Junko Yagami -- Cashmere no Hohoemi （カシミヤのほほえみ）

This is another song that I got from my recently purchased "Light Mellow Breeze" album of  J-AOR/City Pop tunes. A few nights ago, I wrote about Fumiya Sashida's （指田郁也）"Parallel" which was the first track on the CD, and now here is another track by Junko Yagami,（八神純子）"Cashmere no Hohoemi" (Cashmere Smile).

Originally from Yagami's 8th album, "Communication" which was released in February 1985, "Cashmere no Hohoemi" was composed and written by the singer. I read in the liner notes for this particular song in "Light Mellow Breeze" that "Communication" was the first album to present Yagami going in a new musical direction, and that there was some controversy about the decision among the fans. Listening to some of the other tracks on the album, it was obvious that she was going for more of the then-contemporary US R&B/dance sound and leaving behind the Latin-tinged kayo that she had become first famous for in the 1970s.

I'm listening to "Communication" in hindsight of many many years, so I don't have any feelings of polarization at all. As the author of the liner notes mentioned, Yagami needed to make a change after over a decade, and I completely agree. Certainly, singers like Taeko Ohnuki （大貫妙子）and Miharu Koshi（コシミハル） didn't suffer after making their own tangents in their careers. And with "Cashmere no Hohoemi", although there wasn't as much in the way of her soaring vocals as she had injected into her past hits, her delivery was able to fit into the quick urban contemporary melody just fine. Moreover, I've continued to listen to her albums since "Communication", and as I have profiled in previous Yagami articles on songs from those albums, I don't think either she or her fans have suffered too much at all. As for the album itself, it peaked at No. 9 on Oricon but it would be the last time up to now that she would break into the Top 10.

Hitomi Ishikawa -- Migi Muke Migi （右向け右）

I distinctly remember the 2nd entry in this blog being Hitomi Ishikawa's（石川ひとみ）"Machibuse"（まちぶせ）. I chose that hit since it had been one of the big songs in my 1981 epiphany that steered me into my long relationship listening to kayo kyoku. However, up to now it had been the only Ishikawa song that I knew, and recently I was wondering how some of her other songs sounded.

So I decided to go all the way back to her beginnings. "Migi Muke Migi" (Turning Right) was her debut in May 1978, and it was written by Yoshiko Miura（三浦徳子）, a frequent lyricist for Seiko Matsuda（松田聖子）, and composed by Hiroshi Miyagawa（宮川泰）, the man behind the grand theme song for "Uchuu Senkan Yamato"（宇宙戦艦ヤマト）. I've only heard it a few times now and it struck me as being a harmless and pleasant enough 70s aidoru tune about a boy and girl reluctantly turning away in opposite directions. There was nothing too elaborate or challenging about it (yes, I do realize that I am talking about aidoru tunes here), so it was good enough for a young 18-year-old Ishikawa to cut her teeth upon. Man, writing that age down just has me comparing her with what Namie Amuro （安室奈美恵）did when she was 19 years old several years later.

I didn't write anything about Ishikawa's history for "Machibuse", so allow me to rectify that situation. She was born in 1959 in Aichi Prefecture, and in contrast with that stereotypical aidoru look that she had, she grew up as a tomboy. In fact, according to her J-Wiki profile, she got into a huge donnybrook with one kid in kindergarten in a rice paddy which left her coming home completely covered in mud. When she was in her 2nd year of high school, she had actually auditioned for the Fuji-TV talent program "Kimi koso Star da!" （君こそスターだ...You Are The Star!）but kerfuffled the lyrics for Hiromi Iwasaki's （岩崎宏美）"Dream" which led to her screaming out "SORRY!!!" Still, she was able to become the champion on the program. Then some time later, Ishikawa visited the Nagoya branch of the Tokyo Music Academy on the day that she was supposed to take an entrance examination for another institute of higher learning. The staffer at the academy invited her to take the exam there, and since she passed, the rest was history.

Junichi Inagaki -- Sekai de Tatta Hitori no Kimi ni （世界でたったひとりの君に）

My default impression of a Junichi Inagaki （稲垣潤一）song is a languid ballad with images of a wine glass against the backdrop of a night skyline or a sangria against the backdrop of a seashore. Perhaps it's not a fair assessment of the man's work since of course there is also his famous mid-tempo Xmas song "Christmas Carol no koro ni wa"（クリスマスキャロルの頃には）and "Ocean Blue", but I've always thought of him as Japan's Mr. Relaxation.

