated Candies fans weren't impressed with the moniker of Candies Jr, and probably made it very well known to Watanabe Productions, and so the trio's name was switched over to the safer Triangle（トライアングル）. According to their J-Wiki bio, Triangle had actually appeared alongside Candies in the brief overlap time before the latter finally did break up on variety shows such as "Hachi-ji da yo! Zen'in Shuugo"（8時だョ!全員集合...It's 8 O'Clock! Everybody Assemble）, and it was duly noted about how much Triangle resembled their sempai; again not sure how Candies fans took that.
The trio released their debut single"Triangle Love Letter" in April 1978, and judging from the cover of the record, yep, it looks like the next generation were made to resemble Candies right down to their hairstyles. "Triangle Love Letter", which was written by Takemi Shima（島武実）and composed/arranged by Yusuke Hoguchi（穂口雄介）, even sounds like a Candies tune with the delivery and the shaki-shaki melody.
Even though I couldn't find out where exactly "Triangle Love Letter" ended up on Oricon, the J-Wiki article noted that it was the lone hit of theirs that got into the Top 30. There were six more singles and two original albums released up to 1980, but it was basically a slow fadeout for the trio until the official breakup came in 1981.
One of the members of the trio rang a bell for me. Mitsuko Mori, who was a namesake of the legendary actress, has already gotten her own article on KKP after changing her name to Michiko Komori（小森みちこ）. Under that name, she released one single and one album, and then went into the movie industry. Meanwhile Akie Kato took on the stage name of Aki Fujimoto（藤本あき）and ended up as a featured player on the aforementioned "Hachi-ji da yo! Zen'in Shuugo" until its final episode in 1985; she would then marry film director Ryoichi Kimizuka（君塚良一）, one of whose projects was "Odoru Dai Sosasen ~ The Movie"（踊る大捜査線 THE MOVIE） in 1998. Finally, Mayumi Ueno soon became a radio personality in her native Aichi Prefecture.
Last week, I noted about the passing of lyricist Makoto Kitajo（喜多條忠）late last year at the age of 74 through one of his songs for actor/singer Hiroyuki Sanada（真田広之）. Well, I've found an earlier creation by him and folk singer/composer Takuro Yoshida（吉田拓郎）which received some more appreciation and fame.
"Itsuka Machi de Atta nara" (If We Meet In Town Someday) is wistful with a capital "W" as originally recorded by actor/singer Masatoshi Nakamura（中村雅俊）. Released as his 3rd single in May 1975, it tells of a man's encounter, affair and breakup with a woman who still has an effect on him. I believe that the protagonist realizes that the relationship is over and done with but in his mind, he still would like to meet her again if only to go over old times. The arrangement just screams for an observation point overlooking the ocean at sunset.
The song peaked at No. 6 on Oricon and became the 16th-ranked single for 1975. It was also used as an insert tune within Nakamura's own detective series "Ore-tachi no Kunshou"（俺たちの勲章...Our Medals）, a show that I've already noted in a TRANZAM article.
"Itsuka Machi de Atta nara" has gotten its share of covers. I've read that Masayuki Suzuki（鈴木雅之）tackled it as well so I tried searching for his cover, but alas, it's not up on YouTube. However, I did find one cover by Judy Ongg（ジュディ・オング）, a few years before she recorded her most famous hit, "Miserarete"（魅せられて）. Her take on the Nakamura original as arranged by Yusuke Hoguchi（穂口雄介）is a little more uptempo and was a track on her 1975 album"Ai wa Seimei"（愛は生命...Love Is Life）.
Composer Yoshida also provided his own cover of "Itsuka Machi de Atta nara" in his April 1977 album"Private"（ぷらいべえと）which focused on covers of various kayo. His version of the song has a bit more of a gallant country feel. The album hit No. 1 and ended up as the 23rd-ranked album of the year.
I think that I can say that the relationship between the Japanese and pandas are like the ones between sushi and wasabi and me and kayo kyoku. As far as I know, the country has been ga-ga over the giant panda for decades. There's been a recent swell in popularity for a couple of young panda cubs siblings at the Ueno Zoo in Tokyo with fans waiting patiently for who knows how long to get their lone minute in front of the glass to take multiple photos of Xiao Xiao and Lei Lei.
