Tomomi Itano -- Dear J

Tomomi Itano (板野友美) was never my favorite AKB48 member. She was an important member of the group, and one that was especially popular among young girls thanks to her fashion gyaru looks. Even so, nothing on her quite caught my attention. Things changed a bit when she released her first solo single, “Dear J”.

Musically speaking, Tomochin was one of the least talented singers in the group, something that became even more striking when she became the first member to launch a proper solo career, in early 2011. What’s even more surprising: since the time of her graduation, around the time “Koi Suru Fortune Cookie” (恋するフォーチュンクッキー) was released (2013), Tomochin easily became the steadiest ex-AKB48 member in the music industry, releasing mildly successful singles and full albums (her second album, “Get Ready♡”, will be released next month).

Released in January 2011, “Dear J” served as Tomomi’s debut single, and it was a big departure from AKB48’s typical sound. In fact, the heavy Technopop sound is very reminiscent of what K-Pop veteran supergroups Girls’ Generation and KARA, but also J-Pop longtime reigning queen Namie Amuro (安室奈美恵), were releasing at the time. Actually, like one of my friends said, Tomochin must have had lots of Amuro’s posters around her room during her “Dear J” era, because everything in this release, from the song and music video to the looks and faces, screams Namie.

Since Tomochin can’t sing, the vocals in “Dear J” are heavily autotuned in a way that we almost can’t hear her true voice behind all the robotic singing. However, it goes well with the club-friendly arrangement, and even with the somewhat dramatic chorus.

In the end, even though “Dear J” may sound like another disposable J-Pop tune, it stood the test of time for me, as I still listen to it a lot after five years of its release. In my opinion, Tomochin has not come up with another great song like this one in the last couple of years, but I agree that 2015’s “Gimme Gimme Luv” comes close at a second spot. I’ll probably give her second album a spin to see what she has on the sleeves.

“Dear J” reached #2 on the Oricon chart, selling 216,781 copies. Lyrics were written by Yasushi Akimoto (秋元康), while music was compsed by Keyz and Carlos K. As for the arrangement, corin. was the responsible.

Source: generasia.com

Michiko Maki -- Kuchizuke no Aki (くちづけの秋)

The more I listen to the songs of Michiko Maki（牧美智子）, the more I think she was one of the unsung and underrated singers of the 1970s. She apparently doesn't even merit her own J-Wiki entry.

I listened to her 2nd single from October 1974, "Kuchizuke no Aki" (Autumn Kiss). There is a rich layer of lush strings and harp, and so when paired with that crystalline voice of hers, I wonder what she could have done with covers of some of those Disney classics. And the way that her vocals tip toe across the lyrics by Kazue Senke（千家和也）, I also think that Maki may have had a past in ballet. The lovely kayo melody was composed by Daisuke Inoue（井上大輔）under his real name of Tadao Inoue（井上忠夫）.

"Kuchizuke no Aki" was also the title track for her first album which came out in the same year as the single.

Courtesy of amazon.jp

Yellow Magic Orchestra -- Neue Tanz

Technodelic is the fifth studio album by Yellow Magic Orchestra, released in 1981. The album is notable for its experimental and heavy use of samplers which were not commonly used until the mid-to-late 1980s, resulting in a more minimalist sound compared to their previous work.

The above statement is straight from the Wikipedia article on "Technodelic" (テクノデリック) and I couldn't have agreed more. I didn't listen to any of the album until many years later and so my impression of Yellow Magic Orchestra had always been that of a band which liked to add their cool synthesizers to some old-style music such as surf rock and exotica since their debut in 1978.

Therefore, it was with some irony that I had fully embraced the early melodic YMO oeuvre in the same year that the band went further into techno and away from the usual pop. One of the best examples of this was the track called "Neue Tanz" which I actually first heard from a video of one of their concerts as shown below.

