Noboru Kirishima & Misao Matsubara (Miss Columbia)/Chiyoko Shimakura/Eisaku Ohkawa -- Mennai Chidori（目ン無い千鳥）

No "Uta Con"（うたコン）last night so I kinda need my dollop of enka right now. There's been quite a lot of articles going up on the relatively modern music recently so I want to swing the pendulum to the old days.

So, heck, let's go back to the 1940s and revisit the duo of Noboru Kirishima（霧島昇）& Misao Matsubara（松原操）, aka Miss Columbia（ミス・コロムビア）.  Husband and wife got together again after their 1939 "Ippai no Coffee kara"（一杯のコーヒーから）to sing "Mennai Chidori" (Blind Plover) in 1940.

Masao Koga（古賀政男）composed the very cheerful song about what I believe is a newlywed bride learning the hard ropes of being a wife with Hachiro Sato（サトウハチロー）providing the lyrics. In fact, I think the song is so cheerful that I can envision a Japanese Snow White happily trilling these words away while Prince Charming is out slaying dragons or something on that order.

"Mennai Chidori" was created for the 1940 Toei movie "Niizuma Kagami"（新妻鏡...Bride's Mirror）starring Isuzu Yamada（山田五十鈴）. Although there was the official theme song with the same title, "Mennai Chidori" was used within the movie itself.

In 1965, Chiyoko Shimakura（島倉千代子）released her own version of "Mennai Chidori". Like the original version by Kirishima & Matsubara, Shimakura's cover was a B-side to her take on "Niizuma Kagami" on the A-side.

Then a few years later in 1969, Eisaku Ohkawa（大川栄策）gave his own rendition which sounds a bit more contemporary for the times. The bass beat provides a bit more of a slow gallop to the melody. However, although composer Koga tried to make this an A-side for Ohkawa so that the young singer could gain some success, the record company ultimately decided that it probably wouldn't sell, so the powers-that-be placed his "Mennai Chidori" as the B-side for someone else's A-side! There was a happy ending of sorts for Ohkawa as everyone soon discovered that his rendition was starting to gain fans, and it was then marketed as a hit B-side.

Frankly speaking, it's hard to believe hearing Ohkawa's silken and crystal voice that the record company would just dust him off like that in the first place, but then again, I don't know how Ohkawa sounded back in his early days.

Sharam Q -- Single Bed（シングルベッド）

Rather amazing how long-standing assumptions can be torn asunder with a single blow. For the longest time, I had thought that Osaka rock band Sharam Q's（シャ乱Q）big hit "Single Bed" had been the lovelorn ballad/theme song for a typical J-Drama.

Well, it was a theme song but not for a live-action drama. It was actually the ending theme for an anime called "DNA²" back in the 1990s, and for the synopsis of the show, I will leave the above video to explain things rather succinctly.

"Single Bed" was Sharam Q's 6th single from October 1994 and I think it's been treated as the breakthrough song for the band. Written by vocalist Tsunku（つんく）and composed by guitarist Hatake（はたけ）, it's always going to be included in any video retrospective for the group, and considering the lyrics talking about a forlorn guy trying and failing to hold onto his girlfriend, I would have thought that "Single Bed" was the ideal ending theme for a drama instead of a sci-fi anime.

Finally finding out what Tsunku's lyrics were all about, "Single Bed" is quite the melancholy life's lesson on how changing oneself on the inside rather than impressing through material belongings would have been the right way to go for the now-alone fellow. The arrangement also reflects some of that melancholy feeling although there is the refrain which has the guy hopefully and finally seeing the light to redemption. The guitar solo also had me thinking of the band Queen. Perhaps this was a Queen-size single bed....cough, cough.

The single peaked at No. 9 on Oricon and became Sharam Q's first million-seller. In addition, it also ended up as the 24th-ranked song of the year. Pretty darn good for an anison. "Single Bed" was included in the band's 4th album "Rettoukan"（劣等感...Inferiority Complex） released in November 1994 (I think that was my arrival date in Japan) which got as high as No. 25 on the charts and ended up as the 60th-ranked album for 1995, going Platinum.

