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 hope everyone had a good start to the new year. I kind of did with Okinawan food for dinner with the family on New Year's day - I've finally acquired the taste of bitter gourd (goya)! - but the persistent cold I caught from the bug flying around the extended family Christmas party was quite a dampener.
That aside, here's my first article for 2018. Looking back at my previous write-ups, I had always been beginning the year with enka, so I thought it'd mix things up a little this time around with what I consider as one of my guilty pleasures - no, not "Kiyoshi no Zundoko Bushi" (きよしのズンドコ節) - Eikichi Yazawa's (矢沢永吉) "Tomaranai HA~HA".
I don't know all that much about Yazawa, save for his shibui persona and beer adverts, but it seems like "Tomaranai" is one of his most iconic hits and is a real crowd pleaser when it comes to his concerts. Not surprising considering it got me hooked the moment I heard it via those best-selling hit medleys. The strong 80's vibe from the synths, the excessive amount of electric guitar, and the screaming sax (my favourite bit) all make for an indulgence for the ears; Yazawa's husky howls and that defiant way in which he yells out "____ HA HA!" is awesome. I'm not one to listen to music at high volumes, but whenever I do get reminded of "Tomaranai" that's hiding somewhere in my "Liked Videos" playlist on YouTube, I make an exception. It's so LOUD, but it sounds so GOOD. Oddly enough, I find that it serves as sort of a stress-relief song - the almost anarchic vibe of the singer and the rockin' score makes one feel like they can let loose and go ballistic. Not like I actually do, though. It's just the feeling of it.
Definitely not my usual cup of oolong tea that is enka, that's for sure. I suppose it's more like a lemonade soda slushie that can give you brain freeze. "Tomaranai" is wild and so is the man behind the mike, but does it make for one heck of a palate cleanser!
Yazawa himself composed the music, and Tetsuya Chiaki (ちあき哲也) was in charge of penning the lyrics. "Tomaranai" was never released as a single, but it first came packaged in the album "Tokyo Night" (東京ナイト) on 25th July 1986. And then it was also included in "FLASH IN JAPAN", his album aimed at the American market, but in an English version titled "HURRICANE" - that'd be interesting to hear.
2017 was quite a rough year, but it had its merits. I hope 2018 will be more smooth-sailing. I wish you readers and writers alike a Happy New Year!
Kinda too bad about the photo but I really did get the "Tribute to Taeko Ohnuki" album for Xmas this year. After discovering the delicious cover of "Tokai"（都会）by Ryuichi Sakamoto & Yasuyuki Okamura（坂本龍一・岡村靖幸）back in October, I checked out a few more tracks on YouTube and decided that I just had to get it.
The tribute, which was released back in December 2013, is in the form of a 2-CD set with Disc 1 featuring new recordings of Ohnuki's songs for this particular album by various singers whereas Disc 2 has songs created by Ohnuki that had been recorded long before on other artists' albums.
Along with Sakamoto & Okamura's"Tokai" which starts Disc 1 off, the second track is a cover of the unusual "Labyrinth" which was originally on Ohnuki's "Cliche" LP from 1982. Under the name of The Beatniks, Sakamoto's old YMO bandmate Yukihiro Takahashiand Moonriders' Keiichi Suzuki（高橋幸宏+鈴木慶一）give a slightly janglier and more organic version although it still retains that weird moodiness of the original.
Track 3 is Etsuko Yakushimaru's（やくしまるえつこ）tribute to the singer-songwriter through her cover of the whimsical "Peter Rabbit to Watashi"（ピーターラビットと私）which also came from "Cliche". Like "Labyrinth", the original "Peter Rabbit" was more in the technopop vein but Yakushimaru provides a mellower guitar pop take.
The clincher song for me to get this album though is from Disc 2. Akiko Yano's（矢野顕子）cover of "Umi to Shonen"（海と少年）from her 1986 album"Touge no Wagaya"（峠のわが家...Our Home on the Ridge）is pure fun. Compared to the first couple of songs from Disc 1 above, Yano goes the other route by taking the sunny New Music original and putting it through the technopop filter and setting the machine to Happy Happy Joy Joy. Not that Ohnuki made her tune a brooding shoegazer of a song when she recorded it in her 1978 "Mignonne", but Yano just perks it up with extra musical caffeine. In those three and three-quarters minutes, I got that happy-go-lucky Yano pop from the 1980s, even a bit of Prince's funk guitar with some rich piano and at the end, some PSY-S flourish. Pop songs should always be this happy.
