Junko Tokumaru -- Kaze mo Tomaru Juu-gatsu（風もとまる十月）

 

No, folks. I haven't gotten my months mixed up here. It just has to do with the title.

I am talking about "Kaze mo Tomaru Juu-gatsu" (October, When the Winds Stop) which was a track on aidoru Junko Tokumaru's（徳丸純子）2nd and final album "Ao no Nai Palette"（青のないパレット...Palette Without Blue） from December 1983. The singing part of her career ended not long afterwards, although she was able to keep on acting for quite a while longer. However, this particular song is (ironically considering the title) a pretty breezy affair with a touch of old-time pop thanks to the melody and arrangement by Nobuyuki Shimizu（清水信之）. I'm just a sucker for shimmering strings and nostalgic chorus. Yuuho Iwasato（岩里祐穂）took care of the lyrics. 

You can also give a listen to the song's track mate, "Koi wa Seesaw Game"（恋はシーソーゲーム）. I was wondering about the meaning of the title depending on how it's read. Is it "Kaze Motomaru Juu-Gatsu" or "Kaze mo Tomaru Juu-Gatsu"? However, when I defined the first reading as "Wind Calculating October", I figured it was probably the second reading.

Downtown Boogie-Woogie Band -- Smokin' boogie（スモーキン・ブギ）

 

When it comes to the good-time rock n' roll group, the Downtown Boogie-Woogie Band（ダウン・タウン・ブギウギ・バンド）, almost all listeners will be reminded of "Minato no Yoko, Yokohama Yokosuka"（港のヨーコ・ヨコハマ・ヨコスカ）from 1975.

But immediately before that, their 3rd single "Smokin' boogie" was said to be the song that got the band into listeners' ears. Written by bassist and vocalist Takeshi Arai（新井武士）and composed by fellow bandmate Ryudo Uzaki（宇崎竜童）, it starts off rather rootsy before we all get that reminder of what it must have been like to cut a rug on the dance floor back in the 1950s. Meanwhile, Arai's lyrics talk about how one probable teen got into a life of cigarettes. Japan Tobacco must have loved this one while anti-cancer campaigns probably did not. Even the chorus makes like the sound of the guy puffing away.

However, as they say, "Wait, there's more!". It turns out that "Smokin' boogie" was inspired by American blues guitarist Elmore James' 1961 "Shake Your Moneymaker", itself inspired by previous songs according to Wikipedia.

Yutaka Kimura Speaks: Taeko Ohnuki（大貫妙子）

 

For people who had mainly listened to music centering on American and British pop and rock, Taeko Ohnuki's European music approach must have sounded oddly fresh. "Romantique", "Aventure", "Cliché", "Signifie" and then "Copine" in 1985 followed the same road, but what is notable here is that most of the songs were created in Tokyo under that quasi-European sound. Some of the songs on "Cliché" were actually recorded in France, but the vast majority of them were made in Japan's capital alongside people such as Ryuichi Sakamoto（坂本龍一）. For that matter, you can say that they really were of the City Pop world. 

People become the most imaginative when they are heads-over-heels in love. They actually head off in the direction of the place of their desire that they only knew via their records, and so creating these songs while in thrall to their imagination everywhere can often take on a charm that is even bigger than recording them. When talking about City Pop, this is an extremely important element. Music of a refined Western taste that retains the scent of Tokyo...wouldn't this be the true essence of City Pop?

Another thing that can't be forgotten is the presence of Sakamoto. From "Romantique" to "Copine", it can be said that with him as the arranger and Ohnuki as the artist, it was a golden time. When he departed with his skill, the singer's European path could no longer move forward. 

After that, Ohnuki created pop masterpieces in the 90s with "Drawing" and "Shooting Star in the Blue Sky", and always kept up the quality and freshness of her works through working with these excellent sound creators of that time. 

The way to enjoy her City Pop is not just by listening to her as an artist, but also by focusing on her amazing behind-the-scenes work as a producer, arranger and musician.

The above comes from "Disc Collection Japanese City Pop Revised" (2020).

Etsuko Yamakawa -- Do Yah!

