Rumiko Koyanagi -- Sayonara Shibai（サヨナラ芝居）

 

When I first heard this song, I had initially thought that this would be a City Pop tune but then on repeated listenings, I now feel that this is something else although there is something quite urban and urbane about it.

Singer and actress Rumiko Koyanagi（小柳ルミ子）has delved into a number of styles whether it be her early aidoru tunes of the early 1970s such as "Watashi no Joukamachi" (わたしの城下町）, her sexier stuff starting with her 1984 kayo hit "Ohisashiburi ne" (お久しぶりね）and a bit of Mood Kayo thanks to her "Midare Gami"（みだれ髪）. Therefore, there was initial excitement from me when I first heard "Sayonara Shibai" (The Goodbye Game) since I'd thought "Oooh, even Koyanagi was getting on board the City Pop bandwagon!".

However on second and third thoughts, I have to change my mind. Now I believe that her "Sayonara Shibai" is maybe more appropriate to that chaise lounge-friendly and more European-sounding Fashion Music from around the turn of the decade from the 1970s into the 1980s. A few years ago, I actually wrote up an article talking about that very sub-genre with sample singers so have a gander at that, if you so desire.

For me, "Sayonara Shibai", which was created by lyricist Fumiko Okada（岡田冨美子）and composer Kimio Mizutani（水谷公生）, begins with that languid rhythm that feels quite French and fairly jaunty for something that I have described as Fashion Music but I did envisage that representative chaise lounge with its inhabitant asking for those grapes, one at a time. Then again, I could also imagine Koyanagi acting as that veteran hostess tying each of her paramours around her well-manicured pinkie at the same time. 

Interestingly enough, that combination of synthesizers and bass reminds me of another singer with the same initials as Rumiko Koyanagi: Ruiko Kurahashi（倉橋ルイ子）. And Kurahashi is another member of the Fashion Music sorority.

It took quite the effort to track down when "Sayonara Shibai" made its premiere but I finally found out that it was a track on Koyanagi's April 1980 album "Limelight"（来夢来人）. 

Naoki Watanabe -- Saigo no Coin（最後のコイン）

 

Just a little over a year ago, I wrote about bassist Naoki Watanabe（渡辺直樹）, who has worked with the bands Spectrum and AB's, and his solo album "She" from 1987 via the laidback track "Veranda no Carib"（ベランダのカリブ）.

Later that year, Watanabe cut another album called "Star Child" and the launching song here is "Saigo no Coin" (The Last Coin). Composed by Watanabe and written by his old bandmate from AB's, Yoshihiko Ando（安藤芳彦）, I've read in a YouTube comment that the person was hooked within the first several seconds. It took me about the same length of time as well to get with the program on "Saigo no Coin", and the Japanese-language "Music Avenue" has also praised the opening acapella chorus and how Watanabe shows off more of that falsetto of his. Not sure whether he had a lot of opportunities to show off his vocals when he was with AB's and Spectrum, but I think he certainly has the chops for the mike.

Image-wise, I think of that dreamy sunset walk along the beach when I listen to "Saigo no Coin". I don't quite know what Ando's lyrics are alluding to, although the title might hint at a rather sad but perhaps necessary final phone call to a soon-to-be ex-paramour. If that is indeed the case, I will take my image over that.

Hitomi Tohyama -- Baby, Baby, Baby

 

A penny for your thoughts...😋

This will probably be the first and last time that you'll ever read a City Pop equivalent of a Dad joke, so either savor it or spit it out. Still, it's a sunny Friday in Toronto and even better, it's a lot less oppressively humid than it has been for the past few days, but unfortunately heading into the weekend, the 3H (hot, hazy and humid) weather will be back.

Getting back on track, I've found a sunny and relaxing tune by Hitomi "Penny" Tohyama（当山ひとみ）from her debut album "Just Call Me Penny" released in May 1981 (considering that provocative way she's seated in the chair on the album cover, I may have no choice). "Baby, Baby, Baby" is a track written and composed by Yoshihide Yonekura（米倉良広）that possesses that essence of 70s soul, and I'm almost always going to enjoy anything that has a sweet flute and mellow horns in it. Unlike my City Pop oyaji gag above, I'm hoping that listeners will totally savor "Baby, Baby, Baby". Along with that 70s soul, I can also say that some Boz Scaggs got into the arrangement about halfway through.

I feel as if I've already covered a good chunk of "Just Call Me Penny" already since I have written up a number of articles for the individual tracks. You can also look at "Rainy Driver", "Door Goshi no Good Song"（ドア越しのGood Song） and "SFO-OAKLAND".

Mutsumi Inoue -- Nitamono Doushi（似たもの同志）

 

Another pleasant surprise from a singer that I hadn't heard of before, Mutsumi Inoue's（井上睦都実）"Nitamono Doushi" (Kindred Spirits) hails from her third and final full studio album "Shiawase na Denim"（幸せなデニム...Happy Denim） from July 1994. For some reason, the album has been categorized as an aidoru creation according to its J-Wiki article, and though I know that I'm just going with this one track, I don't know whether Inoue would be considered a teenybopper singer, at least for "Shiawase na Denim".

"Nitamono Doushi" is a pretty polished summer pop song in my opinion and Inoue shares some vocal qualities with Misato Watanabe（渡辺美里）although I don't know whether the former has that boomer quality like the latter. There's also a hint of some West Coast AOR through the keyboards and the wailing electric guitar. "Nitamono Doushi" does have that contemporary 90s sheen but overall I believe that it could almost have been lifted straight from the decade before. Inoue herself wrote the lyrics and she was backed up some pretty solid songwriters as well with Akito Kitayose（片寄明人）from the band GREAT 3 handling the melody and Tatsuya Nishiwaki（西脇辰弥）from the amazing one-and-done group PAZZ being responsible for the smooth arrangement of this particular song as well as the rest of "Shiawase na Denim".