Pedro & Capricious -- My Lover's Eyes

Back in the late 1980s when I was still struggling through university, I became friends with a Japanese fellow who also had some affinity for the old pop music in his home country. He was quite impressed and surprised on finding out that I was also a fan of kayo kyoku. In one of our conversations, I mentioned that I enjoyed the song stylings of Mariko Takahashi（高橋真梨子）and even stated one of her most famous ballads "Go-ban Gai no Mari e"（五番街のマリーへ）. He then stated her old band which I needed a few requests for him to repeat since I couldn't quite understand it.

Pedro & Capricious（ペドロ&カプリシャス）, with all due respect to the band itself, doesn't exactly smoothly roll off the tongue and into the ears when said for the first time. I know now that the first part of the name is based on the founder Pedro Umemura（ペドロ梅村）. As for the "Capricious" part, I still have no idea.

Anyways when it comes to Pedro & Capricious, although I even mentioned in my first article for the band (which was the aforementioned "Go-ban Gai no Mari e") that it dabbled in folk, Latin, jazz and adult contemporary, I had always mentally slathered the group as a folk outfit based on songs such as "Go-ban Gai no Mari e". Well, that image was shattered last night...happily, I might add... when I discovered this treat on YouTube.

I never would have identified this as a Pedro & Capricious number without seeing the band and the song identified under the video. Indeed, this is "My Lover's Eyes" by P&C through their 1980 album "Oasis"（オアシス）, and it's about as far from their folkie days that I could hear. Just brimming with AOR goodness and given that slight technopop sheen thanks to Ryuichi Sakamoto（坂本龍一）, "My Lover's Eyes" is a wonderful feast for my ears that deserves its own sun hat and a glass of Perrier with a pink sweater wrapped around my waist. And last but certainly not least, there are those sexy and mellow vocals by Naoko Matsudaira（松平直子）who was the third vocalist for the band after the departure of Mariko Takahashi into her own very successful solo career. I'm not sure if Matsudaira had ever gone solo herself but that voice would have been perfect for R&B from those days.

Would love to hear more of "Oasis" if "My Lover's Eyes" is of any indication (love the cover, by the way). There's not a lot of information on the album and in fact I had to look at a brief blurb on the search results on Yahoo to find out that Sakamoto had anything to do with the song and that was synthesizer arrangement. So I don't know whether he actually composed the song and for that matter, who took care of the lyrics. And "Oasis" seems to be one of those albums that has yet to get the remastering treatment so maybe it's only the LPs out there, perhaps available for auction.

April 4 2018: Actually I know some more information now thanks to Daemonskald. Ken Sato（佐藤健）took care of the music while Simon Browne provided the lyrics.

Iruka -- Bara no Ojousan（バラのお嬢さん）

Been a good long while since I wrote about folk singer Iruka（イルカ）so here she is tonight.

And this one is a high-flying tune that I had never heard of before by the singer-songwriter. I've known Iruka for her contemplative folk ballads such as "Ame no Monogatari"（雨の物語）and mid-tempo City Pop numbers including "Yoake no Goodbye"（夜明けのグッドバイ）, but "Bara no Ojousan" (The Young Rose Lady) is a new animal for me.

Coming from her 3rd and most successful album of her career, "Shokubutsushi"（植物誌...Flora）, from April 1977, "Bara no Ojousan" is quite uptempo, and I think it fits generally more into the New Music genre than folk...or perhaps it's a fusion of the two. In any case, that rollicking piano sets the pace from the beginning and Iruka's voice takes on a higher timbre although it is unmistakably hers.

Written by Iruka and composed by folk singer Takashi Nishioka（西岡たかし）, the song is performed from the point of view of a young man who has seen a young lady whom he has known since childhood grow up to become a beautiful lass. Along with her, his feelings for her have grown as well although it seems as if he has yet to confess his love to her. The love story lyrics aside, "Bara no Ojousan" would also have made for a fun road song on the radio back in those days...perhaps in a Volkswagen van.