So when I got his 12th album, "Sketch of Heart" via Eye-Ai's mail-order service back in the early 90s, I was surprised by the first track, "Sekai de Tatta Hitori no Kimi ni" (To The Only One in The World). It was an Inagaki song that fairly hustled. I was no longer in that hammock with the sangria...I was running on the beach with that sangria. I would have to go through the album again to remember the rest of the other tracks but that first song (which was also Inagaki's 26th single) has always managed to insert itself in my musical memories where Inagaki was concerned. That instrumental bridge of synth-horns rather helped out in that way, too. The single version managed to peak at No. 75 after getting released in May 1992, and it was written by Natsumi Watanabe （渡辺なつみ）and composed by Tatsuhito (?) Kuwamura（桑村達人）.

Namie Amuro -- Don't Wanna Cry

Although I remember watching the commercial (as above) for Namie Amuro's (安室奈美恵) 5th single, I think my first view of "Don't Wanna Cry" was through an ad for a drink by the name of Mistio.

Released in March 1996, "Don't Wanna Cry" was one of the few songs for Amuro that hadn't been completely by Svengali Tetsuya Komuro （小室哲哉）. The former TM Network keyboardist was responsible for the lyrics along with Takahiro Maeda（前田たかひろ）and Komuro took care of the melody. The same combination was also responsible for a previous Amuro hit, "Chase The Chance". At the time, Amuro was beginning her ascent to the top of the J-Pop world, and probably most of us knew her for her dance-pop stuff with The Super Monkeys (now known as MAX) up to that point, but "Don't Wanna Cry" was the first time I'd heard and seen her try an R&B groove, as light as it was. Sometimes, I thought she was going to break her vocal cords on some of the high notes in the song, but I couldn't deny it was a catchy song. Out came my yen.

"Don't Wanna Cry" was another chart-topper for Amuro, and it ended up becoming the 9th-ranked single for 1996. It was her 2nd consecutive No. 1 hit and her 3rd million-seller (1.5 million copies sold). The single won a prize at the Japan Record Awards that year which was the first for Amuro, and the fact that the singer was only 19 at the time meant that she was (and apparently still is) the youngest winner ever to receive such an award. If I'm not mistaken, the above video is from that awards show, and ironically, she didn't mind crying for that. 

By the way, the song is also on her 2nd album, "Sweet 19 Blues" which was also a No. 1 hit and the 2nd-biggest album of 1996. Just to add onto the accolades, Amuro made her 2nd consecutive appearance on NHK's Kohaku Utagassen for "Don't Wanna Cry" as the top batter.

Fumiya Sashida -- Parallel= （パラレル＝）

About a couple of weeks ago, I saw this commercial on YouTube for a Japan-released series of J-AOR/City Pop compilation albums titled "Light Mellow". The commercial showed brief excerpts of every one of the tracks from their "Breeze" album, a couple of which I had already profiled in the blog: Makoto Matsushita's （松下誠）"First Light" and Kirinji's（キリンジ） "Aliens". It was enough for me to send the order in and a couple of days ago, it arrived.

The first track is by someone that I had never heard before by the name of Fumiya Sashida（指田郁也）. The Tokyo-born singer-songwriter started classic piano at the tender age of 3 and then decided that he would become a professional artist in the first year of high school. Debuting in 2011 with the single "bird", he has been influenced by singers such as Tatsuro Yamashita, Koji Tamaki and Kazumasa Oda in Japan, as well as David Foster and Bobby Caldwell on the other side of the Pacific. With someone like Bobby Caldwell as Sashida's career hero, I guess it's no surprise when he declared "I'd love to add an AOR essence to any song!"

And boy, did he do this in a big way with his 2nd single, "Parallel=". I mean I couldn't quite believe it when I first heard this and read the liner notes to "Light Mellow -- Breeze" to discover that this had been released in March 2012, and not March 1982. He almost out-Doobie'ed the Doobie Brothers here with that familiar 80s piano riff of his. Sashida took care of everything here with jam helping out on the lyrics. And it makes for a nice launch to my newest CD. 

"Parallel" was also used as one of the ending themes for the anime "Bakuman"（バクマン。）, itself an adaptation from the 2008 manga about a couple of teenage boys with dreams of becoming manga artists. There are not too many anime out there that have embraced their inner AOR. Although the single didn't chart, it can be found on Sashida's debut album, "Shiro Kuro"（しろくろ...Black and White）.

And for those J-AOR/City Pop fans out there, here is that YouTube ad for "Light Mellow Breeze" that I found. Y'know, thanks to this and Marcos' articles on folks like especia and Hitomitoi, I'm rather reassured that the genre is still hanging in there after 40 years.

Chage & Aska -- no no darlin'

Yep, I have heard of the current troubles that Aska is going through right now. But he certainly isn't the first Japanese pop music artist to have fallen into the drugs trap and I'm pretty sure he won't be the last. All we can hope is that he will come back reflective and healthier soon.

