Pete Mac Jr./Tokyo Ska Paradise Orchestra -- Lupin The 3rd （ルパン三世）

In J-Wiki, the theme from manga-turned-anime "Lupin The 3rd"was labeled the most famous anime theme in Japan. Well, I think a certain boy robot and the crew of a certain spacegoing battleship may take issue with that declaration, but I can say that this theme for the goofy but crafty gentleman thief is probably the most hair-raisingly coolest one that has ever been created...along with the fact that it is one of the most famous themes.

It was first created in 1978 for the second season of "Lupin The 3rd". Composed by jazz pianist/composer/arranger Yuji Ohno（大野雄二）, the theme is a sonic tidal wave of jazz orchestral sax and trumpet pounding on you at the same frenetic pace that Lupin's car outraces the cops. This song would probably have felt at home in the United States alongside the theme from "Shaft" by Isaac Hayes or any of the themes for those cop shows in the 70s like "SWAT" or "Ironside".

Variations on this theme could probably fill a small booklet. In the same year as the instrumental version, lyricist Kazuya Senke（千家和也） (who had written songs for Momoe Yamaguchi and The Candies) added his words to the song for which Pete Mac Jr. (aka Japanese-American singer Kikuo Fujiwara) contributed his smoky yet silky vocals. Incidentally, the female chorus who sing out "LUPIN THE THIRD!"is known as Singers Three. The above video contains the sung version from 1978.

In 2001, Tokyo Ska Paradise Orchestra gave their own version, called the DJ NB D&B REMIX which gives its own warp-boosted version of the theme along with snippets from the actual anime itself.

And here is an update on the song.

Mari Amachi -- Koi suru Natsu no Hi (恋する夏の日）

This is the way that I will always remember Mari Amachi（天地真理）....not as the slightly loopy middle-aged lady selling infomercial stuff a few years ago, but as the adorably cute fresh-faced ever-smiling aidoru of the 70s that I see in this video. When my mother was buying me those Japanese kindergarten manga tomes at the Furuya Japanese supermarket deep in ol' downtown Chinatown 40 years ago, Amachi's face was usually plastered on the cover and in the first few pages.

In 1972, Amachi had her biggest hit with "Hitori janai no"（ひとりじゃないの...You're Not Alone), her 3rd single. In July 1973, her 7th single was also a huge hit and has become another Amachi classic. "Koi suru Natsu no Hi"(Summer Day in Love) was another happy-go-lucky song of romance on the tennis courts. It would be her final No. 1 song during her career and would stay there for 6 straight weeks. It ended up becoming the 8th-ranked song of the year. Michio Yamagami and Koichi Morita（山上路夫・森田公一）were the brains behind this one.

For a guy like me who was weaned in his early kayo kyoku career on the 80s aidoru such as Seiko, Akina and Naoko, it was really nice watching Mari Amachi a decade earlier performing this song in that high-pitched voice of hers. Plus, I think her aidoru moves were a great primer for future karaoke singers.

Top 10 Singles for 1989

1. Princess Princess                 Diamonds
2. Princess Princess                 Sekai de Ichiban Atsui Natsu
3. Tsuyoshi Nagabuchi               Tombo
4. Hikaru Genji                         Taiyo ga Ippai
5. Wink                                   Ai ga Tomaranai
6. Shizuka Kudo                       Koi Hitoyo
7. Wink                                   Samishii Nettaigyo
8. Shizuka Kudo                       Arashi no Sugao
9. Shizuka Kudo                       Kousa ni Fukarete
10. Wink                                 Namida wo Misenaide

I'm guessing the guys were feeling a bit insecure that year. This list was dominated by a female solo artist, a female duo and a female pop/rock group. It may have been Shizuka's year to shine but Wink was not to be denied, and Princess Princess vindicated their near-decade of paying their dues to take the top two spots. And for karaoke singers everywhere, this must have been a banner year.

Wink -- Ai ga Tomaranai (愛が止まらない）

When I landed in Japan in 1989, the airwaves were often punctuated with Wink's big hit at that time, "Samishii Nettaigyo"（淋しい熱帯魚）which had been released on July 5. That initial image as living dolls has always been my image of them. But if I had arrived some months earlier, I would've had a slightly different feeling about them.

"Ai ga Tomaranai"(Love Doesn't Stop) is the duo's most successful single to date. Their third single reached the top spot after its release in November 1988 and became the 5th-ranked single for 1989. But getting back to my statement in the last paragraph about a different feeling about them. I bought a VHS tape of Wink's music videos up to and including "One Night in Heaven", and so I got to see "Ai ga Tomaranai"for the first time. Sachiko and Shoko were definitely a lot looser in their choreography, although those scenes in the shop window kinda foreshadowed how they would be performing in the next year. And of course, their cute earnest looks were there. For all intents and purposes, Wink was the Japanese conduit to that dance genre of Eurobeat for me which brought a bit of nostalgia since my university dances and all those trips to the Toronto discos back in the mid-80s (it wasn't always Kuri on Friday nights) were filled with the sounds of Stock, Aitken and Waterman via Bananarama and Kylie Minogue and Rick Astley (yeah, like my group wasn't exactly too hardcore when it came to nightclubs).

