Nash Music Library -- Weathernews BGM

 

It was in early 2021 when humanity was arguably just beginning to grapple with the pandemic and it was during a time when folks still had to be glued to the Internet via YouTube and other platforms that another phenomenon regarding Japanese pop culture suddenly exploded. Of course, I'm also hinting at the whole thing about Mariya Takeuchi's（竹内まりや）"Plastic Love" a few years earlier.

But in this case, it didn't involve a song. Instead, it involved one weather presenter at Japan's Weathernews channel by the name of Saya Hiyama（檜山沙耶）who was cheerfully going on about her love for the game of shogi before that grinning visage immediately shifted to serious mode to report on an earthquake. Apparently, this was the face that launched a million senses and suddenly folks from outside of the nation began to become interested in Japanese weather patterns...or at least the female presenters who talked about them, including Hiyama.

Strangely enough, I only saw that footage of instant face change on the part of Ms. Hiyama for the first time a few minutes ago. I did hear news about what had happened, but actually I don't exactly remember which Weathernews footage I caught for the first time. However, it may have been Saya's cosplay quick change for which her BFF and colleague Yui Komaki（駒木結衣）was going all Cocoa Puffs for.

So, indeed I will confess that I have been bitten by the Weathernews bug and have been enjoying watching and listening to the goofiness brought up on the channel. The most recent talking point was only last week when staff and presenters were given a new studio to play around in, and Saya and senior presenter Airi Yamagishi（山岸愛梨）pulled off something that I thought was nearing David Letterman levels of surrealism, but then again, it was the late-night Moon segment after all.

However, it's also the music that I have been entranced by. The openings for each of the caster-hosted segments ranging from Morning to Moon all have their individual musical quirks. My personal favourites among them are the trance "Music is Free" for the Morning segment whose wailing chorus has apparently been likened to elephants, the gleefully hiccupy theme "Cartoon" for Coffee Time at 1:07,  and the smoothly thrumming "Future Marbles" at 2:03 for Evening.

Most of the openings have been provided by Nash Music Library, a repository of royalty-free sounds and music which was founded by Yoshinari Nashiki（梨木良成）, a music producer from Osaka who was the vocalist and songwriter for his rock band Bux in the 1970s. According to its website, it's celebrating its 35th anniversary this year.

But it isn't all about the techno when it comes to NML's contributions to Weathernews broadcasts. The reason that I know this is due to the time difference between Toronto and Tokyo. It just so happens when I get back to my day job as either translator or lesson planner in the afternoon, it's thirteen or fourteen hours later (depending on the whole daylight savings time thing) in Tokyo which means it's the middle of the night over there. No one is on air at that time (known as the segment Midnight) normally so the screen is filled with weather maps and viewer photographs for several hours while the background music also provided by Nash Music Library is played (that same BGM also has played over the casters' reports). 

The thing is that there's a fair bit of variety in the BGM and I've enjoyed having Weathernews play its catchy roll of music on YouTube while I'm doing my own work. Recently, I was able to find NML's channel on the platform and could also hear some of those songs in their entirety. For example, the above is "1, 2 & 3" which isn't techno at all. In fact, it's a Leroy Anderson-esque toy parade march which reminds me of the themes of all those children's variety shows that I used to see back in the 1960s and early 1970s. Strangely enough, I only found out recently that it's been pegged as the aforementioned Yamagishi's theme tune.

Another song that I used to hear all the time during Midnight has been called "SC-7713", a quirky techno samba which has now been adopted by all aboard as new caster Mizuki Tokita's（戸北美月）theme tune. As she puts it, it's the "Mokyu Mokyu" song although I think instead of something as mechanical sounding as "SC-7713", perhaps it should be re-titled "Bread Girl" in tribute to Tokita's love of carbohydrates.

"SC-5010" is another instrumental on the Midnight lineup but it certainly sounds like broad daylight smooth jazz. Maybe "Sunday Walk in the Park" would make for a warmer title.

I made a reference to one composer above, and with "Gin Iro no Gerende"（銀色のゲレンデ...Silver Slopes）, I get hints of Toshifumi Hinata（日向敏文）who's provided plenty of soundtracks to Japanese TV dramas such as the famous "Tokyo Love Story". There's something quite breezy, modern and affluent to this track as if the cast from the show actually did ski down some slopes.

One more that I'll provide is the piano-powered "Maniac Avenue"（マニアック・アヴェニュー）which is extremely happy and safe pop despite that ominous title. Well, perhaps the maniac actually refers to the fashionistas of Harajuku or the otaku of Akihabara. The rhythm does strike me as being quite shopping-friendly.

During my foray into the world of NML, I also discovered some other tunes that haven't popped up on Weathernews but do strike my fancy. If I can, I'll introduce some of those in a future article. In the meantime, I did equate Saya Hiyama and Mariya Takeuchi, didn't I? Well...