As for "Shokubutsushi", it scored a No. 1 ranking on the Oricon weeklies with all of the tracks being recorded in Los Angeles over a two-week period in February 1977. The album also has that classic "Ame no Monogatari". I'm starting to wonder whether it's also time to invest in a few Iruka original albums since I only have that one BEST compilation.

Aya Matsuura -- Momoiro Kataomoi（♡桃色片想い♡）

The warmer weather may be a bit slow in coming to my neck of the woods but that doesn't mean I can't bring in some sunniness to "Kayo Kyoku Plus".

For today, there is no one better than Ayaya, aka Aya Matsuura（松浦亜弥）, and no song better than her "Momoiro Kataomoi" (Peach-Coloured Unrequited Love). This was her 5th single from February 2002, and the one thing I remember about it is that day-glo video set in a peach cannery that looks like it was built in the same town where H.R. Pufnstuf (Google it!) lived.

Being a member of Hello Project at the time, Tsunku（つんく♂）was of course the one behind words and music for "Momoiro Kataomoi", about as bouncy as an aidoru tune that I've ever heard. The song's title might be hinting at something sad but I certainly can't tell from the music and the video. Not surprisingly, it has become one of Ayaya's trademark tunes with J-Wiki stating that it was her breakthrough song. It did get as high as No. 2 on the Oricon weeklies. It was also included in her second album "T・W・O" from January 2003 which peaked also at No. 2.

With that twangy arrangement, I think the song would also have been ideal for Chisato Moritaka（森高千里）.

Junichi Inagaki -- April

Obviously, it's April. Still not quite the spring temperatures we've been hoping for but at least it's sunny out there. Plus, the unusual start isn't just in a meteorological sense; apparently we can now have April Fool's fall on the same day as Easter Sunday. I only hope that there wasn't anything nasty in those chocolate Easter eggs for the kids.

Well, to commemorate the arrival of the fourth month, here is "April" by J-AOR crooner Junichi Inagaki（稲垣潤一）. Only that it's not really an AOR number. This was the flip side to Inagaki's 24th single "Ichi Das no Iiwake"（1ダースの言い訳）from December 1991, and the song by Yasushi Akimoto（秋元康）and Yasuhiro Kido（木戸やすひろ）has that 60s doo-wop feeling compared to the Motown sound brought about by "Ichi Das". Both songs also existed as separate tracks on his 6th album from March 1986 "Realistic".

Although I mentioned that there was a bit of that doo-wop in there, the arrangement by Masaaki Omura（大村雅朗）includes some synth-y keyboards which rather brings "April" into the 1980s especially during the instrumental.

Mashinomi -- Stoic ni Detox（ストイックにデトックス）

Well, the Ryuo won his shogi match, Hakumei & Mikochi have come to appreciate their home, Kokonotsu and Hotaru are back together again, the adventures of ramen-loving Koizumi-san continue and Takagi-san & Nishikata-kun may have entered a new level in their relationship. Yes, Winter 2018 of anime has come to an end.

And that includes the pleasant "Takunomi."（たくのみ。...Drinking at Home）, the weekly 15-minute show paying tribute to all of those drinks we love to imbibe in Japan after a hard day of work. I mentioned this in the article for the opening theme "aventure bleu", but "Takunomi." is probably a show that my buddy will not purchase the Blu-Ray for since it's rather inconsequential for him, but I wouldn't mind catching it on Crunchyroll again.

Of course, the final episode paid tribute to Asahi Super Dry beer.

The ending theme for "Takunomi." is "Stoic ni Detox" (Stoically Detox) by technopop singer-songwriter Mashinomi（ましのみ）from Chiba Prefecture. This one took a while longer than "aventure bleu" to get into my system but the blippity-bloppity beats finally got to me by episode 12. The slightly whisper-voiced Mashinomi debuted in 2015 according to J-Wiki with her first album, "Happy End ga Miemasen"（ハッピーエンドが見えません...I Can't See A Happy End） coming out in September 2016. "Stoic ni Detox" is included in her latest album "Pet Bottle Literacy"（ぺっとぼとリテラシー）that was released in February this year.