From what I've learned, the Japanese love for pandas may have gone as far back as the early 1970s if not earlier, but my personal realization came in 1981 during that Japanese language school graduation trip when we made our stopover in Kobe during the Portopia fair. As I recall, there was a panda craze back then for some reason.
So as such, I wanted to see if I could find any kayo kyoku that might be associated with the giant panda. It didn't take too long before I came across this kid-friendly tune from 1973 called "Panpaka Panda"(Ta-Da Panda) as part of a novelty song compilation called "Koi no Huang Huang"（恋のホワン・ホワン...Huang Huang in Love）. Sung by a combination between Housei Komatsu and Himawari Sisters（小松方正＆ひまわりシスターズ）, I couldn't find anything really on the latter girls but I found out that the late Komatsu was an actor and a seiyuu who had appeared in some of the early anime hits such as "Eight Man"（8マン）and "Tetsuwan Atomu"（鉄腕アトム）. His music contributions were restricted to just "Panpaka Panda" and one other tune in 1974. As for the songwriting, Sammy Chiba（サミー・千葉）was on the lyrics while Yusuke Hoguchi（ほぐちゆうすけ）took care of the music; for some reason, Hoguchi didn't register his name at JASRAC under his usual kanji but all in hiragana.
To finish things off, perhaps I can leave that to adorable Mei Mei to sum up how much in love the Japanese are where the giant panda is concerned.
Yesterday, there was a windstorm that hit the Greater Toronto Area and it did leave a number of neighbourhoods without power, and I think that there are some areas which are still waiting for restoration. Fortunately, that didn't happen to us but there were a few tense hours. Today has made for a sunny December Sunday. It might be fairly cold outside but happily there are no warnings...knock on wood.
An appropriately sunny Sunday song is in order then. I give you singer-lyricist Hiromi Kanda's（神田広美）debut single from January 1977, "Hitomi Shiri" (Shyness). She was all of 20 when this was released and for her first few singles, she actually didn't provide any lyrics. For "Hitomi Shiri", for example, Takashi Matsumoto（松本隆）was the wordsmith while the man who would later become her husband, Yusuke Hoguchi（穂口雄右）, provided the melody.
It's a wistful song that brings about a few thoughts such as how Kanda sounds a bit like Junko Yagami（八神純子）in her own early days and the fact that "Hitomi Shiri" gave me hints that not only does it sound like the quintessential summer kayo but it also sounds like something that vocal group Hi-Fi Set（ハイ・ファイ・セット）could also have sung. From Hoguchi's music and arrangement, I'm not sure if I would place it as City Pop or AOR, but I think that it can fit the New Music mold especially with that certain 70s soul-sounding guitar or keyboard plucking away.
There was much more information about "Hitomi Shiri" at "idol.ne.jp" than on her J-Wiki profile, including the statistics that the song sold 50,000 copies and ranked as high as No. 43 on Oricon. Again with that tradition of cheery music underlaid with at least a bittersweet story, according to the reviewer on that site, the story is about a woman saying goodbye to a man for the last time the morning after. The reviewer even posits that "Hitomi Shiri" has that stylish vibe of a city-based Hiromi Ohta（太田裕美）song. Both him/her and me also noticed that Kanda's vocals were quite different here when compared to her 5th single"Don Juan"（ドンファン）which she released more than 18 months later and it turned out to be the last article that I'd written about her more than three years prior.
As embarrassing it is to say as a kayo kyoku fan, I have yet to own a Candies'（キャンディーズ）album of any sort although some of those compilations that I have contain their hits. My impression, though, is that for any fans of Ran, Sue and Miki, the album that must be purchased is their 3rd and final live album"CANDIES FINAL CARNIVAL Plus One"（キャンディーズ ファイナルカーニバル プラス・ワン）that was first released in May 1978. The original LP consisted of three records of which the first two covered their final concerts culminating in the very last one at Korakuen Stadium (demolished in 1988 to be replaced by the Tokyo Dome complex) in Tokyo on April 4th 1978. Record 3 was a studio-recorded effort and this article's song belongs there (and that's where the "Plus One" comes in).