Yogee New Waves -- DOWNTOWN/Night Sliders

 

From looking through the discography page on their website, I don't think that the band Yogee New Waves have put their cover of "Downtown" into an actual recording, but their take on the classic so resembles Sugar Babe's original that I just had to put them onto the blog. That galloping rhythm, the flirtatious guitar and the delivery by everybody certainly had me wondering if Yogee New Waves was a clone band for Tatsuro Yamashita（山下達郎）and Taeko Ohnuki's（大貫妙子）old group. Incidentally, the above video was supposedly of a late 2018 live performance at Zepp Diver City Tokyo right by the bay which is how I will label the year.

Yogee New Waves began in 2013 as a duo consisting of guitarist/vocalist Kengo Kakudate（角舘健悟）and bassist Naoki Yazawa（矢澤直紀）who were childhood friends since elementary school and later became involved with a funk band as high school students. Drummer Tetsushi Kasuya（粕谷哲司）joined later on and there were a few other lineup changes including Yazawa's departure in early 2017 to be replaced by guitarist Fumiya Takemura（竹村郁哉）. The current lineup has Kakudate, Kasuya and Takemura. J-Wiki has listed the band as one delving into rock and City Pop.

Up to now, Yogee New Waves has released four albums, four EPs and six singles. The fourth and latest album is "Windorgan" from October 2021 which managed to reach No. 27 on Oricon. One of the tracks from that release is "Night Sliders" written and composed by Kakudate. It's undeniably a YNW tune but I think that it may have also inhaled the spirit of not only Sugar Babe but 1990s Original Love as well. If either of those great bands had decided to release a tune these days, "Night Sliders" could have been the result.

The music video may have really wanted to focus on the flora of what I assume is Tokyo, but the lyrics seem to be about a night owl in the pandemic era trying to get that feeling of excitement, perhaps with that special someone. Maybe the two just want to feel alive again outside while no longer having to be cooped up in the apartment.

MAX -- Give me a shake

 

Well, I guess in a way, it did take well over a decade of this blog's existence for MAX's "Give me a shake" to get on board despite the fact that it was a song that I'd remembered hearing and seeing over and over again on television while in Japan. But that's what an aging mind does to me.

As usual, I have to say "Better late than never". "Give me a shake" was not only MAX's April 1997 6th single since coming out as a solo unit but it was their first homegrown single that didn't have any origins from Italo Eurobeat tunes (did not know that). Written by Yuuko Ebine（えびね遊子）and composed by Yasuhiko Hoshino（星野靖彦）, who's collaborated with some of the other stars of the decade such as Namie Amuro（安室奈美恵）and Ayumi Hamasaki（浜崎あゆみ）, I think it still has that MAX sheen of dance-pop with the glamourous ladies vamping it up in the video.

"Give me a shake" would win a Japan Record Award for Excellent Song that year, as well as hit No. 1 on the charts and invite MAX for their first of five consecutive appearances from 1997 to 2001 on NHK's Kohaku Utagassen. It ended up as the 67th-ranked single for 1997 and was a track on the group's 2nd album "MAXIMUM II", released on Christmas Day that year. It hit No. 2 on the Oricon weeklies and became the 23rd-ranked album for 1998. Some other accolades for that album was that it became a million-seller and it won Best Pop Album of the Year honours at the 12th annual Japan Gold Disc Awards.

Yukiko Okada -- Soyokaze wa Peppermint（そよ風はペパーミント）

 

Today is August 22nd 2022 and as such, it would have been 80s aidoru Yukiko Okada's（岡田有希子）55th birthday. To commemorate the occasion, we have one song to display here on "Kayo Kyoku Plus".

"Soyokaze wa Peppermint" (Peppermint Breeze) was the B-side to Yukko's April 1984 debut single, "First Date"（ファースト・デイト）. Written by Shun Taguchi（田口俊）and composed/arranged by Masaaki Omura（大村雅朗）, "Soyokaze wa Peppermint" makes for a pretty interesting contrast with the Mariya Takeuchi（竹内まりや）-penned A-side in that Okada sings about the anxiety of that titular first date, and the arrangement also displays that nervousness. Meanwhile, the B-side is quite the footloose and fancy-free story of a self-confident lass biding her time as she waits for that potential boyfriend to finally make his confession known

Not sure where the peppermint and the breeze come into play but since both are considered to be refreshing things, there is something of the refreshing optimism here in "Soyokaze wa Peppermint". I think that there is also a certain raw element in Yukko's vocals alongside the burgeoning talent which makes the song an adorable aidoru tune. By the way, the singer is apparently cavorting in Switzerland in this video below. To be honest, seeing that smile below, I really wish that we could have seen many more instances of it in the years between then and now.

The Tube -- Namida no Harbour Light（涙のハーバーライト）

 

There's only a month left for Summer 2022 and I may have committed a sin by not having included the usual TUBE song. But that can be easily rectified.