Inoue hails from Kumamoto Prefecture but was also raised in Fukuoka Prefecture, and along with her jobs of being a singer and a lyricist, she was also a model. In addition to those four studio albums, she released five singles between 1992 and 1994 and three mini-albums up to 2001. Finally, Inoue has provided lyrics for songs recorded by singers including Hitomi Shimatani（島谷ひとみ）, Hikaru Nishida（西田ひかる）and Satoshi Ikeda（池田聡）.

capsule -- Retro Memory（レトロメモリー）

 

First off, I would love to know where that café is. Secondly, that must have been one laid-back video shoot. Capsule vocalist Toshiko Koshijima（こしじまとしこ）does her singing in that Pan Am flight attendant outfit with an orange fetish and then she can sit down for a bit of lunch with whom I assume is her partner and songwriter Yasutaka Nakata（中田ヤスタカ）. But then again, it was all about the breezy life in the early years of the duo, wasn't it?

The last time I wrote about capsule was about 2 1/ 2 months ago in mid-June with their most recent production "Hikari no Disco"（ひかりのディスコ）, a tribute to those 1980s and Vaporwave. Well, I'm heading back to February 2004, when capsule was more about the Shibuya-kei rather than the EDM. I have here their 7th single "Retro Memory".

Let's bring out those martini glasses, shall we? Naturally written and composed by Nakata, "Retro Memory" has all of that wonderfully swinging French jazz and Koshijima's kittenish vocals to take us on that nostalgia trip. The vocalist is giving her thanks and farewells to all those old lovely memories before heading back to the present. However, there doesn't seem to be anything maudlin here. Everyone had their fun time but all good things must come to an end and all that, and there are no regrets. Head back home with a skip.

"Retro Memory" hit No. 50 on Oricon and the song was also a part of capsule's first BEST album "Flash Best" which came out in August 2009. It hit No. 7 on the charts.

Mimori Yusa -- Hoshikuzu no Platz（星屑の停留所）

 

Sheepish J-Canuck here. Sheepish because up to now, the only article written up on eclectic singer-songwriter Mimori Yusa（遊佐未森）was February 2013 when nikala contributed Yusa's "Kureteyuku Sora wa" (暮れてゆく空は). Nikala herself mentioned in that article that "...Yusa only enjoyed mild popularity, since her music and lyrics were considered eccentric by mass audiences". And yet, there was a fairly sizable flood of fresh unusual acts coming out in the final few years of the 1980s when she debuted such as PSY-S, Tama and Jitterin' Jinn, and I've liked all those and more. So allow me to rectify.

At the end of her article, nikala also introduced "Chizu wo Kudasai"  (地図をください...A Map, Please) which was Yusa's 3rd single from February 1989. Well, I have the coupling song from that single, "Hoshikuzu no Platz" (Stardust Bus Stop), and the pop melody by Takafumi Sotoma（外間隆史）was probably like a breath of fresh air for those listeners who were perhaps getting a tad tired of all of the heavy synthesizers and electric guitars at that time. Both Yusa's vocals and the arrangement are very organic and airy for a lack of better terms.

The lyrics by Junko Kudo（工藤順子）seem to relate the beginning of a fantastical trip to isekai through the usual route of an attic with a mysterious trunk...leading to a magical bus stop(?), and Yusa is trying to invite us all on the voyage. I gather that the video above of her performing "Hoshikuzu no Platz" was from the same NHK program that featured "Chizu wo Kudasai" as shown in nikala's video, and I think that the whole setup including Yusa's outfit is very reminiscent of PSY-S' presentation, although again anything electronic is very much subdued.

Seri Ishikawa -- Fuwa Fuwa WOW WOW（フワフワ・WOW・WOW）

 

I figured that for a song with this title, Pikachu would fit the thumbnail bill.

Well, for a blistering Hump Day today, I think something like a relaxing 1970s New Music song would be appropriate to help in some cooling down. Therefore, why not go with "Fuwa Fuwa WOW WOW" (Fluffy Fluffy WOW WOW), a footloose and fancy-free tune from Seri Ishikawa（石川せり）via her January 1976 sophomore album, "Tokidoki Watashi wa..."（ときどき私は…Sometimes I...）?

With lyrics by Ranbo Minami（みなみらんぼう）, music by Yasuo Higuchi（樋口康雄）and jazzy arrangement by Mitsuo Hagita（萩田光雄）, "Fuwa Fuwa WOW WOW" is a truly short song at a little over 2 1/2 minutes, but considering how the protagonist simply desires a light and happy life, I gather that extending it any longer could have risked adding a little too much gravitas. There's some of that skippy piano, fleet-footed Latin guitar and a bluesy saxophone contributing to the fun. Still, the song, and the album for that matter, has quite the pedigree behind it in terms of musicians. Sugar Babe（シュガーベイブ）and Singers Three（ シンガーズ・スリー）are helping out on backing vocals, Tsugutoshi Goto（後藤次利）is on bass, and then there are Akiko Yano（矢野顕子）and Masataka Matsutoya（松任谷正隆）on the keyboards. The album, which peaked at No. 34 on the Oricon chart, also has Ishikawa's "Hitori Shibai"（ひとり芝居）which I wrote about back in 2018.

A single version of "Fuwa Fuwa WOW WOW" was released a few months later in April and in place of the jazz, a bit of progressive rock seems to have seeped into the arrangement. It's still the same short length and has that lightness, but I prefer the original album track.