"Inspiration Game" is an interesting one since it comes off as a Candies song grafted onto an underlayer of rock/AOR of that decade. Composer/arranger Yusuke Hoguchi（穂口雄右）, who was responsible for a number of the trio's songs such as "Haru Ichiban"（春一番）, wove this tune that sounds almost as if it could have been recorded by any of the Shin-Gosanke（新御三家）: Hiromi Go, Hideki Saijo or Goro Noguchi（郷ひろみ・西城秀樹・野口五郎）. Lyricist Yoko Aki（阿木燿子）, who was also providing the words for Momoe Yamaguchi's（山口百恵）tough-as-nails hits at the same time, wrote up the story of the kakkoii life on the West Coast of America and also in Paris. For a Candies tune, it's a pretty tough and cool piece that has me picturing the ladies lighting up some Parliament cigarettes on a street corner.
In its original form, "CANDIES FINAL CARNIVAL Plus One" hit No. 1 on Oricon and became the 35th-ranked album for 1978. Then in March 1985, the first CD version of the triple-LP was released.
Had a heck of a time trying to parse this title here for aidoru Nozomi Inoue's（井上望）3rd single "Hana Negawakuba". Just looking at the arrangement of the kanji and kana, I had been wondering whether it was something like "Hanane ga Wakuba" or "Hananega Wakuba", but throwing in the words into the Jisho.org dictionary, I found out that the latter word of "negawakuba" means "I pray" or "I wish". So, perhaps "Hana Negawakuba" can be translated as "Flower Wishes" as in doing that old-fashioned action of "He loves me, he loves me not" with the petals of a bloom.
In any case, just going into this song by Inoue, who unfortunately never quite hit it big although she's found bigger success as a music producer, "Hana Negawakuba" isn't bad at all as this bouncy tune which was released back in December 1979 (yup, almost 41 years ago...I'm reaching for my Metamucil right now). Written by Kazuya Senke（千家和也）and composed by Yusuke Hoguchi（穂口雄右）, the same duo behind 70s aidoru trio Candies'（キャンディーズ）first Top 10 single"Toshishita no Otokonoko" (年下の男の子）, it possesses some of that early and mid-1970s innocent skippy nature but at the same time, I also think of late 1970s aidoru Ikue Sakakibara（榊原郁恵）when I hear Inoue's delivery. Speaking of her vocals, I think that they were a tad lower than in her debut single"Refrain" (ルフラン) which came out earlier in May. The other interesting observation is that underlying guitar riff that pops up at the beginning of each verse.; trying to remember where that comes from.
Just an additional piece of trivia concerning Inoue, but she ended up marrying Ed Yamaguchi（エド山口）, the TV personality and musician who, along with Shiro Okada（岡田志郎）, created the hit "Roppongi Lullaby"（六本木ララバイ）for singer Yasuko Naito（内藤やす子）in 1984.
It's been a while since I've put up this sort of kayo, but in the past, I've found that there were some of the old songs which had some happy and cheerful music alongside some sad lyrics. Basically, the moral of the story was that one not only has to keep that upper lip nice and stiff but that lip also has to be a part of a big smile, no matter how bad the situation. Maybe one of the better examples is Kyu Sakamoto's（坂本九）"Ue wo Muite Arukou" (上を向いて歩こう), aka the "Sukiyaki" song.
Well, I found one of Hiromi Iwasaki's（岩崎宏美）earlier songs from her February 1976 2nd original album"Fantasy"（ファンタジー）. Titled "Hitoribocchi no Heya"(Lonely Room), it's another wonderfully delivered 1970s Iwasaki tune with a bit of light funk by Yusuke Hoguchi（穂口雄右）, and not thinking too deeply about the title, I had assumed that it was another happy-go-lucky number of being in love. However, Yu Aku's（阿久悠）lyrics relate a young devastated girl holing up in her bedroom due to some adolescent frustration about a boy that she likes. It's quite dark, actually...looking at those lyrics makes me wonder if she is heading into hikikomori territory. But hey, it's still a bouncy tune.
The album "Fantasy" also contains her 3rd single"Sentimental"（センチメンタル）and the title track which was her 4th single. I was surprised to find out that I have yet to write about that one so I will have to rectify this next month. "Fantasy" the album hit No. 2 on Oricon and became the 32nd-ranked album for 1976.
