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.
Listening to Kanako Wada's（和田加奈子）December 1989 album "dear" once more on stereo again had me thinking about which tracks that I had yet to cover since for my article on her 6th album, I only took care of three of them. There were also "See You" and "If" which I covered individually since then and I'd been hoping that the rest of her songs were available on YouTube so that I could do a follow-up on "dear".
Alas, such wouldn't be the case since I could only find one more track that has an existence on the video platform. That would be the second-last track, "Le Vent Doux" (The Gentle Wind). Written by Wada, composed by Tsukasa and arranged by Yuji Toriyama（鳥山雄司）, it's reminiscent of that wave of gentle pop songs by female singer-songwriters that were coming out at the end of the late 1980s and the beginning of the early 1990s. But not only that, "Le Vent Doux" is also representative of why I've cherished "dear" as my reacquaintance with Wada when I was living in Gunma Prefecture.
I was reminded right from the start that "Le Vent Doux", despite its French title, is more of a peaceful bossa nova number. I do like all of the instruments in play here especially the guitar and the piano, and of course, it was a wonderful discovery of Wada's velvety voice. To remind folks, "dear" was the first album that I'd bought of Wada since I purchased her debut album"Tenderness" back in my university days, and I hadn't been all that impressed with her vocals back then.
Well, considering that earlier today I wrote about GREAT3, it's time to bring in the family connections once again. As I mentioned for the first article featuring singer Heaco, she happens to be the sister-in-law of Akito Katayose（片寄明人）from that trio of tall singer-songwriters.
Heaco only released two albums with the second one being "Perfect Circle" from November 2000, and from it is a cover of Yumi Arai's（荒井由実）"Ame no Station" (Rainy Station) which was originally from her "Cobalt Hour" album of 1975. Aside from some contemporary accoutrements, Heaco's take on one of Yuming's（ユーミン）classics pretty much follows the tempo and atmosphere of the original song, and the singer adds that nice breathy huskiness in her vocals.
It's a nice mellow tune to hear on another Monday evening, holiday or otherwise. Speaking of rain, we may be getting smacked with a thunderstorm in the next couple of days, and we could use the moisture since it's been a fairly dry May.
Man, do I like the above video for GREAT3's"Ai no Kankei" (The Connection of Love). It's all so stylish especially with the three members Akito Katayose（片寄明人）, Kenichi Shirane（白根賢一）and jan dressed in black all huddled around the microphone (kinda too bad that the video seems to cut off some forty seconds before the end, though).
I also like the songwriting by lyricist Katayose and composer Shirane for the title track of their 9th studio album from March 2014. Of course, there is the habit-forming funk but I also enjoy the way that the guys skip through those lyrics. Never thought I would ever hear any act trip the light fantastic in such a sexy way delivering the first two lines of the hiragana syllabary. Even the lyrics as they are set up on "Uta-Net" reflect the skippy delivery. As for the album "Ai no Kankei", that reached No. 66 on Oricon.
OK, first off, for my fellow Canadians, Happy Victoria Day today! Because of the current COVID restrictions, there won't be any officially-sanctioned fireworks displays this year as well but I did hear some of those rascals being fired off near my home last night.
I've heard and read the word Fujiyama a number of times. There is the Kome Kome Club (米米クラブ) song "Funk Fujiyama" and of course, there is the late singer Ichiro Fujiyama（藤山一郎）who sang a number of the old kayo chestnuts including "Aoi Sanmyaku"（青い山脈）. Then, there is the roller coaster called Fujiyama at the famous amusement park, Fuji-Q Highland in Yamanashi Prefecture; I do remember all of those commercials for the place.
Now, I can add a new entry and that would be "Fujiyama Paradise", a song by singer-songwriter Yuko Kawai（河合夕子）. A 1982 single that was also the title track on her album of the same year, it does hit all those nostalgia nerve clusters because of that rumbling guitar and keyboard work which reminds me slightly of Blondie's "Call Me" (I wonder what Richard Gere has been up to recently). This song written by both Kawai and Masao Urino（売野政男）and composed by the singer won't enter my list of Top 10 favourite songs per se but it still does have some of that old sparkle.