Listening to "Neue Tanz" (New Dance), I felt that YMO was either referring back to their German comrades-in-arms, Kraftwerk, or going ahead in time. For a number of their past hits, there was a certain playful tongue-in-cheek nature but "Neue Tanz" is, as that Wiki paragraph stated, pretty darn experimental. It's something that would be heard backing some sort of weird performance art video. What was definitely affecting for me was that "ch-ch-ch-chatter" which had been provided through samples of Indonesian kecak chanting. In fact, according to the J-Wiki article on "Technodelic", the song had been temporarily titled "Kecak".

The album peaked at No. 4 after its release in November 1981.

Pikotaro -- PPAP: Pen-Apple-Pineapple-Pen

The pineapple: grand for upside-down cakes and Canadian pizza and sundaes. And it can be the go-to organic container for Chinese dishes such as the sweet-and-sour pork above and even fried rice in Japan. Not too sure about pens and apples, though.

After my niece's birthday dinner on Sunday, we all went back to my brother's place for some of that birthday cake. There, the bonnie lass gleefully showed me a video of this lantern-jawed fellow by the name of Pikotaro（ピコ太郎）who looked like he was dressed by some woman from Sugamo, Tokyo performing a (mercifully) short-but-sweet number called "PPAP: Pen-Apple-Pineapple-Pen". It's just some minimalist technopop paired with an English vocabulary lesson for the kiddies that was released as a digital download single only a few days ago although the video seems to have already gotten around like a virus. Canadian singer-troublemaker Justin Bieber has given it his star of approval, and apparently it has made the rounds on the news channels such as BBC and CNN. I guess even they need a break from talking about Donald and Hillary once in a while. In other words, it has become a thing.

The video above has so far had over 83 million views. I guess I should say that it has become a meme although I don't think it's gonna quite reach the heights of PSY's "Gangnam Town".

Pikotaro is supposedly a 53-year-old singer-songwriter from Chiba Prefecture although he has just popped up in the pop culture world. Actually, he is the creation of 43-year-old comedian Daimaou Kosaka（古坂大魔王）from Aomori Prefecture (real name: Kazuhito Kosaka/古坂和仁) who started out as one-third of a comedic trio called Sokonuke AIR-LINE（底ぬけAIR-LINE）in 1991 before taking a break in 2003 to form a techno unit which was called New Bushidou Ravers. The Ravers helped produce club events and even assisted in remixes for singers such as Ami Suzuki（鈴木亜美）. Kosaka revived his comedic career in 2008.

One of his other characters was Mendokusai Otoko（メンドクサイ男...The Troublesome Man） who you can see in action above with a backing techno track.

Speaking of celebrity Canadian admirers, even Drake from Toronto has gotten into the act, something that my niece also showed me while we were eating our cheesecake.

Not sure how far this "PPAP" phenomenon will go but if it makes it to the end of the year, I think it's guaranteed that Pikotaro will show up on the Kohaku Utagassen in some form or other. Pens, apples, pineapples and all.

Mieko Takamine -- Kouhan no Yado （湖畔の宿）

I'm not all that big into traveling since my comfort zone outside of home isn't all that wide. However, having said that, I'm always appreciative of any sort of accommodations that provides the minimum of clean and comfy sleep. The urban hotels whether they are the high-end Keio Plaza Hotel in Shinjuku (my orientation venue on the JET Programme in 1989) or the medium-priced Toyoko Inn (where I stayed late in 2014) chain have been fine with me.

But there is also something about the rural ryokan that has managed to provide its charms. During that same trip in 2014, my anime buddy, his friend and I stayed at the Daitokan（大東館）in the city of Ito, Shizuoka Prefecture. As you can see above, it was Japanese-style, the bedding and futon were neatly arranged all in a row, there was the alcove with two seats and a small table to enjoy the view of the city, and there were the hot spring facilities down below. I also had plenty of opportunities to enjoy the ryokan scene during my time on JET when the teachers often took overnight trips in the nearby resort areas of Gunma Prefecture at the end of the year.

