Tokiko Kato -- Akogare no Sora（あこがれの空）

 

Of course, Bing Crosby's discography is bigger than "White Christmas" although whenever his name is mentioned, that particular song will be the first to come to mind to many. I've known that he was quite the crooner many years before he and Irving Berlin's legendary Xmas song for the ages were put together, and a few of his songs managed to get onto the old LP compilation of standards that our family had (or perhaps has...just misplaced).

But his "The Day You Came Along" is a new one for me. Created by the songwriting duo of Sam Coslow and Arthur Johnson, Der Bingle introduced it in his 1933 movie "Too Much Harmony" as a song of woo for that special someone.

The reason that I'm even introducing "The Day You Came Along" here in a non-ROY capacity is that I first encountered it as a cover by singer Tokiko Kato（加藤登紀子）under the title of "Akogare no Sora" (The Sky I've Wanted). It's a track on Kato's 1983 album, "Yume no Ningyo"（夢の人魚...A Siren Dream） whose concept is all about the music that was heard between 1914 and 1939, through the Taisho and early Showa eras. The singer produced the album alongside Ryuichi Sakamoto（坂本龍一）, and he was also the arranger for this particular playful track, according to Tower Records.

I've known Kato as the tenderhearted folk singer behind "Shiretoko Ryojou" （知床旅情）but over the years and especially listening to some of her other songs through my old radio program "Sounds of Japan", I also know that she's more than game with other genres. Listening to her husky voice tackle Bing's old song, she sounds as if she is a natural for old-style nightclub torch singing in the European establishments. Takao Saeki（佐伯孝夫）was responsible for providing Kato with the Japanese lyrics for "The Day You Came Along". I really enjoy the classy but, as I said before, playful nature of this cover version.

Come to think of it, I'm going to have to do a Reminiscings of Youth for "White Christmas" although that song was more than 20 years before my appearance on Earth.

Shigeru Suzuki -- Hachi-gatsu no Nioi（八月の匂い）

 

Last April, I introduced one of the tracks "Suna no Onna"（砂の女）, from singer-songwriter and musician Shigeru Suzuki's（鈴木茂）inaugural solo studio album "Band Wagon" which was released in May 1975. After further delving into the J-Wiki article on this rock/New Music album, I discovered that perhaps "Band Wagon" had been born from some pain and a feeling of betrayal on the part of Suzuki. 

Maybe I've read wrongly into the article but if someone can correct me in that case, please do so. But when Suzuki and his former bandmate from Happy End（はっぴいえんど）, Haruomi Hosono（細野晴臣）, had their new outfit in the early 1970s, Caramel Mama（キャラメル・ママ）, Suzuki gradually felt that Hosono and Caramel Mama, which changed into Tin Pan Alley（ティン・パン・アレー）, were going in a different direction from what he had hoped for. As such, he decided to go off on his own to create his own album in his own way to get back at the members of Tin Pan Alley (although apparently Suzuki later had some pangs of guilt). And so, "Band Wagon" was created via San Francisco and Hollywood with recording occurring in most of November 1974.

All of the tracks were written by Suzuki's other bandmate from Happy End, Takashi Matsumoto（松本隆）, while Suzuki took care of the music and arrangements. The aforementioned first track, "Suna no Onna", with its sensation of driving in Hawaii and living the hedonistic life, was followed by "Hachi-gatsu no Nioi" (The Smell of August), which is more of a happy rock tune with a tight brass section and an even tighter lyrical focus on a fetching young lady and her bottle of Ramune.

I mentioned in the article for "Suna no Onna" that singer-songwriter Toshiki Kadomatsu（角松敏生）, as a fan of Happy End's material in his childhood, was quite surprised by how different "Suna no Onna", and most likely by association, the rest of "Band Wagon" sounded. "Hachi-gatsu no Nioi" is also different from what I have heard of Suzuki's old band. In its own way, it comes across as if Suzuki was once again kicking off the shoes and just having a good ol' time with his new compadres in a new band in America while a Schlitz and a Marlboro were not too far away. Maybe I'm going a little too sommelier here but I pick up on some country, some roots rock and maybe even a whiff of jazz. Whatever the mélange is, it had me tapping my feet as I was listening to it for the umpteenth time.

