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've read a little about singer-songwriter Hiroe Ueda（上田浩恵）and heard some of her material on YouTube such as tracks from her 1987 album"Place in the Sun". Although I have yet to hear all of the tracks, I think that my jury is still out on a few of them but I do like the first one "Wonderlight"（ワンダーライト）.
Ueda hails from Miyazaki Prefecture and while she was attending Chuo University in Tokyo, she won out in a vocal audition which led to her debuting as a singer at what is now known as Pony Canyon Inc. in 1986. Later on in the year, she introduced her debut single"Solo Sapiens" which was written by Jun Natsume（夏目純）and composed by Ami Ozaki（尾崎亜美）.
My first impression of "Solo Sapiens" is that she sounds perfect for straight-ahead bouncy pop or urban contemporary. I'm not sure whether Ueda had ever done backup chorus before her debut, although she has contributed her skills to other singers such as EPO and Kenjiro Sakiya（崎谷健次郎）since starting out, but she strikes me as someone who can provide great support on any concert tour. And in fact, Ueda has since become good friends with the two singers that I've just mentioned.
As well, with "Solo Sapiens", I really get that boomer voice of hers and with the type of music she sang back then, I think that she does share some similarities with her good friend EPO and Yurie Kokubu（国分友里恵）. Speaking of the song, "Solo Sapiens" was used as the commercial tune for the L100 Leeza car in which Ueda also stars as the main character in the ad.
From what I can see in the Amazon.jp page for any of her works, it seems as if she only released two studio albums, the aforementioned "Place in the Sun" and "Blew" and I believe 5 singles. According to her J-Wiki bio, the songwriting part of her career began in the late 1990s, and then in 2004, she decided to go into jazz, R&B and gospel under her new stage name of Whoopin (pronounced "oo-peen") which was devised by her sister by combining the "wo-" of "woman" and Ueda's nickname of "Pin".
I'll have to see about listening to "Place in the Sun" some more.
Before actor Masakazu Tamura（田村正和）became famous as Japan's version of Columbo, aka master detective Ninzaburo Furuhata（古畑任三郎）, he was quite the head-turner in a number of those late 1980s trendy dramas on TV, including one such rom-com called "Atsuku naru made Matte!"（熱くなるまで待って!...Wait Til It's Hot!）. From what I've read on J-Wiki, it sounds a bit like "The Odd Couple" as his character, a widower manga artist who's been isolated in his urban condo, is invited by his cousin who's recently separated to share a mansion in the ritzy Den'en-Chofu area of Tokyo.
My student used to live there and when I was teaching him in person a decade ago, he drove me from Den'en-Chofu Station to his place and vice versa. Yup, indeed, there were some nice palatial estates there although I'm sure that they still pale against the celeb homes of Beverly Hills.
Generally speaking, I don't know the gamut of theme songs for these trendy dramas and their characters of leisure. The one that I know off the top of my atama is Carlos Toshiki & Omega Tribe's"Aquamarine no Mama de ite" (アクアマリンのままでいて), the Resort Pop theme song for "Dakishimetai!"（抱きしめたい!...I Wanna Hold Your Hand） starring the Asanos, Yuko and Atsuko（浅野ゆう子・浅野温子）.
However for "Atsuku naru made Matte!", the theme song went more into a flirtatious and snazzy direction with "Joudan janai Asa" (No Joke Morning). Plus it was recorded by Miki Hirayama（平山みき）, who up until this point was only represented on "Kayo Kyoku Plus" by her trademark tune "Manatsu no Dekigoto" (真夏の出来事）from 1971. Underlaid with a contemporary rhythm track, "Joudan janai Asa" floats above with some old-time jazz arrangement provided by the brass and Hirayama's vocals. I think it's safe to say that the song fulfills both the romance and the comedy aspects for the show. Yasushi Akimoto（秋元康）provided the lyrics while Kyohei Tsutsumi（筒美京平）composed the song.