As much as Yano was dabbling in her quirky technopop in the 1980s, actress/singer Miki Nakatani（中谷美紀）was also doing the same thing in the 1990s. Her contribution to the tribute album came from her 3rd album in 1999, "Shiseikatsu"（私生活...Private Life）through her cover of "Natsu ni Koi suru Onna Tachi"（夏に恋する女たち）. The original by Ohnuki was from her 7th album"Signifie" and had that romantic French pop sweep to it; I'm now wondering if it even could have been treated as a precursor to Shibuya-kei. In any case, Nakatani's cover has got the technopop touch to it.
"Tribute to Taeko Ohnuki" has no fewer than three versions of "Shikisai Toshi"（色彩都市）which was another nice mix of old-fashioned and technopop from "Cliche". The one that I like the best is Tomoyo Harada's（原田知世）version which veers fully into the former area with strings and harp. Feel like having a cup of tea in a parlour after listening to this version. The Harada cover is a track on her 2007 album"music & me" and apparently was selected by Ohnuki herself for the singer.
It's been quite a long and happy journey for me when it comes to the Ohnuki file. After hearing her name in the wind for so many years, I got that BEST album of hers to listen to it once and then let go fallow for many more years before I finally saw and heard the light. Then I made it the mission to collect her first several solo albums and enjoy them before getting this tribute album. The artists who came together for this project certainly respect her and so do I.
It’s a been a long time since my last entry for Megumi Hayashibara (林原めぐみ), and the main reason is that most of
her songs are not on Youtube anymore.
“Kagirinai Yokubou no
Naka ni” is not one of the songs I listen to the most from her, but it’s one I
know for a long time, since I was 14 or 15 years old in 2005. At the time, I
liked to watch everything related to the Slayers franchise (スレイヤーズ), from movies and OVAs to the anime itself… and “Kagirinai Yokubou no
Naka ni” happened to be the theme song for the “Slayers Special” OVA (スレイヤーズすぺしゃる), which got aired in three separate episodes between 1996 and 1997.
Since I’m talking about a
song from my favorite singer, it has a lot for me to like, with Megumi’s very
professional vocals (she shines as a singer here) being important to notice. Besides
that, what I like the most here is the build… from the mysterious verses and
warm pre-chorus, to the explosive and strong chorus. And the arrangement, with
all the keyboard and wild guitars punctuating the song, is typical from its
era. All in all, “Kagirinai Yokubou no Naka ni” succeeds in being what it is: a
good Shounen (少年) anime song.
“Kagirinai Yokubou no Naka ni” was released in
May 1996, reaching #20 on the Oricon chart and selling 69,510 copies. Even
though not included in any of Megumi’s original albums, it was finally part of
her “Slayers Best album”, which is called “Slayers MEGUMIX” (スレイヤーズ MEGUMIX) and was released in June
2008. Lyrics were written by Satomi Arimosi (有森聡美), while music was composed by Hidetoshi Sato (佐藤英敏). As for the arrangement, Sho Goshima (五島翔) was the responsible.
I was watching TV some weeks ago when I saw this young female band called SHISHAMO on "Music Station" in the middle of a performance. My first thought was suddenly thrust to food and izakaya since I have eaten the shishamo fish on a number of occasions.
Later on, I heard that SHISHAMO, who are currently made up of vocalist/guitarist Asako Miyazaki（宮崎朝子）, bassist Aya Matsuoka（松岡彩）and leader/drummer Misaki Yoshikawa（吉川美冴貴）, got their invitation to the 2017 Kohaku Utagassen. So I finally got to view them perform a full song called "Ashita mo" (Tomorrow As Well) with the backing of a high school horn section behind the band.
Their performance was one of the reasons that I enjoyed the Kohaku a bit more than usual (despite the 3rd-worst ratings ranking in the history of the show as has been reported in Nikkan Sports). "Ashita mo" struck me as being an encouraging song written and composed by Miyazaki about young folks doing their best and overcoming the usual obstacles to keep on going. No, it's not exactly the most original idea for a song but the sound and message are fine.
(karaoke version)
One reason that I enjoyed the song was because the overall arrangement of "Ashita mo" and the presence of high school kids reminded me of a fairly acclaimed anime that popped up twice in the last couple of years, "Hibike! Euphonium"（響け! ユーフォニアム）and its opening theme songs. I guess it's not just 80s British horns or American R&B horns from any decade that entice me but also cheerful horns from Japanese high school bands.
"Ashita mo" didn't come out as a single but as a track on their "SHISHAMO 4" which was released almost a year ago in February 2017 and peaked at No. 8 on Oricon. Apparently, the number got traction in the public when it was used as a commercial song for the mobile phone operator, NTT DoCoMo.
I've chatted a few times here and there on the blog with folks like Marcos V. on the point that aidoru in the late 1980s had the interesting benefit of having some rather lush arrangements granted on their singles which elevated things a good bit despite perhaps some of these ladies not possessing the strongest of vocals. Added to that fact is that back in that same decade, I was able to listen to a number of aidoru tunes through borrowed tapes or even through the radio program "Sounds of Japan" without ever finding out the lasses' names or even the titles.