Actually, there is another "Hitoribocchi no Heya" sung by Masa Takagi（高木麻早）back in 1973. I had wondered why in researching about Iwasaki's "Hitoribocchi no Heya" the title sounded so familiar, but Takagi's song is very different in that it's a very folksy number and the lyrics are also much happier in tone.
Another one of those aidoru that I had never known about, Tokyo-born Kumiko Aimoto（相本久美子）had actually started her career back in 1974, although for the first couple of years, it was under the stage name of Kumiko Kondo（近藤久美子）. She released 14 singles and 2 albums between that first year and 1981 with another single released in September 2015.
I came across this track from that second album from July 1981, "Yume Nanoni I Love You"（夢☆なのにI LOVE YOU...Even If It's A Dream, I Love You）. Titled "Mayonaka no Heroine"(Midnight Heroine), it has that certain synthesizer plowing the way which perhaps takes things into the techno aidoru kayodirection. It was written by Aimoto and composed by Yusuke Hoguchi（穂口雄右）with "Mayonaka no Heroine" having a pleasant and laidback beat. The end is a bit abrupt but the song is such that I would be pretty interested in hearing what the rest of that album sounds like.
With her final single in the summer of 1981 (aside from that 2015 release), Aimoto decided to go into acting.
According to kayo tradition, perhaps it's not the best thing to go out on a foggy day or night. There may be reduced visibility but I think it's something somewhat more existential that will collide with you.
Over the years of writing on this blog (coming to 7 years later next week), I've learned that there have been a number of songs in the late Showa Era with the word kiri（霧）, or fog, in the title. Sometimes, the song describes a fateful encounter but I've often felt that those encounters involve the end of a romance.
Such is the case with the beautifully and freshly delivered "Kiri no Hi no Dekigoto" (What Happened on That Foggy Day) by 70s aidoru Hiromi Iwasaki（岩崎宏美）. This is a track from Iwasaki's 3rd album"Hikousen"（飛行船...Airship） whose tracks were all written by Yu Aku（阿久悠）while this particular track was composed by Yusuke Hoguchi（穂口雄右）. Despite the title and the subject matter of an ended relationship, Hoguchi's arrangement keeps things going briskly at a cool beat provided by that lovely bass. In fact, I think the feeling of the song almost puts things in the wheelhouse of the folk/pop bandOff Course（オフコース）which knows a thing or two about former flames and lost love.
As for "Hikousen", it peaked at No. 3 on Oricon. I gather that now I have another artifact of nature to symbolize breakups along with dead autumn leaves.
This is another chance encounter with an aidoru who never really made it big but listening to "Aoi Suiheisen"(Blue Horizon), I think that there is some pleasant nostalgia when it comes to this teenybopper tune.
"Aoi Suiheisen" was sung by Tomoko Izumi（和泉友子...not sure about the reading of that first name; if it is actually Yuko, please let me know） as her first of only two singles according from what I could find on this archive for 70s and 80s aidoru. It was released in June 1981 and the timing was pretty appropriate since it does have that summery and breezy feeling. There is unsurprisingly no J-Wiki entry for Izumi because of her very brief discography but from that archive, the author mentioned some similarity to an aidoru who was becoming very big at the time, Seiko Matsuda（松田聖子）.
The arrangement is quite reminiscent of that time going from the late 1970s to the early 1980s when it comes to aidoru music, but listening to "Aoi Suiheisen", I'm also reminded of the music of Yoshie Kashiwabara（柏原よしえ）and the vocals of perky Ikue Sakakibara（榊原郁恵）. The song, which apparently didn't even break into the Top 100 on the Oricon weeklies, was written by Kazuko Katagiri（片桐和子）and composed by Yusuke Hoguchi（穂口雄右）.
Seeing Agnes Chan（アグネス・チャン）performing Takashi Matsumoto's（松本隆）debut song as a lyricist, "Pocket Ippai no Himitsu" (A Pocketful of Secrets) once more on Tuesday's "Uta Kon"（うたコン）and then hearing the original again on YouTube actually helped me to find out that Matsumoto's former bandmates in Happy End（はっぴいえんど）, Haruomi Hosono（細野晴臣）and guitarist Shigeru Suzuki（鈴木茂）through their initial run in the mid-1970s as part of Tin Pan Alley（ティン・パン・アレー）came up with a cover version of Chan's 6th single. Incidentally, Yusuke Hoguchi（穂口雄右）took care of the music.