The above photo was something that Rocket Brown of Come Along Radio was very kind to send to me some weeks ago. If you look closely, you can see a very young Mariya Takeuchi（竹内まりや）in the middle of Masamichi Sugi（杉真理）and Red Stripes. With all that heavy garb, they look positively Canadian! I hope that provides some happiness especially to the Mariya fans out there.
And that is the point of this Author's Pick article. Over five years ago in March 2015, I posted up an article in commemoration of the United Nations' International Happiness Day on March 20th (coincidentally Mariya's birthday!) titled "Happy Songs for Me" which listed some of the many songs that have made or kept my spirits happy and light. Just a few months after that, I then provided "Happy Songs for Me 2" just to show that the list was far from complete.
Well in July 2020, I've decided to go for a three-peat. And I think it's especially important now when the pandemic and its various ill effects have left millions upon millions of people feeling anything but happy. Not to say that this article is going to provide the ultimate cure to the population of Earth obviously. However, perhaps for those who do like Japanese popular music, some of my choices in "Happy Songs for Me 3" (along with its two cousins) can be your choices that make you feel happy.
For a fellow who got his education in all things Taeko（大貫妙子）first through her synthpop offerings at the turn of the decade into the 1980s, hearing the singer-songwriter going really high into the 1970s City Pop was quite the revelation. In the years since listening to "Summer Connection" repeatedly, this has become one of my summer must-hears and it's a grand aural sepia-toned photograph into the Tokyo hot season of that decade. Especially when the brass launches it and then she hits her highest notes in the song, I get to go to my happy place.
This wasn't the first Seiko-chan（松田聖子）song that I ever heard but it's been the one that has struck me as being one of the purest grin-giving aidoru numbers of the 1980s. When I first heard this on "Sounds of Japan" decades ago, I thought that this was the ultimate Seiko song. It's just a buoyant summer song of yesteryear powered by disco strings that takes flight over the beach and surf while the teen aidoru and a beau are frolicking the days away.
There's nothing like listening to an Anri（杏里）song from the 1980s with a Toshiki Kadomatsu（角松敏生） engine to drive the blues away. Of course, that includes many tunes but one of my very favourite is "Shyness Boy" from her "Timely!!" album. As soon as I hear this one on the stereo with the sunny brass, I get transported to wherever Anri was having her photograph taken on the cover of the album; I'm assuming that it's either Hawaii or Los Angeles. Just imagine the rise on the happiness scale when listening to "Shyness Boy" while in a convertible driving along the California coastline.
SLT's "Together" is already included in one of the previous "Happy" lists and while that is just one joyous caper through the city, "Mitsumeru Ai de"（みつめる愛で）has me preparing for a fun night out on the town. It's pure fantasy but this song is the theme for throwing on a Hugo Boss suit (that would probably have to go beyond its usual parameters to fit me), getting into a limo with the lady of my dreams (no comment on that), and tripping the light fantastic for dinner and drinking and dancing. Pianist Satoru Shionoya（塩谷哲）absolutely helps in batting this one out of the park.
One of my friends on the JET Programme frankly had the same attitude toward KAN's magnum opus "Ai wa Katsu"（愛は勝つ）that I had (and still have) toward natto: GET IT AWAY FROM ME! She really wasn't much for whimsical pop. For me, "Ai wa Katsu" was one of the musical touchstones in my life since it became that big hit during my two years in Gunma Prefecture. Perhaps the message is as corny as a field in the Midwest but the song still manages to prop up some happy memories of pop culture and life back then.
The next few entries involve some of the wonderful new urban contemporary acts in the last decade that I've discovered in the years since the first two "Happy" lists have come out. Case in point: the cool AOR duo Blue Peppers with vocalist Shiori Sasaki（佐々木詩織）with their "Roku-gatsu no Yume"（6月の夢）, one very happy-go-lucky number that deserves its own light sitcom set in a Tokyo suburb. I get some of that lovely Steely Dan vibe here and I still eagerly await that next album.