Daitokan

Over the last 18 months, I've been involved in translating short travel articles from Japanese into English, and so mention has been made of some of those countryside inns such as Daitokan. And a couple of weeks ago, on an episode of NHK's "Uta Kon"（うたコン）, there was a performance of a very old enka ballad titled "Kouhan no Yado" (Lakeside Inn) which was originally sung by the late actress-singer Mieko Takamine（高峰三枝子）in 1940. I've translated at least one article which involved one of those exclusive hotels beside a lake; I think one of them was situated right on the shores of Japan's largest inland body of water, Lake Biwa, and certainly that had me thinking about my time at Daitokan a couple of years ago and all of the ryokan back in 1989-1991.

Midori Oka's（丘みどり）performance of "Kouhan no Yado" was quite jazzy so I was slightly surprised when I heard the original version above and the later performances by Takamine, and found it quite melancholy, thanks to the melody by Ryoichi Hattori（服部良一）. Sonosuke Sato's（佐藤惣之助）lyrics describe a woman arriving at that lakeside inn all by herself just to try to recover from the end of a relationship. It seems as if there have been a lot of enka tunes which portray a woman heading out into the regional areas to attempt to forget heartbreak (admittedly, a good onsen does soothe). For me, a good dinner with lots of protein does the trick. But I digress.

One of the interesting rumours that I've picked up over the years about Japan is that management at some of the old-fashioned ryokan tend to decline reservations by solo travelers out of fear that one of these guests may decide to end it all in his/her room due to some sort of depression. Still not sure if that is true or not.

In any case, although the J-Wiki article on Takamine (1918-1990) is long, there is barely anything about her singing career aside from the fact that a few of her songs are mentioned in passing.

Unfortunately, I don't know whether this had been released as an official single or not but I have to say that actress-singer Chieko Baisho（倍賞千恵子）does a masterful job at this cover of "Kouhan no Yado". It's too bad that I can't find out when it came out. That voice of hers really resonates.

Aru Takamura -- I'm In Love

Another discovery on YouTube the other night, I had never heard of Aru Takamura（高村亜留）but I really like this track, "I'm In Love" from her debut album "Aru First" which was released in May 1985. I guess she belonged to the underwater nine-tenths of the iceberg. It's short but sweet (although with that very abrupt ending, I wonder if there was actually more to the song), and it has that funk n' horns which I always enjoyed in a good R&B tune of the day although sometimes they threatened to cover up her slightly whispery voice. The lyrics were written by Yuuho Iwasato（岩里祐穂）and the strutting music was by Masao Nakajima（中島正雄）.

The late Takamura was born in 1961 and when she was 16 years old, she declared to her mother that she would become a singer and soon entered a rock band. They covered all of the Aerosmith and KISS hits but then started exploring soul music. Finally, Takamura would come out with her first album in 1985 followed by her second, and last, album a year later. Unfortunately in August 2014, she passed away from cervical cancer.

Akina Nakamori -- Mizu ni Sashita Hana （水に挿した花）

On first hearing this haunting ballad, "Mizu ni Sashita Hana" (Flowers Arranged in the Water) by Akina Nakamori（中森明菜）, I thought this was more back to form for the singer with Natsumi Tadano's（只野菜摘）lyrics about a damaged angel (of death?) offering to take a troubled lady back to happier times. And the melancholy melody by singer-songwriter Junko Hirotani（広谷順子）sounded like a dark lullaby.

"Mizu ni Sashita Hana" is Akina's 25th single from November 1990. It's never going to be one of my favourite singles by her, but after all the turmoil that the singer had been through in the last several months and the sadness of her songs in the last year or so, this particular ballad sounded more genuine coming from her than her previous comeback single of "Dear Friend"/"Caribbean" in July of that year. The two songs, though fun, always struck me as being forced cheeriness from her and that has never been part of Akina's makeup in my opinion. "Mizu ni Sashita Hana" just seems to have a certain fragile beauty that resembles that of the singer at that time (and probably even now).

The song was used as the ending theme for the Wednesday night drama of the week on NTV. It hit the top spot on Oricon and became the 92nd-ranked single of the year and was even bumped up to No. 76 for the same rankings the following year. It has also been placed as a track on her "BEST III" from November 1992.