This is a good opportunity for me. nikala wrote the first and, up to now only, article on the unique Tin Pan Alley back in September 2014. When I first heard about Hosono, it was through Yellow Magic Orchestra as one of the three technopop masters, so I was quite surprised to know that he had been part of the rock/New Music/City Pop group Happy End in the early 1970s and then a member of Caramel Mama（キャラメル・ママ）which got renamed Tin Pan Alley. I had wondered what kind of music a band with those names would create. Well, from what I've heard in nikala's article and through YouTube, it seems as if Hosono, Suzuki, keyboardists Masataka Matsutoya（松任谷正隆）and the late Hiroshi Sato（佐藤博）and drummer Tatsuo Hayashi（林立夫）enjoyed playing this blend of Martin Denny exotica and urban sounds. I can only speculate since I was in Japan for only several weeks in the 1970s as a kid, but perhaps Tin Pan Alley's freewheeling music was the type that would be played in the more intimate nightclubs and not on the NHK stage. It was quite the revelation to find out about the pre-YMO Hosono.
As I said, Tin Pan Alley came up with their own cover of "Pocket Ippai no Himitsu", a cute story of a girl swearing a boy to secrecy after she whispered sweet nothings into his ear only for the fellow to wake up and know what she had said. It came on the band's 1977 "Tin Pan Alley 2" and has that playfully funky beat (not so exotica) compared to Chan's countryside arrangement. Not 100% sure but I think that is indeed singer-songwriter MANNA as the vocalist here. She herself did a cover of a Tin Pan Alley tune, "Yellow Magic Carnival".
Candies（キャンディーズ）were always a group that I had associated with the season of spring due to their huge hit "Haru Ichiban"（春一番）from March 1976. However, just a couple of months after that single came their 10th release, "Natsu ga Kita!" (Summer Has Come).
With the same sort of bubbly energy that inhabited many a Candies song, Ran, Su & Miki decided to give tribute to the hot season as well thanks to Yusuke Hoguchi's（穂口雄右）music and lyrics. And it was also another Top 10 hit for the trio as it peaked at No. 5 and ended the year as the 72nd-ranked song. Selling about 176,000 copies in its initial release, the sales went up even further to about 260,000 when Candies had their final concert in 1978. "Natsu ga Kita!" would also be Hoguchi's final contribution to their discography after providing a number of hit singles for the ladies including the aforementioned "Haru Ichiban".
Still, listening to "Natsu ga Kita!", there is a certain relaxed feeling to the song when compared to the near-anthemic "Haru Ichiban" despite the horns that are blaring away in the live versions performed on the TV shows.
Of course, this song is not to be confused with its namesake by Misato Watanabe（渡辺美里）which was created later in the century.
Trying to categorize this article for today, I can only remark that this song has kinda popped out of the second-string tier of aidoru from the 70s and 80s who came and went with the wind. But the trio who sang "You Are Sexy", Fever（フィーバー）, has actually popped up on this blog once before and that would be the article that nikala had written up a couple of years ago in 2014 about her favourite techno kayo songs.
However, Fever's 2nd single"You Are Sexy" from August 1979 was far from the blips and bleeps of a synthesizer. The melody by Yusuki Hoguchi（穂口雄右）most certainly put it in the annals of good ol' disco. I mean, looking at the trio above in their hot pants and listening to the song, I think they answered the question "What if Candies and Pink Lady had been merged with not-as-good choreography?". Chinfa Kan（康珍化）, who would come up with lyrics for many an Anri（杏里）tune in the next decade, provided the words for "You Are Sexy".
As a B-kyu aidorugroup, there isn't a whole heck I could find in terms of information on Fever, and a good chunk of that has already been provided in nikala's paragraph on them. Just 4 singles and 1 album before the Fever broke (up) in late 1980.
Man, the things you can learn when doing a blog...
