Mai Kuraki -- Togetsukyō ~Kimi Omou~ (渡月橋 〜君 想ふ〜)

 

J-Canuck here and once again, we have special guest contributor Fireminer with his thoughts on a song from the "Meitantei Conan"（名探偵コナン...Case Closed） anime franchise. 

There are anison singers, and there are singers whose songs just happen to end up in a lot of anime. Where will you put Mai Kuraki（倉木麻衣）then? A glance through her discography and you will be forgiven to think that she belongs to the first category -- to date she has 29 (as many as I can count) anime theme songs, of which 27 have appeared in the famous Case Closed aka Meitantei Conan (名探偵コナン) and its various spin-offs. She held the Guinness World Records for the artist with the most songs featured in a single animated franchise from July 25th, 2017 to May 19th, 2023 when she was dethroned by the duo angela, who have 34 songs in Soukyuu no Fafner (a personal favorite of mine that I will recommend to anyone who likes mecha anime). But given that Fafner has reached its ending and Case Closed is still going strong, expect Mai Kuraki to break the record once more.

Anyway, back to the original topic, do you consider Mai Kuraki an anison singer? I personally do not, given how extensive Kuraki’s catalog is and how many non-anime hits she has. It is the same case as with B’z, another regular presence on Case Closed. I imagine these artists have a very strong relationship with the producers of the series, if not being fans of it themselves, thus why their songs are featured so regularly. Hell, Kuraki is a character in Case Closed, her counterpart also a popular singer who sometimes makes cameos in the bizarre cases of Conan Edogawa.

That is not to say some of Kuraki’s most successful hits are not tied to Case Closed like the subject of this topic, 2017’s Togetsukyō ~Kimi Omou~ (渡月橋 〜君 想ふ〜 Togetsu Bridge ~Thinking About You~). The song was used as the 55th ending theme of Case Closed as well as the closing song for its 21st movie The Crimson Love Letter. Given how the movie takes place in Kyoto, it is only given that Togetsukyō centered around the titular Togetsu bridge. I have never been to Kyoto, but from the images alone it certainly looks stunning in fall, with white bridge on a backdrop of red from the maple trees. The song ties that scenery to the classic story of a woman far away from her lover letting her emotion pour over the Katsura river, in hope that the water will carry it to him.

Togetsukyō has been Mai Kuraki’s best-selling single since 2004, peaking at 2nd on the Japan Hot 100 Chart and 5th on the Oricon Chart. And it is not hard to see why. There is bound to be someone who heard of this song and immediately thought “I should make time for Kyoto.” It is a classic song in theme and styling, much like a classic landscape painting harmonizes the tones of different subjects. It draws up a beautiful vision of the Togetsu Bridge and imbues it with a fantasy that anyone would have had put themselves in at least once.

(shortened version)

Chiharu Matsuyama -- Machi（街）

 

The last time I wrote on singer-songwriter Chiharu Matsuyama（松山千春）was back in mid-July when I posted my thoughts on his 7th single from August 1979, "Yoake"（夜明け）. I noted that perhaps it inhabited that gray area between enka and kayo kyoku or pop known unofficially as New Adult Music back in the day. The genre was never fully accepted by the media or other institutions but I'm starting to think just for KKP purposes, I really ought to adopt it and so I'm plugging the label for the first two times on "Yoake" and this Matsuyama ballad.

"Machi" (The City) was a track on Matsuyama's May 1979 5th album with the very long title of "Sora wo Tobu Tori no You ni, No wo Kakeru Kaze no You ni"（空を飛ぶ鳥のように 野を駈ける風のように...Just Like the Bird Flying in the Sky, Just Like the Wind Running Through the Fields）. As I just stated, I think "Machi" fulfills that feeling that it belongs in the amorphous New Adult Music area because it not only has that lyrical theme of an opportunity lost regarding love in the cold cold city which is very much enka, but the music by Matsuyama additionally has that enka languidness though filtered through Western instruments and arrangements.

I even came across an Ameba blog whose author pointed out that "Machi" gives off that enka aroma in the lyrics and that enka singers in their fifties right now would probably be tackling this one, despite the fact that the singer first recorded "Machi" in his early twenties. Knowing how opinionated Matsuyama can be on most things, I'm uncertain whether he would be thrilled about at least some of his creations being labeled anything close to enka, but still from my own personal view, I'm perfectly fine with these bittersweet sigh worthy New Adult Music ballads. Anyways, I'll be heading into some back labeling for the next little while on behalf of this new Label.

Tomokazu Miura -- Illusion（イリュージョン）

 

Amazing how fast a month can speed by. We're already in the final week of September 2023, but today is slightly warmer than usual for an autumn day. Not that I see a whole lot of people complaining, mind you.

Over six years ago, I added actor Tomokazu Miura（三浦友和）to the "Kayo Kyoku Plus" family because of his 1978 debut single "Hohoemi no Tobira" （ほほえみの扉）, and it didn't hurt that he would eventually marry aidoru Momoe Yamaguchi（山口百恵）and have two sons, one of whom is also up here, Yutaro Miura（三浦祐太朗）.

The second song that I'm providing for Pere Miura's KKP file is "Illusion" which is a track from his April 1979 album "Sobyou"（素描...Sketches） which managed to reach No. 28 on the Oricon chart. As with "Hohoemi no Tobira", this was also created by Etsuko and Takao Kisugi（来生えつこ・来生たかお）with Masataka Matsutoya（松任谷正隆）behind the arrangement. "Illusion" is somewhat bizarre since it seems to have lifted some of the rhythm part from Billy Joel's "Movin' Out" and along with it comes a grafting of a melody that was inspired by an old-style jazz café. At the same time, Miura himself sounds as if he were vocally on the verge of going outside of his comfort zone as opposed to the relaxed way he delivers in "Hohoemi no Tobira". Perhaps it was just as well that it was a non-single track on "Sobyou". 