"Namida no Harbour Light" (Harbour Lights of Tears) is being performed here at a 1990 concert when TUBE was fully in their prime as the ultimate in summertime goodtime boys. However, this first appeared on a B-side for their debut single "Best Seller Summer"（ベストセラー・サマー）in June 1985 when Nobuteru Maeda's（前田亘輝）band was simply known as The Tube. As with the A-side, this was written by Yoshiko Miura（三浦徳子）and composed by Kisaburo Suzuki（鈴木キサブロー）while the band took care of the arrangement. 

I guess that with Boz Scaggs' "Harbour Lights", a number of songs in Japan probably wanted to get that cool cachet of having their own harbour lights in the title. Anyways, since I could only find this concert version of "Namida no Harbour Light" which feels like a TUBE tune, I can imagine that perhaps the original recorded take of that B-side may have been more along the A-side as created by Miura and Suzuki with more of a Checkers or Rats N' Star vibe.

As I encounter more of these late summer tunes, I'm also feeling that such songs also have a certain angle on the whole love thing. Whereas the spring tunes hint at love blossoming and the autumnal kayo display the dried and cracked leaves of dead romance, songs such as "Namida no Harbour Light" seem to show off a transition of the experience of summer beach love into the wistfulness of realizing that though there were some good times, it's now time to end the seasonal fling and head back home, tears and all.

Mayumi Itsuwa -- Tokei（時計）

 

Listening to a Mayumi Itsuwa（五輪真弓）song, especially going into the 1980s, is like watching any heavily dramatic European movie. It's beautiful but also very lonely at the same time. Although it's just my ears that collect all of the information through tones and vocals, I still imagine a big "FIN" in my head at the end of the tune.

That's no different with "Tokei" (The Watch), the 25th single by Itsuwa released in October 1983. Written and composed by the singer, even on seeing that simple title, I knew that there was going to be a lot more going on than just imagining a Rolex or a Timex. And sure enough, the watch in question (no brand name identified) is on the wrist of a man who's sitting with who I assume is a female friend in their favourite café. She's staring at the watch, counting away the seconds before he ultimately leaves the place and presumably her forever for a significant other. The problem is that she had feelings for him that she could never express and now it's too late. Melancholy and ennui ensure. FIN.

It may not be the happiest song but the music by Itsuwa is tenderheartedly poignant. I simply cannot imagine myself in Japan with this one; instead it's some small neighbourhood coffeehouse on the outskirts of Paris or another French city. And the weather is gloomy outside. FIN.

Leo Ieiri -- Sabrina（サブリナ）

 

The first time that I had ever heard of the name Sabrina was through "Sabrina The Teenage Witch", a spinoff from those "Archie" cartoons in the early 1970s. I gather that she was the "Archie" equivalent of Samantha Stevens from "Bewitched" which was still running in prime time.

It would be years later when I was getting into the films of old Hollywood that I finally got to see Audrey Hepburn's original "Sabrina" (1954). I think that I'll always prefer the earlier "Roman Holiday" over "Sabrina" but there's no denying that Audrey was still amazing to watch.

As much as people were going gaga over Audrey's Sabrina wearing that black cocktail dress, I think that for the Japanese who saw the movie under the title "Uruwashi no Sabrina"（麗しのサブリナ...Beautiful Sabrina）, it was the rather form-fitting black outfit that she wore at 11:33 above that got their attention. When I was living in Japan, I often heard about those Sabrina Pants as they were called back then, although I don't know if the outfit had an official name in the United States. My impression is that young women were trying to get their hands on their own version of the outfit.

All this talk about Sabrina is due to the fact that I had wanted to profile "Sabrina", singer-songwriter Leo Ieiri's（家入レオ）debut single from February 2012. Last year, I wrote about her "Sora to Ao"（空と青）after catching her on an episode of "Uta Con"（うたコン）, and I did want to do a follow-up. 

Interestingly enough, Ieiri had gotten the title for her first single directly from the 1954 movie "Sabrina" after seeing it as a child (according to a 2012 Barks interview with the singer via J-Wiki). Ieiri wrote the lyrics while she and Yoshihiko Nishio（西尾芳彦）came up with the rock melody. The whole idea behind "Sabrina" was based on the singer's own fears during junior high about how she would be accepted in class, and so she tended to close herself off from others...something that she imbued into the song's protagonist of Sabrina. Sabrina would then express herself in some very bold ways including some very bright red lipstick, just to gain any sort of attention including perhaps love to relieve her loneliness.

"Sabrina" was used as the third ending theme for the anime adaptation of the manga "Toriko"（トリコ）which ran between 2011 and 2014. The single would break into the Top 10 of Oricon by placing in at No. 9, going Platinum. It was also on her Ieiri's debut album "LEO" which was released in October 2012 and hit No. 2 on the album charts, going Gold. The album would ultimately finish at No. 98 in the yearly charts for that year.