Well, that got me started in trying to track some of those "lost" tunes down. So where do I begin? I figured that I would launch my trek through the largest source of aidoru in that particular time frame: Onyanko Club（おニャン子クラブ）. This great ancestor to all of the current alphabet aidoru groups such as AKB48 and NGT48 was quite the modular teenybopper organization since a number of the members had their own solo careers with others forming smaller sub-units. Therefore, I think it is quite the mother lode to search for these aidoru and their songs.
It didn't take me too long to make a catch...or a re-catch, if you catch my drift. As soon as I heard this on YouTube, my Spidey Sense of nostalgia and recognition lit up like a flare at night. Let me introduce Onyanko Club Member No. 16, aka Mamiko Takai（高井麻巳子）and her 3rd single"Yakusoku" (Promises) from December 1986.
Wowsers! As soon as I heard those urgent strings and classy keyboards start "Yakusoku" off, the hair on my arms stood up at attention. How long has it been since I heard this one? Takai's vocals don't sound too bad here but it's that sweeping arrangement by Nobuyuki Shimizu（清水信之）of Masahiro Hatta's（八田雅弘）melody and Masao Urino's（売野雅勇）lyrics that had me hooked on this song. The beat keeps things moving along at a pretty fast clip, too.
"Yakusoku" hit No. 1 on Oricon and ended up as the 55th-ranked single of 1987. The song also made it onto Takai's 2nd album"Kokoro Biyori"（こころ日和...The State of Affairs of the Heart）, released in July 1987. Between 1986 and 1988, the aidoru would release 8 singles and 4 original albums. In May 1988, she retired from show business for a good while after getting married to songwriter Yasushi Akimoto（秋元康）. So did that make her a den mother of sorts to all of the ladies in AKB48 and beyond?
Now that the Holidays are truly done for another year here, everyone's headed back to work, although those lucky Japanese will continue to enjoy the New Year's holidays for at least a couple of more days. Pretty soon, those credit card statements will be flowing in like water and we will all have to face the music. Still, I managed to pick up a set of Sennheiser headphones over the weekend since that is what I wanted and needed for a few months.
I've been testing the Sennheisers on music such as Makoto Matsushita's（松下誠）1981"First Light"album. Nice to hear the deeper bass and more richness coming through my ears. Another track is "This is All I Have for You". I've compared some of the other tracks on this City Pop classic to folks like the Doobie Brothers and Steely Dan but I don't think either defines this smooth, gallant and yet slightly introspective song. Still, it fits nicely into my favourite Japanese pop music genre.
Interesting title as well. I've long been accustomed to the tradition of gift-giving in Japan starting with the gift-giving person saying something humble such as "This is nothing special, but..." which comes out as "Tsumaranai mono desu ga..."（つまらないものですが）. Early in my Japanese-speaking experience, I once pulled an unintentionally hilarious error and said "Tondemonai mono desu ga..."（とんでもないものですが...This is utterly ridiculous but...）. Luckily the folks around me had a sense of humour.
Well, Happy New 2018 everyone! Mostly did the usual thing when it comes to our family...did the o-zoni breakfast with mochi and miso soup and then had my brother's family over for dinner tonight. Plus, most of us watched the video tape of the 68th edition of the Kohaku Utagassen.
In all likelihood, the above video will disappear within the next day or so but for those who catch it quickly enough, you can get a good idea when I say that the Kohaku was actually a bit more entertaining for me when compared to other years. It wasn't the usual introduction with the Red & White teams on stage behind the hosts and a grand anthemic fanfare. NHK actually put in some pizzazz with a "relay" of sorts involving everybody on the list heading up to the Shibuya studio in Tokyo.
Furthermore, the first few songs on the lineup were pretty catchy, too. The top batter was Hey! Say! JUMP, a Johnny's group that hadn't ever gotten onto the blog but here it is tonight. When I first saw the title for this song, I was imagining (as crazy as it may sound) that these guys were actually gonna sing a cover of Rosemary Clooney's standard.
My naivete cleared up quickly as soon as Hey! Say! JUMP started up on the stage. This particular "Come On A My House" is a peppy and inviting boys' band tune that was pretty good to get everyone in the right frame of mind for a Kohaku. Not sure what got me all cheerful about the song but I gather with all of the frigid weather outside and looking back on a year that wasn't exactly the greatest, "Come On A My House" made for a nice tonic.
Written by Komei Kobayashi and composed by veteran Koji Makaino（馬飼野康二）, Hey! Say! JUMP's 10th single actually came out back in June 2013, and hit No. 1 on the charts. It's also on their 3rd original album,"smart" from June 2014 which also went to the top spot.