Around the same time that I first heard about Blue Peppers, I came across the coolness of BLU-SWING which has been around for over a decade. I really am a late bloomer. At least, I was fortunate to discover "Flash", a great calling card for the band and perhaps the theme song for the nightlife in any major city in Japan. With a combination of sultriness in the vocals and the snap-and-bang in the arrangement, any listener can potentially be enticed to plan a vacation for the metropolises of the nation (although unfortunately not now).
It was quite the re-introduction to Kirinji since I had known them mostly for their soulful ballads back in the early 2000s. How was I to know that the band made a change into catchy/spacey pop tunes some years back? And then I get hit with "Jikan ga nai"（時間がない）with its video that has gone worldwide with that middle-aged manager and his disco moves. I didn't stand a chance. Even now, as I write this, my shoulders instinctively started shimmying to the groove. I won't ever hit a dance floor but I can imagine that I'm on one thanks to this one.
Of course, I'm going to end this list with the first singer that I mentioned off the top. There's something so adorably 80s AOR about "Morning Glory" and since I'm a big AOR fan, it's downright Pavlovian how I react whenever I hear this track from "Miss M". Thankfully, I tend to get happy instead of salivating all over the CD. Maybe Tatsuro Yamashita（山下達郎）thought it was a little too AOR for his tastes, but I'm perfectly happy with his future wife's original (although Tats' version on "For You" is also fine).
Well, that is my third list of happy songs. I hope that at least some of them made you happy in these uncertain times. Already there are tunes that are stabbing me in the head demanding why I haven't included them so I'm pretty sure that there will be a fourth list sometime down the line without having to wait another five years. For commenters and collaborators, let me know what your happy song or songs are.
Gonna finish off this broadcasting day with something appropriately summery. I only found this song simply through the usual browsings of YouTube and it's a winner to me.
Marina Saito（斉藤まりな）is a Tokyo-born singer and TV personality who, according to her J-Wiki profile, has had great admiration for Mariya Takeuchi（竹内まりや）and constantly sang her songs. While attending Gakushuin University in the capital, she also participated as a pinup model through the "Miss Flash 2011" DVD series. However on graduating in 2014, Universal Music Japan took notice of her voice and signed her up for a major debut with a mini-album "Hajimaru Futari"（はじまるふたり...A Beginning Couple） in August.
"Hajimaru Futari" is her only music release thus far and it has only 4 tracks, one of which is "crazy for you", a spritely and sunny number that has some merits with those horns and Saito's talented vocals. The song was written and composed by Shinya Tada（多田慎也）, who has provided his works for a number of Johnny's Entertainment bands and the various female aidoru groups under Yasushi Akimoto（秋元康）such as AKB48. In her biography at Universal Music Japan, she's been described as the next generation of pop singer involved in the current form of City Pop that has the feeling of nostalgia and newness. When I listen to "crazy for you", there is that feeling of Hitomitoi（一十三十一）, come to think of it.
It's just a pity that it's just been the one mini-album so far, and apparently she took a leave of absence in 2016 after moving from UMJ but resumed her career a year later.
Some of us of a certain age might suddenly get that "Pepperidge Farm Remembers" sensation on reading the following.
I certainly remember when my father got us our first computer, the Vic-20 by Commodore in the beginning of the 1980s. Oh, the excitement of getting 3,583 bytes of power in a keyboard and loading up our favourite video arcade games through a dedicated Commodore tape recorder! But even then, my brother and I were probably very jealous of other friends who upgraded to the Commodore 64.
The games were more advanced and there was one interesting software tool called the Kawasaki Synthesizer which used discs to upload the program, and then the musically-minded among us could have its way with sound and images and fury...such as boogeying aliens from outer space! I never got the Kawasaki Synthesizer but I did get a Casio keyboard later on...which is still sitting somewhere fossilized in one of our closets.
Now, the fellow who came up with this tool didn't start out as a computer-programming geek. Actually, he was jazz fusion guitarist and composer Ryo Kawasaki（川崎燎）originally from Tokyo, and he came up with a ton of albums since the early 1970s. In fact, his Wikipedia file states that he was one of the pioneers of fusion.