 

Back on Wednesday, I wrote up an article based on the late Hiroshi Narumi's （鳴海寛）"Ame Agari"（雨あがり）and since I will always think of him and singer-songwriter (almost always the latter) Etsuko Yamakawa（山川恵津子）as the City Pop duo Tohoku Shinkansen（東北新幹線）, I decided to whimsically throw her name into the YouTube search engine to see if she might have popped up with anything on her own. After all, in Part 4 of that translation that I did of the liner notes for Tohoku Shinkansen's one-and-only "Thru Traffic" (1982) last year, it was noted that Yamakawa hadn't been too fond of being front and centre behind the mike.

Well, I actually hit an unexpected Bingo when I put her name into the search engine. In July 2024, she released a digital single called "Do Yah!" with her behind the melody with veteran Goro Matsui（松井五郎）behind the lyrics. Perhaps time and circumstances mellowed her out on the old unwillingness to sing out on her own. In any case, she sounds great in a cute and kittenish way while handling her own tune which is reminiscent of late 80s-early 90s Bubble Era City Pop with some of that funk intertwined in there. Plus, there are some nice subtle harmonies in the background. For me, "Do Yah!" is Oh Yeah! Nice to hear her behind the mike again after 42 years.

Kanako Wada -- Wake Up Dream

 

Ahhh....it's so nice to hear the velvet tones of Kanako Wada（和田加奈子）once more after so long. And the crazy thing is that this song "Wake Up Dream" was included on her "Golden Best" compilation but I never mentioned it in its article.

Well, allow me to rectify. "Wake Up Dream" was Wada's final single to date, released in July 1991, and it's been given the subtitle of "New Arrange Version". Thing is, I can't find the so-called "old arrange version" anywhere in her other singles or albums. But in any case, this arrangement is a fine one with that refreshing feeling of bossa nova in the morning. Haven't heard this in so long that hearing it again a few days ago brought some hairs to attention.

Neko Oikawa（及川眠子）was the lyricist while Hideya Nakazaki（中崎英也）took care of the soothing melody. Some very nice background vocals accompanying Wada's own lovely voice which would make it sound quite ideal for radio. The song was also used in a Morinaga Piknik ad; it looks to be some yogurt drink. Below is a commercial for the product but from 1987.

Ryohei Yamanashi -- Futari no Africa（二人のアフリカ）

Wikimedia Commons
Eric Gaba

A little over a month ago, I profiled a 1987 song by singer-songwriter Masatou Higashi（東正任）titled "Singapore no Yuki"（シンガポールの雪）. I noticed that the song had been composed by Ryohei Yamanashi（山梨良平）, someone that I haven't really written about in a few years and that was a pity because as I recall, he came up with some pretty snazzy songs himself, mixing in some jive jazz with the City Pop.

One such song was his "Jungle Love" track from his 1984 album "La Habanera" which was pretty darn close in tone to some of the songs that Kid Creole & The Coconuts were releasing at about the same time. A fellow track from the album is "Futari no Africa" (Africa for Two). Written and composed by Yamanashi, it's a musical version of a romantic and breezy honeymoon on the titular continent, once again bringing jazz and City Pop together. I swear that in another life Yamanashi must have been a Jazz Age crooner singing weekly on top of the Waldorf-Astoria in New York City.

Naoya Matsuoka -- Cosmos Avenue（コスモス アベニュー）

 

As with Kayo Grace above, I was also eating sushi with a couple of friends at a place that I'd never been to before, Jyugyoya in the Bayview-Leaside neighbourhood. The weather wasn't the greatest since the clouds kept threatening to open up on pedestrians but it was still a nice walk through this quaint area in the city. The food was good, the service was fine and the company was wonderful.

I'd like to start this edition of Urban Contemporary Fridays on KKP with another entry from the "Heart Cocktail"（ハートカクテル）series. First off, the original NTV film "Cosmos Avenue" involves a couple who look to be fairly long into their relationship judging from the nature of their banter, and it looks like they seem to be exchanging stuff over a fairly long distance between their respective homes. 

The somewhat banging "Cosmos Avenue" soundtrack which plays during the nearly three-minute vignette is by Naoya Matsuoka（松岡直也）and is included in the 1986 "Heart Cocktail Vol. 1" album of songs. It's elegant and busy at the same time with the string synths flowing over a hammering synth rhythm punctuated by syn-drums. Still for something more organic, there is a piano beating away at its heart.