I was wondering which song to write about tonight when I decided to pull out the 1978 discs from the "Seishun Uta Nenkan"（青春歌年鑑）series, and second from the top on the CD 1 list was Candies'（キャンディーズ）"Hohoemigaeshi". Coming across a Candies' entry on the 1978 disc was a bit surprising since I had been under the impression that Ran, Su and Miki had already hung up their mikes a couple of years earlier, and the title didn't ring any bells. I had actually thought that there was a figurative baton passed between Candies and Pink Lady, but as it turned out, there was quite an overlap between their eras.
Then on listening to the song, I realized that it was something that I have heard a few times at least in the past. It was still the jaunty and perky Candies song, this time by composer Yusuke Hoguchi（穂口雄右）, that I was accustomed to hearing, but as it turned out, it was their 17th and final singlefrom February 1978. And it's from here for the remainder of this paragraph that things get a little shaky in the telling since a number of statements in the source article in J-Wiki have been hit with the "citation required" tag. So, basically, this is not set in stone. Although Candies and their fans strongly consider "Hohoemigaeshi" as the final single, there was an 18th single which was released in November of the same year to supposedly great protest from the trio but the decision was made by higher-ups. And so, "Tsubasa"（つばさ...Wings）was released at the end of 1978.
But if indeed this was true, then I don't blame Candies and their fans one bit for their resentment at the recording company. "Hohoemigaeshi" has all the hallmarks of being the swan song of a trio which grabbed the hearts of fans hard for over half a decade. Lyricist Yoko Aki（阿木燿子）may have set her words to sound like the slightly sad but overall cheerful story of a young couple making their move to a new home, but there was so much crammed into Single No. 17 to not hint but pretty much bludgeon the listener into realizing that this was the end of an era. There are lyrical shoutouts to past Candies' hits such as "Heart no Ace ga Detekonai"（ハートのエースが出てこない）and the even more famous "Haru Ichiban"（春一番）that Aki incorporated as a gift to the fans according to radio personality ANNA on a 2009 bayfm show. And the title means Smiling Back....perhaps as the ladies walk off into kayo kyoku history. I don't think you can get more goodbye than that. The fans had known for several months that Candies would be breaking up but this song must have still stopped hearts.
The other surprise that I received in digging for information for "Hohoemigaeshi" is that for all of their famous past hits, this song was the one that got Candies their first...and last...No.1 on the charts. There probably wasn't a dry eye among Miki, Su and Ran on learning that. This would be the trio's most successful hit with close to a million records sold, and an eventual achievement of No. 5 in the 1978 Oricon annual charts. The song was also a track on their third and final live album, "Candies Final Carnival Plus One" which was released in May 1978. That album would also reach No. 1 and become the 35th-ranked release of the year.
J-Canuck's post on Saori Minami's warm and summery "Soushun no Minato" inspired me to revisit some of the classic kayo tunes from the 70's, which of course included Candies (キャンディーズ), one of my favorite aidoru acts from that era. For all their harmless looks and choreography, I always thought the group's music had a certain edge to it, thanks to songwriting contributions of Yusuke Hoguchi (穂口雄右), former member of the Group Sounds band Out Cast (アウト・キャスト). "Sono Ki ni Sasenaide" (その気にさせないで...Don't Come Onto Me), their 7th single from September 1975, appeals to me for its upbeat disco groove and earworm melody. It's got the familiar orchestra band backing which was characteristic of Japan's 70's pop sound, which is perked up by the the driving force of guitars and bass. The girls' vocal delivery is self-assured and commanding: quite a contrast to their carefree smiles in the video above where they prance gleefully around the streets of Tokyo.
"Sono Ki ni Sasenaide" was composed and arranged by Hoguchi and written by Kazuya Senke (千家和也). The single peaked at No.17 on Oricon weeklies, charting for 14 weeks in the Top 100, and sold about 190,000 copies by the time Candies broke up. It was moderate hit for the girls compared to their classics "Haru Ichiban" and "Toshishita Otoko no Ko", but it'll always be a winner in my book. It was also included in their fifth studio album of the same title.