One of those albums was his 1976 effort "Juice" and the lead track is "Raisins". It begins life sounding like another one of those really funky themes for a gritty New York-set movie. I'd say that I can almost feel those platform shoes hitting the hot pavement on a July day in the decade of disco when I listen to "Raisins". As the song goes along, though, the fusion and rock begin to percolate through as the jam session also comes into play. The YouTube page has a list of the musicians who were involved in the making of "Juice".
Looking through his Wikipedia profile, it looks like he lived quite the life in music and computers, and as for the latter pursuit, he spent all of the 1980s there in between his times as a musician. Kawasaki in his later years also worked with a number of Estonian musicians and contributed his expertise in that part of the world. I wouldn't mind getting to know more of his creations but unfortunately, I've read that he passed away only a few months ago in April at the age of 73 in his home in Estonia.
I figure that since it is Ocean Day or Marine Day in Japan, one of the more recent national holidays added to their calendar, I ought to pick something apropos tonight. Perhaps I have found just the song.
"Sunset Beach" is a calming track from jazz pianist Hiroko Kokubu's（国府弘子）"Diary" album from October 1998, and it makes for a fine aural digestif while sipping some of that other drinkable digestif, brandy (I'll take suggestions for which vintage is best)🍷. As Kokubu stated on her website in Japanese concerning this particular piece (while I translate in English):
"Just idly hanging out on the pier with those sand-filled sandals in one hand. A refreshing cool breeze penetrates into hot skin like a cold lotion. The fishermen, the seagulls...the sound of the waves."
Yes, wouldn't it be nice doing all that on a clear evening by the seashore...preferably with that significant other leaning on your side? I think that Kokubu's languid piano sets the pace of the stroll quite nicely here. "Sunset Beach" is also on her "Moments"BEST album released in America which apparently has different release dates depending on the site. J-Wiki states that "Moments" came out in January 1996 while Amazonsays that it was released in February 2000. It doesn't matter, of course. "Sunset Beach" is simply pleasant listening.
When I first heard Kaela Kimura's（木村カエラ）"Butterfly", I thought it was the perfect pop song for a children's musical about the moral of a shy young girl metamorphizing into that beautiful and confident and splendid lady. Certainly the music video for the song helped in my impression (unfortunately the above video has been truncated).
But then, I started to hear about "Butterfly" being put alongside songs such as Tsuyoshi Nagabuchi's（長渕剛）"Kanpai"（乾杯）and Yuming's（ユーミン）"Anniversary" as wedding reception-friendly tunes, and yeah, I guess there is a certain celebratory regality to Kimura's 1st-ever digital download single released in June 2009. And in fact, the whole project began when a friend asked the singer to write and perform a song at a wedding party which in fact she did. Pretty soon, the wedding-themed magazine "Zexy" picked "Butterfly" up as its campaign tune on commercials which led the single to not only hit No. 1 on iTunes and No. 2 on Sony's online music store mora for the entire year, but also get her first invitation to NHK's Kohaku Utagassen at the end of 2009.
The "Butterfly" snowball continued to gain speed as her Kohaku performance got even more love from the masses to the extent that the song had over 2 million downloads. "Butterfly" would get onto CD, though, as a track on her 5th major album"HOCUS POCUS" which came out in the same month as the download single. That album peaked at No. 3 on Oricon and ended up as the 37th-ranked release of the year. A couple of years later, the song would be used in a TBS matchmaking variety show hosted by the Osakan comedy duo 99.
Kimura did write the lyrics but the music and arrangement was left to Atsushi Suemitsu（末光篤）, aka SUEMITSU & THE SUEMITH, the fellow who came up with the theme song for the anime version of "Nodame Cantabile"(のだめカンタービレ) in 2007. In coming full circle with my comparison of "Butterfly" to the ideal song for a children's musical, there is something very down-home contemporary pop in the verses, but when the chorus comes around, I keep thinking that there is also a Gilbert & Sullivan sensibility as if Kimura is singing alone on the stage in a prim Victorian dress while her hands are clasped in prayer and her face is pointing toward the heavens.