Suzuki did get his own Japanese band together, Huckleback（ハックルバック）, in that same year and up above, they are performing "Hachi-gatsu no Nioi". The original members were Suzuki, keyboardist Hiroshi Sato（佐藤博）, bassist Akihiro Tanaka（田中章弘）and drummer Toshiaki Hayashi（林敏明）.

Toshiki Kadomatsu -- Moonlight Tokyo Bay

 

Despite the facts that the neighbourhood is built upon a mix of reclaimed land and garbage and there are numerous signs all over the area warning that if there were a strong enough earthquake, the ground would liquefy, Odaiba in Tokyo is still a gosh-darn fun place to be.👍 Not only are there shopping malls galore to satisfy most shopping and dining needs, there are hotels, the Big Sight convention centre, the Fuji-TV complex and other establishments all tied together with train lines, highways and a free bus that circles around Odaiba.

Moreover, there are plenty of places for the exuberant shutterbugs such as a fine night view of Rainbow Bridge and the big lug above this paragraph.

But no, this is not the place for a tourism spiel on Odaiba. In fact, I'm just doing all this to introduce guitar-playing City Pop bon vivant and songwriter Toshiki Kadomatsu's（角松敏生）"Moonlight Tokyo Bay" from his 1989 album "REASONS FOR THOUSAND LOVERS". The title of romantic salaciousness aside, "Moonlight Tokyo Bay" is quite the tour de force musical stroll which begins in a relaxed manner but then decides to go soaring off into the sky as if that Gundam Unicorn whips out the ultimate surprise and actually flies off from Diver City.

As much as I've described some of the spots in Odaiba, "Moonlight Tokyo Bay" as well has got some delights right within its performance. The comments function has been shut off for the YouTube video above but if commenters were able to put in their two pennies, they would be marveling at some of the musicians involved: the Steve Gadd on drums, the Jerry Hey handling the horn arrangement and the Jay Graydon with the guitar solo among other great talents (a lot of definite articles being used here). I fully remember that it was Graydon who took on the legendary solo for Steely Dan's "Peg". It makes me wonder who did Kadomatsu have on on his Rolodex at the time.

Of course, at the time that "REASONS FOR THOUSAND LOVERS" was released, I think Odaiba was pretty just bay water, not coming anywhere near its current configuration until at least the mid-1990s. But still, the view of the skyline was probably already looking quite impressive even back then. In any case, the album hit No. 4 on the Oricon weeklies.

Noriyo Ikeda -- Sunday Morning

 

Yep, I realize that it's neither Sunday nor the morning that I write this, but hey, it's still a statutory holiday today so I'll give myself a pass here.

Of course, whenever all those City Pop fans hear the name Noriyo Ikeda（池田典代）, the Pavlovian response will be "Dream in the Street", the funky and nimble melodic strut concocted by Tatsuro Yamashita（山下達郎）alongside Ikeda's lyrics. Well, now I have here "Sunday Morning" which was totally created by the singer.

There's a lighter and breezier feeling with "Sunday Morning", as there should be for a day of the week where folks usually like to kick back and enjoy a big breakfast, even with the spike of those horns and a tempo that gets increasingly faster. Ikeda's vocals even differ somewhat here from her delivery on "Dream in the Street" with a little less breathiness and a little more push and depth. It sounds like that Sunday morning involved a happy ride out on the bayside highway.🌊Incidentally, "Sunday Morning" shares space with the title track on the 1980 album "Dream in the Street".

Yukino Ichikawa -- Hizakura（秘桜）

 

Happy Labour Day! Obviously no work today and no particular need to get any supplies. So I get to do some more stuff on the blog.

I may have mentioned this NHK kayo program in a past article, but for the last little while, there has been "Hayauta"（はやウタ）which translates as "Early Songs", and the reason is that "Hayauta" has been televised at the eye-blearing time of 4:30 am on Sunday mornings! Now of course, with the advent of technology such as DVRs or even ancient stuff such as VCRs with the timer function, die-hard enka/Mood Kayo fans don't have to fret about waking up in the wee hours (way before pancake time) to catch something like "Hayauta". However, why anyone at the national broadcaster would program a kayo show in this slot is still rather mind-boggling. Perhaps they might be going along with the theory that older people tend to wake up a lot earlier.

