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.
"Crystal City" is a City Soul masterpiece of Tokyo. Although it came out well over forty years ago, it doesn't feel ancient at all, and maybe that's because there isn't much difference between then and now when it comes to the romanticism of a metropolis. The song, the sound, the lyrics...no matter from which angle, its quality still comes through even in 2020. Junko Ohashi's（大橋純子）vocals are truly excellent thanks to their steadiness.
The above comes from "Disc Collection Japanese City Pop Revised" (2020).
Looks like today is featuring the rare stuff on Urban Contemporary Friday, and Article No. 4 for September 29th 2023 involves model/actress Reiko Itsuki（樹れい子）. The cover for her one-and-only single "Ai no Tsubasa" (Fly Me on the Wings of Love) from February 1979 along with the moaning which begins this disco tune reflects a lot of the sex appeal she displayed during her relatively short career. Kazuko Kobayashi（小林和子）provided the Japanese lyrics for this cover of a Celi Bee song that had originally been written and composed by Pepe Luis Soto.
Itsuki was born as Shomei Hou（賀小美）in Aichi Prefecture as the daughter of an Italian-American father and a Chinese mother. In 1972 when she was a teenager, she was scouted in her hometown to become a model, and in her senior year of high school the following year, she entered the Miss International beauty pageant and won the title on behalf of Japan. However, because she didn't have Japanese citizenship at the time, she had to relinquish the crown. According to an article in the "Shukan Shincho"（週刊新潮）journal cited in her J-Wiki profile, her modeling career continued and she was in a number of TV and movie roles up to 1980, although it was all brought to an unfortunate end when she was associated with a guy who had swindled a ton of money from an insurance company that year. I don't know what happened to her after that.
Incidentally, she received her Japanese citizenship in 1985. Below you'll see and hear the very long Celi Bee original.
The article that I just posted several minutes ago for TOSHITARO's "Am9 ni J - Eikaku Boy de Ite kure yo"（Am9にジェイ - 鋭角ボーイでいてくれよ -）made the point that if anyone knew about this song then they would considered to be truly music maniacs in Japanese; personally, I would prefer the term lovers or hobbyists. Regardless, this song might also be in the same category.
And man, this intro is so AOR, it hurts! Commenters have been pointing out how shocked and delighted to see and hear RAIN's"Hari no Nai Tokei" (Clock with No Hands) up on YouTube. There is next to no information on this group aside from the fact that singer-songwriter Shuuji Kuniyasu（国安修二）had belonged to the band according to his J-Wiki profile. In 1978, it had been known as the folk duo TAKE ONE until they took one more member at least to become RAIN in 1981 (it would break up in 1983).
I could only find out on the YouTube description that RAIN had released this single "Hari no Nai Tokei" in 1982 with Kuniyasu as the composer, Shun Taguchi（田口俊）as the lyricist and Kimio Mizutani（水谷公生）as the arranger. At first, I had assumed that Taguchi was part of the band but he was actually busy with his own group Lorelei at the time. Anyways, getting back to "Hari no Nai Tokei", this song about time standing still due to a romantic breakup (by death or argument) is so smooth and refined that milk tea would curdle in its presence. In fact, with those lovely strings in there, I couldn't help but throw in the Fashion Music label, too.
I haven't featured a TOSHITARO song since "Romantic Noise" in the past couple of years so I thought it was time to bring back this City Pop singer from the 1980s. I've read on sites where this particular song of his has only been known to the most knowledgeable of listeners (read [in Japanese]: maniac), but it was used in a commercial for a brand of tape cassette.
But that title threw me for a loop! "Am9 ni J - Eikaku Boy de Ite kure yo" from his May 1985 album"Paradise", had me scratching my head while I was listening to this strutting City Pop boogie twice. Who was J and what was so important that it had to happen at 9 am? Well, the mystery was such that I had to look it up online and fortunately, I was able to get most of my questions answered. Musician Taro Mejiro's（めじろたろう）November 2020 blog entry helped explain that "Am9" doesn't refer to a time but to the A Minor 9th chord, and after consulting with a YouTube video on that specific chord, it sounds like the song actually wraps itself around this very chord (TOSHITARO even shouts it out in the lyrics). Perhaps City Pop YouTuber Sora Satoh has even mentioned this in one of his videos.
Thanks, mahalodotcom!
As for the "Eikaku Boy" part, I've got no idea since eikaku translates into "acute angle". I tried to see via the search engine whether eikaku boy is a form of musical jargon but I couldn't get anything. So, basically speaking, the title in English is "J at A Minor 9th - Stay an Acute Angle Boy, Will Ya?". OK, whatever you say.😵
Keiko Aso（麻生圭子）was behind the lyrics for TOSHITARO's melody and from what I could glean, the protagonist is a fellow who's in love with a female radio DJ known only by her first initial J (so, Janice, Joyce, Junko?). As the singer shouts out, that A Minor 9th is the zinger to his heart for some reason and maybe J sang or spoke something at that chord. But the chorus throws back at the lad that she's already married so don't bother although the fellow is undeterred. In any case, I like the boogie in this one and the wailing guitar solo.