Masato Shimon -- Fireman（ファイヤーマン）

 

All firemen are heroes...that's without question. In Japan though back in the early 1970s, there was a Fireman who was a tokusatsu hero. "Fireman", or as he was known in certain overseas markets: "Magma Man", was a live-action series that premiered in January 1973 and was launched with two other similar series, "Ultraman Taro"（ウルトラマンタロウ）and "Jumborg Ace"（ジャンボーグA）in commemoration of Tsuburaya Productions 10th anniversary.

Ironically though, I never saw an episode of "Fireman". Actually, I remember the character in his manga form when my parents bought me those thick kids' books that were selling at the old Furuya food market in downtown Toronto back in those 1970s. Even back then, I thought that it was rather odd to name a superhero after a well-known essential service for any community, but I was informed that in Japan, firemen were and are known as shouboushi（消防士）, so the character's name was still an exotic one.

Seeing Fireman in action through one of the YouTube videos, I didn't think that there was anything special in his battling of monsters that couldn't have been replaced by one of the Ultramen or I assume Jumborg Ace (since he showed up in that same thick manga book), but variety is the spice of life. The theme song, "Fireman", is the usual heroic ballad of dramatic horns and strings created by composer Asei Kobayashi（小林亜星）and lyricist Yu Aku（阿久悠）with perennial kids' hero singer Masato Shimon（子門真人）behind the mike.

Come to think of it, I'll have to take a look at "Jumborg Ace" as well. 

Akina Nakamori -- Non-fiction Ecstasy（ノンフィクションエクスタシー）

 

I wasn't sure whether I would be putting up another Akina Nakamori（中森明菜）post this year as an addition to "Shiroi Labyrinth"（白い迷い）and "Kagami no Naka no J"（鏡の中のJ）, but then I found this oldie but goodie a few days ago.

"Non-fiction Ecstasy" is Akina's November 1986 single and true to my faltering memory, I had been wondering this was a track on her "CD '87" album that I forgot to mention in that July 2013 post. Well, that certainly wasn't the case and the reason that I am rather emphatic about that is that "Non-fiction Ecstasy" was only initially available as a cassette single with the main song and its karaoke version on Side A while Side B had karaoke versions of a couple of songs which would eventually get onto "CD '87". In fact, the first album that it finally got onto was the singer's "BEST II" compilation from December 1988...which I have as a cassette tape as well, although I won't play it on my tape recorder that I've dubbed Jaws.

The single's cover has a mighty good hint as to what the song sounds like. Looking like a very inviting and a slightly adorably goofy cabaret singer, Akina is basically offering herself as a very congenial host for the evening surrounded by a techno jazz arrangement. Considering the general sound of her singles in the late 1980s, I have mused whether Akina felt that she should have been born up to half a century earlier. 

Arranged by Kazuo Shiina（椎名和夫）, the No. 1-reaching "Non-fiction Ecstasy" was written and composed by singer-songwriter Kazuko Sakata（坂田和子）. I'd never heard of her before but according to her J-Wiki profile and her own website, she had been creating songs since her student days before providing her songs to a wide variety of other singers though not particularly focusing on any one artist. Sakata did release one CD of her own titled "Lullaby" in 1991.

Chickenshack -- Impulse Love

 

Impulse love? Love on impulse? Sounds a tad dangerous with the potential consequences being 1) parents of one of the partners discovering they are proud card-carrying members of the NRA, 2) the sudden need to file some paperwork at the nearest government facility, and 3) discovering how expensive baby cribs can be.

Well, "Impulse Love" here is a lot safer but it also has quite a bit of funk. This is the penultimate track on fusion band Chickenshack's "Chickenshack IV" from 1988 with jazz and blues guitarist Junshi Yamagishi（山岸潤史）helping out. The late saxophonist Hidefumi Toki（土岐英史）and keyboardist Toru Tsuzuki（続木徹）were behind this strut-happy tune down the street. As the chorus sings out, it's time for a nice little walk with that significant other.

imase -- NIGHT DANCER

 

I guess that I can add the good folks at Japan's "Weathernews" as a source for new music to be discovered. Yesterday, I was just casually leaving the YouTube channel for the station open while I performed my usual blog maintenance when the caster introduced the relatively new segment known as "Weather Music". It's the brief part where J-Pop songs from a variety of decades are played while the weather maps and temperatures are shown and perhaps the caster gets a bit of a break or an update.

Well, the song on that particular "Weather Music" segment was a new one for me. It was "NIGHT DANCER" by singer-songwriter imase from Gifu Prefecture. The song came out as his 5th digital single last year in August and though it's not a Neo-City Pop tune per se, it does have that amiable urban feeling to it as a couple having to deal with yet another humdrum night but at least they are together to enjoy that humdrum night. "NIGHT DANCER" managed to get up to No. 38 on the Billboard Japan Hot 100, and since then, a couple of remixes of the song have been getting out this year.

From what I've read of his profile on J-Wiki and Wikipedia so far, it seems like imase is the latest Luke Skywalker for J-Pop. After only getting into songwriting for a year, this young man in his early twenties had already been getting his debut single out there in 2021, and less than half a year after that, he got the gig to sing the Pocari Sweat jingle, something that only established artists usually get. Business has apparently also been booming on his social network accounts. The Force has truly been with him, so I wouldn't be surprised if he were invited to the Kohaku Utagassen in a couple of months.