Lucky for us guys on TV Japan, we were able to catch the latest broadcast of "Hayauta" at the far more amenable time of 1 o'clock PM yesterday, and it was definitely nice to catch a kayo show again after all of the hoopla surrounding the Olympics for a month. And one of the acts that I was able to catch was enka singer Yukino Ichikawa（市川由紀乃）with her recent single "Hizakura" released in March this year.

I've read that hizakura（日桜）refers to the cherry blossoms seen in the daytime, so this song title with the kanji for "secret"（秘）instead of the one for "day"（日）fronting the kanji in the title may be a Japanese pun. Looking through the lyrics by Ou Yoshida（吉田旺）, the veteran songwriter who contributed the words for Naomi Chiaki's（ちあきなおみ）"Kassai"（喝采）all the way back in 1972, perhaps "Hizakura" here could mean "Secret Among the Cherry Blossoms" hinting at a tryst that has to inevitably come to its natural end.

Mind you, for something that lyrically feels very sub-rosa, the music by Kohei Miyuki（幸耕平）, who has often worked with current kayo group Junretsu（純烈）, packs a lot of brio with those dramatic strings and the electric guitar punch. Yet, Ichikawa's elegant delivery does float above the melodic sturm und drang. "Hizakura" peaked at No. 11 on Oricon. My compliments also go to the set designer and fashion designer for the official music video.

I Don't Like Mondays. -- MR.CLEVER

 

Honestly speaking, I wasn't sure which one was the band's name and which one was the song's title. But thanks to J-Wiki, I was able to figure it out.

I Don't Like Mondays. is a stylish rock band that's been around since 2012 and consists of four members: vocalist Yu, guitarist Choji, bassist Kenji and drummer Shuki. Their abbreviated nickname bandied about among the fans is IDoLa (アイドラ...based on the pronunciation of the name) and in terms of writing, they can also be identified by IDLMs. According to their Wikipedia article, the unusual name for the band originated from the fact that the members had wanted a whole sentence as the name, and apparently they really don't like Mondays. Mind you, I'm pretty sure that a lot of the working class in my nation have no love for Mondays either.

IDLMs may be categorized as a rock band but their September 2020 single "MR.CLEVER" definitely sounds more like R&B, perhaps in the hip-pop zone. Words and music are by the band and though "MR.CLEVER" is pretty short at around 3 1/2 minutes (ah, but longer below), the bopping melody and Yu's nimble dance with the lyrics make it all worth it. 

Also reading that the guys are into the fashion industry and make their own music videos, the band does look really slick in the video for "MR.CLEVER". Only a few days ago, I was referencing the 1998 film "Ronin" in another article, one of the best flicks involving a MacGuffin, and the video has the guys involved in a bit of their own espionage derring-do with a mystery package which is passed along among a network of underground Tokyo types. There's also some "Reservoir Dogs" and maybe even a bit of "Ocean's Eleven" as the video ends on a touch of humour. Mr. Clever was obviously a little too much of his name for his own good.

Chieko Matsumoto -- Boyfriend（ボーイフレンド）

 

Approximately a week or so ago, commenter Owl Chick let me know about an actress and a tarento by the name of Chieko Matsumoto（松本ちえこ）who also had a stint as an aidoru in her early years.

Matsumoto, born in 1959, hailed from Tokyo and one day when she and a friend were attending a music TV show, she was scouted and was even invited to sing a Junko Sakurada（桜田淳子）song just for a lark. Well, that ended up beginning her career in show business.

In August 1974, Matsumoto released her first single, "Boyfriend", which Owl Chick is quite enamored by. Considering that her birthday was November 12th, she was all of 14 years of age as she sang about the envy of one of her schoolmates gaining that cherished of adolescent objectives: gaining a boyfriend. The song was written by Kazumi Yasui（安井かずみ）and composed by Taiji Nakamura（中村泰士）, and it's a typically jaunty aidoru song of the 1970s, ready for easy performance and consumption in a TV studio, and Matsumoto's singing is bright and as cute as a button. There's also something about the melody and the arrangement which reminds me of some 60s Brill Building song but I can't recollect which one it was.

Between 1974 and 1978, Matsumoto released 11 singles and 6 albums with a number of BEST compilations. She also appeared on many music show, variety programs and dramas up to the early 2010s. Tragically though, her life was cut short at the age of 60 in 2019 due to an aneurysm.