Amazing where getting information for writing an article on "Kayo Kyoku Plus" can take me. I was looking up the usual information about my last entry, Yoko Oginome's（荻野目洋子）debut single, "Mirai Koukai"（未来航海）and saw the name of the lyricist, Hiromi Kanda（神田広美）, and just on a whim, I decided to check if any of her songs were available on YouTube after seeing her own J-Wiki article.
Sure enough, I did hit pay dirt. This is "Kanashimi Yohou"(Melancholy Forecast), her 2nd single from May 1977, and I found it to be a very light and pleasant number which reminded me somewhat of the songs by another Hiromi...Hiromi Ohta（太田裕美）from around the same time. It has that sunny and summery feeling. Takashi Matsumoto（松本隆）provided the lyrics and Yusuke Hoguchi（穂口雄右）was behind the nostalgic music. Hoguchi was also responsible for composing a number of Candies'（キャンディーズ）hits such as "Toshi Shita no Otoko no Ko"（年下男の子）. And on a personal note, Hoguchi and Kanda would later marry.
Kanda was born in 1956 in Kishiwada, Osaka (according to J-Wiki...her own website has her coming from Nagasaki), and first got into the music business through an audition for NTV's "Star Tanjo"（スター誕生...A Star is Born）. After winning the competition, she was signed to the Polydor label and debuted in January 1977 with "Hitomishiri"（人見知り...Shyness）. Up to 1980, she would release 6 singles and 1 album, but also got into the songwriting profession. Along with the Oginome debut, she wrote lyrics for Anri（杏里）and Momoe Yamaguchi（山口百恵）.
In the past several years, though, Kanda and her husband have settled into life in Hawaii, and she's gotten full throttle into the jazz genre. Her first album in America was "Hiromi in Love" in 2010, and she has just released her sophomore album, "Days of Yesterday" back in September this year. Above is her performance of Cole Porter's classic "Night and Day".
Fortunately for a guy who loves the oldies, the various recording companies kinda got rather nostalgic at the turn of the century and started releasing kayo kyoku galore from as far back as the 50s via compilation albums, and then they began to re-issue actual re-mastered albums by specific singers such as Seiko Matsuda（松田聖子）, Junko Ohashi（大橋純子）, etc. Hiromi Iwasaki's （岩崎宏美）collection also got the same treatment and since she was one of the first Japanese singers that I fell in love with, as soon as I saw her soft-cover (as I like to call them) jacket versions of her 70s and 80s albums hitting the shelves, I went on the hunt.
One of the first re-issued albums I bought was Iwasaki's"Hatachi Mae..." (Before 20...),her 6th album from April 1978. Aside from the title track, I hadn't known any of the other songs on it but I decided to buy this one solely because of the cover photo of the then-19-year-old lass standing in front of the mixing board at the studio. She just looked so young and quite different from my image of her with the long, long hair and the formal dresses; according to her comments in the liner notes, everything she was wearing in the photo was all bought by her without any stylist calling the shots. She could've just been shopping at the local supermarket.
The album starts off with her 12th single, "Hatachi Mae", a song that I'd actually heard from years back when Mom got me a BEST tape of hers. Now in Japan, the age of 20 is one of the big ones since the teens legally become adults and there seems to be this romanticism surrounding the big 2-0. Written by Yu Aku（阿久悠）and composed by Yusuke Hoguchi（補口雄右）, the intro and Iwasaki's sung prelude strikes me as being the innocent and nostalgic end to adolescence as the singer elegantly makes a written greeting to a certain young man about how he's doing and if it isn't too much trouble if he could meet her. Then the song ramps up into a light bouncy disco trot as she looks forward to life beyond 20 although she hopes to get that answer from her Romeo before the big birthday.
I think that "Hatachi Mae" probably strikes a chord with a lot of people in my age range with the music and lyrics. However, according to those liner notes from the album, it was memorable for Iwasaki in that it was exceedingly difficult for her and the orchestra to tackle during recording due to the arrangement and the tempo shift. It also didn't help that the lass was in the throes of a bad cold at the same time, so an initial version of that recording has also been included in my softcover album along with the official one. To be honest, I couldn't really tell much of a difference....Iwasaki handled herself with aplomb....and tissues.
"Hatachi Mae" was released as a single in February 1978 and got as high as No. 10 on the charts, and eventually placed No. 76 in the annual singles charts.