Speaking of Kylie, Wink's "Ai ga Tomaranai"was the Japanese cover of Ms. Minogue's "Turn It Into Love", which was the B-side to "I Should Be So Lucky", released nearly a year before. Feel free to make a comparison.

Akira Terao -- Shukkou Sasurai (出航～SASURAI)

Another cool City Pop tune from actor/singer Akira Terao（寺尾聡）. Not surprisingly, it's from his No. 1 album of 1981, "Reflections". "Shukkou-Sasurai"(Leaving Port -- Wandering) was actually released in August 1980, some months before the release of the album. It starts off with a somewhat boozy intro as if the protagonist may have awakened anywhere else but in his bed on a ship. After that, Terao leads the song as if he were still bumbling around with a bottle in his hand and trying to conduct a waltz while walking on the deck. Nope, perhaps not a City Pop song per se but heck, cruise liners tend to stick close to the Japanese shore near Tokyo or Yokohama anyways.

Here is a live performance of the song. Terao is basically just a thespian now, and he looks pretty grizzled. But back then, he looked like one of those kid geniuses with some rad sunglasses. By the way, as for "Sasurai", it went as high as No. 47 on the Oricon charts. Back in 1981, while kids a good decade or younger were climbing up those charts and frenetically dancing and prancing about, Terao kept it nice and cool and still.

Akira Terao -- Reflections

Sachiko Kobayashi -- Omoide Zake （おもいで酒）

Sachiko Kobayashi（小林幸子）will always strike me as that eccentric but cheerful aunt who comes but once a year to the family Xmas party. She comes with that ready smile and twinkle in her eye. And she just happens to perform in the Kohaku Utagassen annually in costumes that consume one-third of the entire stage at NHK Hall. Did I say she was a bit eccentric? To be honest, that whole thing with her wearing Titanic-sized dresses wore off for me after the first couple of times. Still, she's quite the Western fashion plate...she's not usually decked out in a kimono like some of her contemporaries in enka.

The Niigata Prefecture native first made her singing debut in 1964 as a 10-year-old with "Usotsuki Kamome"（ウソツキ鴎....Lying Seagull） which also became a huge hit, selling 200,000 records. Pretty heady days back then for the girl. And a year earlier, she had been a grand champion on a kids' talent show on TV which featured boys and girls doing vocal impersonations of their favourite pop singers. Kobayashi had even been labeled as "the 2nd Hibari" for her impersonation of the legendary Hibari Misora（美空ひばり）.

Afterwards, though, would follow 15 years of struggle in which no hits came about. But in January 1979, the 25-year-old Kobayashi would finally get that hit which got her permanently settled as an enka star. "Omoide Zake"(Sake of Memories) was composed by Tadahiro Umetani（梅谷忠洋）and written by Naokazu Takada（高田直和）as a song of regret while drowning one's sorrows. Along with Kobayashi's warm resonant voice, I love the strings and the melancholy arrangement.

"Omoide Zake"gradually went up the charts until some 5 months after its release, it entered the Top 10, and some 6 weeks after that, it finally reached the No. 1 spot. The accolades continued for Kobayashi as the song won a number of awards and became the 3rd-ranking song for 1979. Its staying power even went into 1980 as it hung on to become the 31st-ranking song for that year. Her very first appearance on the Kohaku Utagassen was due to "Omoide Zake", and she would continue to appear 32 consecutive times after that right up to the 2011 show.

Akiko Kosaka -- Anata （あなた）

Over the decades, "Anata"(You) by Akiko Kosaka（小坂明子） has been played repeatedly on music retrospective programs and been sung once in a while by some of my past female colleagues at the karaoke boxes in Tokyo...those with the really high voices.

Kosaka was born in Hyogo Prefecture in 1959 and attended the Osaka College of Music. In 1973, as a 16-year-old, she entered the Yamaha Music Festival with this song she composed and wrote, titled "Anata"....a bittersweet, wistful and proud story of a young girl whose beau had already passed away dreaming of what life would've been like had they gotten married. The last line was sung especially poignantly: "Anata ga ite hoshii"(あなたが居てほしい....I want you here with me). The plaintive way she sang "Anata"won me over, and millions more back then.

The teenager ended up winning the Grand Prize for that festival and it was released in December 1973 as a single. It spent 7 weeks at the top of the charts and earned Kosaka an invitation to the 1974 Kohaku Utagassen. By the end of the year, it was the 2nd-ranked song and was a mega-hit with 2 million records sold. Since then, it was covered by her contemporaries at the time such as Saori Minami（南沙織）and Ayumi Ishida（石田あゆみ）, and then some decades later, singers such as Chara and Hideaki Tokunaga（徳永英明） have covered it.

After such a beautiful song, it's hard to believe that this was Kosaka's only major hit.