Yeah, the commercial for this tape cassette fairly screams "Typically Bizarre Japanese CM!".
First off, I was happy to see 80s aidoru Iyo Matsumoto（松本伊代）on a recent episode of "Uta Con"（うたコン） after she had suffered a fairly serious back injury in a game show stunt gone wrong several months ago.
Well, just returning to her discography in the 1980s, Iyo-chan really did come a long way since her chirpy "Sentimental Journey"（センチメンタル・ジャーニー）debut in 1981 after listening to the opening track of her 10th album, the January 1989 "Private File". "Private file wa Aketa Mama de..."(Leaving My Private File Open...) is the story of a twentysomething in Japan getting her opportunity to be an independent and free-spirited sprite in one of the major cities (I think the Bubble Era was still intact at that point). The pumps are on, the makeup is on and she's in her car possibly flirting with the toll gate attendant.
Good ol' kaz-shin wrote a review on the entirety of "Private File", and it seems that he was quite smitten with the then-24-year-old singer and that folks ought to give her album a second listening. With those characteristic high and nasal vocals tackling a dancing R&B tune, I thought about another singer, Yoko Oginome（荻野目洋子）, handling "Private file wa Aketa Mama de...", although I think Matsumoto acquits herself well on this first track. kaz-shin isn't quite as complimentary about the singing quality but he does say a few sentences later that the aidoru-level attack on this one contrastingly works here. I'll just say that as a casual fan, I'm getting along fine with disco-era Iyo-chan.
The first track was written by Kouiki Kokubu（国分広域）and composed by Tatsuya Nishiwaki（西脇辰弥） who was a member of the AOR/R&B groupPazz. As for the lyricist's name, I couldn't get a confirmed reading of it so once again, if anyone can confirm or correct the proper pronunciation, I would be very happy.
Part of the reason that I'm posting this particular song is that my friend Scott from "Holly Jolly X'masu" made his first podcast in a while last week focusing on the soundtrack of "Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence". The 1983 movie starred David Bowie and Ryuichi Sakamoto（坂本龍一）with the latter even providing the soundtrack (in fact, Scott points out that a reluctant Sakamoto only joined the cast once director Nagisa Oshima allowed him to score the movie...his very first time to do so). Anyways, if you like, have a listen to the episode through the above link.
Another reason is that I'm still missing The Professor after his passing earlier this year, and it's still a bit of a shock to realize that both he and Bowie have now left this mortal coil. Still grateful though that they also both left a large legacy of music.
I encountered this track from Sakamoto's second original album"B-2 Unit"（B-2ユニット）which was released in September 1980. "Thatness and Thereness" is his first try singing on an album, and as his good friend and YMO bandmate Yukihiro Takahashi（高橋幸宏）pointed out in a 2011 issue of "Switch" via J-Wiki: "It's not that he's a good singer, and the Professor knows that when he sings, but it's a really good song". (translated by yours truly)
Well, if Takahashi is willing to say that, I can also agree that Sakamoto would never have won any prizes for his vocals, but "Thatness and Thereness" is a contemplative and sumptuous (despite its short time) technopop tune based on one experience with the student movement when he was back in school. Written and composed by The Professor with a co-writing credit given to Yoshitaka Goto（後藤美孝）and translation into English by Peter Barakan, the languid pace of the song makes me wonder whether that scene he had witnessed was so affecting that he saw it in slow motion. The title, which is based on a couple of examples of psychological jargon, adds to my feeling on that possibly very intense memory. Sakamoto also indicated that the song was influenced to a degree by Bertolt Brecht's"The Threepenny Opera" from 1928.
Takahashi himself covered the song (as did many other artists) for the November 2008 2nd album compilation by musician and producer Bajune Tobeta（トベタ・バジュン）, "Aoi Chou"（青い蝶...Blue Butterfly）.
In retrospect, I believe that going into the late 1980s, I was really getting into the classier aspects of popular music through genres such as sophisticated pop and Quiet Storm through folks like Swingout Sister and Anita Baker. Singer-songwriter Sade had already gained fame globally a few years earlier with hits including "Smooth Operator" that I've already put in as a ROY article. But then in January 1986, Sade released a single that became another heavy-rotation song on radio and had me always going up and down the dial to hear the extended version.
So for today's ROY, I have selected "Is It a Crime?". A torch song involving two former lovers reminiscing over old times which had devolved into something horrid, those first notes by the sax player grabbed my ears and never quite let go. It was like listening to an entire film noir from the 1940s although I can also hear the contemporariness in the arrangement at that time as well. The song created by Sade, Andrew Hale and Stuart Matthewman (who was that sax player) has been classified as smooth jazz but I think that feeling of old-style jazz nightclub further elevates "Is It a Crime?". I guess in a way, the song helped pave the way for me to finally watch some of those film noir flicks such as "The Maltese Falcon" years later.
So, what was hitting the top tiers of Oricon in January 1986? I have Nos. 1, 3 and 4 today.