Moving on, I came across this old song of Chage & Aska from a couple of decades back that I hadn't heard in some time. And it was good to hear again since compared to some of their huge anthems such as "YAH YAH YAH", "no no darlin'" is a nice and mellow piece, thanks in part to Jess Bailey's smooth and comfy piano. Plus, the boys keep the volume down a little more than usual. As for the official music video above, it's a nice little slice-of-life of a London suburb where everybody seems to know your name, although the last half when Chage & Aska go all Clarence The Angel and start spreading the pixie dust on that bickering couple had me slightly gagging.

"no no darlin'" was Chage & Aska's 30th single written and composed by Aska  for release in October 1992. An intriguing piece of trivia I was able to dig up from the J-Wiki article on the song was that the title was actually derived from one small part of the lyrics from an old kayo kyoku chestnut, Hiromi Ota's（太田裕美） "Momen no Handkerchief"（木綿のハンカチーフ）. The phrase was "Iie, anata"（いいえ、あなた...No, darling）. It's probably one of the more interesting lyrical examples of botanical grafting I've ever read about.

The song went as high as No. 2 and did very well despite the late release in the year to become the 26th-ranked song for 1992. It was also a track on Chage & Aska's 15th album, "GUYS" which was released in November in the same year and hit the top spot on the charts. That album did even better than the single on the annual charts as it became the 12th-ranking album for 1992, breaking through the million barrier.

Subaru also came calling on the guys to have the song made a commercial campaign tune for one of their cars.

PUFFY -- SWEET DROPS/Kasarinchu -- High, High, High

Back a couple of years ago, my anime buddy introduced me to this rather sweet slice-of-life anime that had run from July 2011 for 11 weeks called "Usagi Drop"（うさぎドロップ...Bunny Drop）. It had no reality-warping cute witches or city-breaking giant mecha robots....it merely told of a story of a somewhat taciturn young bachelor businessman Daikichi who through some very unusual circumstances suddenly became the caretaker of a precocious girl by the name of Rin. Each week, the series depicted some minor crisis that "sudden" father Daikichi had to tackle vis-a-vis Rin as he gradually grew into his new life role. The show also included a small arc involving the search for the girl's biological mother. Along with the soft pastel-like animation, I enjoyed "Usagi Drop" since it had that element that every movie that I've enjoyed from "Star Wars" to "Ghostbusters" had...a good heart.

The other reason behind my profile today has to do with the music, so I've decided to kill two birds with one stone and cover both the opening and ending themes. First off, there is the opening by PUFFY titled "SWEET DROPS". When I saw the cute opening credits to "Usagi Drop" and heard Ami and Yumi for the first time in a very long while, I just went "Wow! They're still together". And I think the child-like and sing-song nature of "SWEET DROPS" was just perfect for PUFFY and for the series. The song was the pair's 31st single from August 2011 which just happened to be their second single in their 15th anniversary year.

Singer-songwriter Shoko Suzuki（鈴木祥子）was the one behind the creation of the song, and I think getting PUFFY to come on board was fairly easy since the manga artist responsible for the original comic of "Usagi Drop", Yumi Unita（宇仁田ゆみ）, was a huge fan of the duo. "SWEET DROPS" got as high as No. 34 on Oricon.

However, if I had to make a choice, I would have to say that my favourite of the two themes would be the ending song by the other duo, Kasarinchu（カサリンチュ）. I think "High High High" was the song that finally made me realize that a wailing & twangy guitar is just the thing for a happy-go-lucky tune. Reminiscent of some of the works by Spitz, "High High High" is like taking a fun walk in the park or that Sunday drive with your own kids.

Kasarinchu is Tatsuhiro （タツヒロ）and Kousuke （コウスケ）from Kagoshima Prefecture. Being classmates in both junior and senior high school, they were in a band together, and then after graduating, they headed up to Tokyo for some more education although the J-Wiki article hints that the two had spent their lives separately up there. They returned to Kagoshima, and on attending a mutual friend's wedding, Tatsuhiro and Kousuke sang together which sparked the idea of them starting up a double act. So in 2005, Kasarinchu was born. As for the name, it was derived from the name of their hometown, Kasari Town （笠利町）on Amami-Oshima Island and it actually means "people of Kasari". The town was recently merged with two other municipalities on the island to become the city of Amami.

"High High High" was the coupling song to Kasarinchu's 2nd single, "Yamerarenai Tomarenai" （やめられない、とまれない...Can't Quit, Can't Stop） which came out in July 2011. The single was written and composed by Tatsuhiro, and managed to get as high as No. 82 on Oricon.