Strangely enough, before I looked up the songwriters for "Fujiyama Paradise", I did wonder whether Urino had something to do with the song, and it turned out that he did. Usually when there is a good ol' rock n' roll-sounding tune from the 1980s, his name often shows up.
As an update on an upcoming event that I mentioned back on May 3rd, I found out from DJ FACT.50 via Discord that the DJ schedule has been established for the International City Pop Festival and Fundraiser on May 29th beginning at 12 pm Pacific Daylight Time/3 pm Eastern Daylight Time. It will be going for 12 straight hours.
12PM PDT -1PM Your host, DJ FACT.50 - City Pop Revival set (all new 2020/2021 releases)
1-2 Rocket Brown (US - Come Along Radio w/ a set of 70's & 80's City Pop)
2-3 Nostalgia (S. Korea - w/ a set of Japanese, Korean, & Taiwanese City Pop!)
3-4 Space Jams Radio (UK - W/ a set of fresh Future Funk)
4-5 Masa (Japan - Original songs & Q&A with your host)
5-6 Greg Hignight (US - Tune In Tokyo)
6-7 Chiyoco (Japan - w/ A set of original music!)
7-8 Epoch (UK - Paradise Killer OST - w/ a video walkthrough by your host)
8-9 Van Paugam (US - Sake Lounge - w/ a surprise poolside set!)
9-10 Opus Science Collective (UK - Debuting brand new City Pop album)
10-11 Johnny Quan (US - W/ a set of Indonesian, Thai, Chinese, etc. Pop)
11-12 Chat Noir (US - Seance - W/ a set of Asian Goth & Post-Punk)
One of my earliest articles for "Kayo Kyoku Plus" (March 2012) was dedicated to the classic City Pop album, "Reflections", by singer/musician/actor Akira Terao（寺尾聰）. Of course, being the lazy bum that I was (and still am), I only provided a couple of tracks in that article, Oricon's No. 1 single for 1981"Ruby no Yubiwa"（ルビーの指輪）and another hit single "Shadow City". Since then though, I've written up articles on some of the individual tracks: "Shukkou Sasurai" (舟航～SASURAI), "Kita Wing"（北ウィング）, "Yokisenu Dekigoto"（予期せぬ出来事）and "Nagisa no Campari Soda"（渚のカンパリ・ソーダ）.
However, it says something that despite handling all these other tracks on "Reflections", there are still a few more tracks that have yet to be covered. Therefore, over 9 years later, I'm taking another crack at Oricon's No. 1 album for 1981 as a follow-up and finish off at least the remaining tracks recorded on the original LP.
A piece of trivia that I learned from reading the J-Wiki article regarding "Reflections" that I hadn't caught onto when I wrote the first article is that the famous cover for the album was photographed on the fly. Oddly enough, Terao had been so busy filming his scenes on his cop show "Seibu Keisatsu"（西部警察...Western Police） at the time that he and the photographer only had time to take that iconic shot of him smoking and tracing out the LOVE letters between scenes so that shot was actually taken in a corridor at the television studio.
Now, I did mention up above that "Reflections" was this classic City Pop album. Well, that's not exactly true since listening to the album a number of times over the years, I've found that the album seems to be split down the middle in terms of genres covered. Side B comes across as the more down-home City Pop side while Side A is more of an international travelogue with some City Pop elements and more rock and New Music hints in there (although the exception is the final track of the side which just happens to be "Ruby no Yubiwa").
Case in point is the first track on Side A is "Habana Express". It launches the album at a pretty frenetic pace as our hero is loving, leaving and sprinting across Cuba in what seems to be multiple whirlwind romances. I hear the City Pop but also the tropical and spritzes of rock thrown in like a many-ingredient cocktail. As is the case for most of the tracks on "Reflections", Masako Arikawa（有川正沙子）is behind the lyrics while Akira Inoue（井上鑑）handles the arrangement for Terao's melody for all of the tracks.