Also on the album is her 10th single from July 1977, "Nettaigyo"（熱帯魚...Tropical Fish）. What struck me about this song was that the Aku-penned lyrics already had Iwasaki growing up even faster than the innocent in "Hatachi Mae" as she sings about hanging around that bar in a melancholy state while nursing that cocktail and refusing to go home due to guy trouble. Makoto Kawaguchi（川口真） provides a jaunty aidoru kayo melody that reminds me a bit of Momoe Yamaguchi's（山口百恵） discography to a certain extent. The single peaked at No. 4 and ended the year as the 44th-ranked song.
However, the one song from the album that got my attention was "The Man"（ザ・マン）. The same fellows behind the more famous "Hatachi Mae" were responsible for a song that I think would have made a cool theme for a 70s Japanese detective show. The cool staccato horns and the guitars just give "The Man" a really nice City Pop beat for that decade. And lyrically, Iwasaki takes on the role of that manly man and the woman who doesn't quite know what to do with him by alternating the masculine and feminine speaking styles. Not that I would have noticed the difference on first listen since she sounds so beautiful either way. The song was the B-side to the "Hatachi Mae" single.
Two of the songs on the album were written and composed by singer-songwriter Keiko Maruyama（丸山圭子） which also got my attention. The one above is "Imayo Tsuzuri"（今様つづり）, the type of wonderful ballad that Iwasaki has done so well for so many years, and listening to it, I immediately had images of a young couple in ancient Japan walking discreetly on a country lane since the lyrics referred to floating cherry blossom petals, castles and old tiled roofs. I'm not all that confident of my translation of the title but it may mean "Heian Style Writing" or "Modern Style Writing" (If my Anonymous Iwasaki fan commenter can clear this up, I would appreciate it).
As for the album, "Hatachi Mae..." peaked at No. 10 on Oricon.
Several months ago, I wrote an article about one of the more odder duets in kayo kyoku history with boy aidoruHiromi Go（郷ひろみ） and actress Kirin Kiki（樹木希林） performing "Obake no Rock". One of the things I neglected to add to that story was that the song had actually been a theme song to a TBS sitcom from the 70s titled "Mu"（ムー）which included both singers in the cast.
Well, a year later, the sequel to that show was "Mu Ichizoku"（ムー一族...The Mu Family） with the same large cast including Go and Kiki. Apparently, "Obake no Rock" was so successful that the two got together again to do another number for the show that had a more disco bent called "Ringo Satsujin Jiken" (The Apple Murders). From what I could understand about the show itself, the Uzaki Family is a rather weird one so the theme song got a similar treatment in the lyrics by Yu Aku（阿久悠） which detail a detective's search for a killer with only a half-eaten apple as a clue.
Of course, I also have to show a video of Go and Kiki performing another dance that drunken salarymen could love. I'm not sure if I would ever sing this at karaoke and do the choreography but I enjoy the disco. In fact, the Yusuke Hoguchi（穂口雄右） melody almost spills over into City Pop territory. The song was released in June 1978 and reached No. 6 on Oricon and became the 42nd-ranked song for the year.
Now, what perked my memories of "Ringo Satsujin Jiken" was coming across the above video by pure accident last night. A few years ago, chanteuse Yuko Ando（安藤裕子） and vocalist/musician Takafumi Ikeda (池田貴史...formerly of the funk band Super Butter Dog) got together on Ando's March 2011 album of cover songs, "Otona no Majime na Cover Series"（大人のまじめのカバーシリーズ....An Adult's Serious Series of Covers） to not only perform a cover of the Go/Kiki tune, but also make the official music video.
I have to say that I was taken a bit aback by witnessing a happy smiling Ando doing the goofy dances since my image of her had been rather rainy and melancholy. But she and Ikeda go for the gusto all over Tokyo, including nearby Tokyo Sky Tree. And to add further fun, Kiki returns for a cameo in her first appearance in a music video in 33 years. By the way, "Otona no Majime na Cover Series" peaked at No. 19 on the album charts.
As for "Mu Ichizoku" itself, well, it certainly doesn't start off in the usual home comedy way.
And as a bit of a gift, here's Go with AKB 48 performing "Ringo Satsujin Jiken". Ole!
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