Track 3 on Side A continues the international travel as Terao heads for South Africa in "Kibouhou"（喜望峰...Cape of Good Hope）. Takashi Matsumoto（松本隆）, this time, has the lyricist duties for a song that actually sounds more reggae. There's nothing really City Pop with the track but those familiar sounds and chords that I've associated with Terao's material are still there.
The track just before "Ruby no Yubiwa" is "Niki Monogatari"（二季物語...A Tale of Two Seasons）. With Arikawa on lyrics, it's by far the longest track at over eight minutes, and I gather that this is Terao's version of Billy Joel's"Scenes from an Italian Restaurant". It's an epic reporting of a once-happy romance that has since withered on the vine with the first half being the languid and melancholy aftermath as Shigeharu Mukai（向井滋春）provides a trombone solo. But then, a little over halfway into the song, the story shifts back in time to a snazzier and brighter past when the love was still there. Terao himself fairly tap dances vocally during this latter half.
Now, the final track for the original album that I've covering is the Side B"Dial M". It's the same trio of Arikawa, Terao and Inoue, and I'm not sure if any of them were big fans of Alfred Hitchcock when they came up with the title. It's that down-home City Pop that "Ruby no Yubiwa" belongs to with the crooning singer and the Latin rhythm bubbling underneath.
As for the "down-home" part that I've mentioned twice now, I have to admit that my good friend Rocket Brown of "Come Along Radio" was a little confused by my term when I first said it to him since images of country hoedowns entered our heads. To explain a bit more clearly, a number of Japanese City Pop songs have been clearly influenced by Steely Dan, the Doobie Brothers or Airplay so when I say "down-home", I merely mean that the City Pop sounds very Japanese or kayo without those American AOR influences. And you know, when I first heard "Ruby no Yubiwa" all the way back in 1981, my extremely limited musical vocabulary forced me to initially categorize it as really funky enka!
In 2007, there was a re-release of "Reflections" with four bonus tracks which consist of the totality of Terao's 2nd and 3rd singles released in October 1974 and August 1977. The A-side for that 2nd single is "Honto ni Hisashiburi dane"（ほんとに久しぶりだね...It Really Has Been a Long Time） which was actually written and composed by singer-songwriter Ken Murata（ケン村田）with Mickey Yoshino（ミッキー吉野）of Godiego（ゴダイゴ）fame handling the arrangements. A happy-go-lucky summery tune, it's about as far from City Pop as Terao can get as the lyrics relate the story of a re-encounter of what I assume are two former flames. "Honto ni Hisashiburi dane" was actually used as the theme for an NHK program "Osaka, San-gatsu, Sannen"（大阪、三月、三年...Osaka, March, Three Years）.
Cheap perfume? I would probably snark a couple of drops of One Cup Ozeki behind each ear but there is some of the stuff that I bought in the neighbourhood convenience stores when I was living in Ichikawa. At least, the fragrance for the konbini cologne was magnitudes more subtle than the average douse of Aqua Velva, although I know that Aqua Velva was really aftershave.
Anyways, I mention cheap perfume here because that is also the title for this song from Baker's Shop with Haruko's 1980 album"Hot Line"（ホット・ライン）. I also have one other track, "Furimukuna"（ふ・り・む・く・な）, from Haruko Kuwana's（桑名晴子）lone album under this particular band name, and unlike that one, "Cheap Perfume" isn't a cool City Pop number at all. Instead it's some fun and rambunctious piano pop that brings to my mind some of the music that Elton John and Billy Joel were making those days. If I were thinking of someone Japanese for comparison's sake, I would also go with Yumi Arai（荒井由実）.
Toshiro Masuda（トシロウ・マスダ）, who came up with the lyrics for "Furimukuna" alongside Kuwana, also provided the words for "Cheap Perfume" while keyboardist Teruyuki Kokubu（国府輝幸）was responsible for the music. Kokubu has worked with other musicians such as Tatsuro Yamashita（山下達郎）, Ryuichi Sakamoto（坂本龍一）and Makoto Kubota（久保田麻琴）.
