WANDS -- Sekai ga Owaru made wa...（世界が終るまでは…）

From Wikipedia

"Slam Dunk" was never a manga or anime that I got into because I'm not a basketball fan, but I've had a lot of students sing the praises of the franchise in either form. I've seen excerpts from the anime in which the individual players have their own crazy ways of offense and defense including one fellow who can apparently throw up a wall of arms.

Another thing that I didn't know about "Slam Dunk" the anime was that the song "Sekai ga Owaru made wa..." (Until the World Ends...) by the rock band WANDS had been used as its second ending theme. I've heard the song before elsewhere, perhaps on a commercial or on some celebrity karaoke show but didn't know about its connection with "Slam Dunk".

When it comes to WANDS, I'm always reminded of "Sekaijuu no Dare yori Kitto"（世界中の誰よりきっと）, their 1992 hit collaboration with singer-actress Miho Nakayama（中山美穂）. Perhaps I ought to include "Sekai ga Owaru made wa..." in my memories since it's also been one of their most famous entries in their discography. It was released as their 8th single in June 1994 after which it hit No. 1 for two straight weeks, ending up as the 10th-ranked single of the year. Other accolades that it earned was becoming a million-seller and the Artist Song Award (1989-1999) at the Heisei Anison Awards. As well, "Sekai ga Owaru made wa..." was also a part of that Sunakku Songs（スナックソング）list that I wrote about just a few minutes ago.

The music video for the song was filmed at a hangar at Haneda Airport. The lyrics were by WANDS vocalist Show Wesugi（上杉昇） while the melody was provided by Tetsuro Oda（織田哲郎）with arrangement by Takeshi Hayama（葉山たけし）. "Sekai ga Owaru made wa..." can also be found on the band's 4th album "Piece of My Soul" from April 1995 which also hit No. 1 for two weeks in a row and eventually became the 16th-ranked album of the year.

Uta Con: October 1st 2024 ~ Sunakku Songs（スナックソング）

 

During my years at the University of Toronto as I was majoring in Japanese Studies, through my digestion of a lot of books on Japanese culture, I read that the society had something called a "bar culture". Not only can the usual drinking and light noshing be done in drinking establishments, but business negotiations, airing of work grievances and testing out of vocal cords can also be accomplished (mind you, I think the same things happen in my country, too).

I know that drinking establishments in Japan can come in a variety of sizes and forms. Of course, there are the Western-style bars up in the hotels with the tuxedo-garbed bartender shaking up cocktails. Then there are the more financially accessible chains of izakaya with plenty of space, libations and dishes. For an English conversation teacher like me on a budget, the izakaya was by far the watering hole that I frequented the most in the country, although I was never much of a drinker. 

On the other hand, the Japanese snack bar, or sunakku（スナック）as they say it over there, is a place that I very barely entered although there were those significantly rare times that I managed to squeeze into one due to friends taking me there. A sunakku is indeed a very cozy place with limited seating and it's usually run by a woman known as the Mama or Mama-san. There is the usual supply of alcohol to wet one's whistle and some light snacks only. One big reason that I rarely went into a sunakku is that it's basically the neighbourhood meeting place for the regulars...kinda like a mini-Cheers, if you remember that American 80s sitcom. Probably depending on the night, which can go really long depending on the energy levels of all those involved, there are dedicated regulars coming in and mixing throughout the week singing karaoke and knocking them back. Maybe there is even that one nightly barfly who gets "NORM!" yelled at him in greeting.

Anyways, a couple of days ago, NHK's "Uta Con"（うたコン）was televising its usual episode but this time around, the theme of the episode was something that I hadn't heard before: favourite sunakku karaoke songs. According to what I heard, apparently the current demographic frequenting the little bars may mostly be in their 40s. I'm not sure if I even heard any enka (have a look at a past article on what folks in their 60s have enjoyed singing). Regardless, here are three from the "Uta Con" list.

Kiyomi Suzuki with Rats & Star -- Lonely Chaplin (ロンリー・チャプリン）

Sharam Q -- Single Bed（シングルベッド）

Yasushi Nakanishi -- Saigo no Ame （最後の雨）

Ayako Suzukawa -- Go! Shinkansen（GO！新幹線）

 

Well, ten years ago, I commemorated the 50th anniversary of the launch of the very first Bullet Train on October 1st 1964 with the 1967 song "Hashire Chotokkyu"（はしれ ちょうとっきゅう）which has been very kid-friendly. 

News on the 60th anniversary of the pride and joy of Japan Railways has been showing up on NHK over the past couple of days including a special one-hour show earlier this morning. The above video by JR Tokai ought to also have train otakus' eyes glistening.

For "Hashire Chotokkyu", I related one of my experiences on the ol' Shinkansen. One regret is that I didn't get to go on as many rides on the Bullet as I could have during my very long stint in Japan between 1994 and 2011 (although I was riding the Joetsu Shinkansen monthly while I was living in Gunma Prefecture between 1989 and 1991). Still, there was that one time in 1990 when I had to attend the Renewers' Conference for the Japan Exchange and Teaching Programme in Kobe. We took the Tokaido Bullet from Tokyo Station and we had some pretty decent seats. However, one of my colleagues who was a CIR (Coordinator for International Relations) got his own suite and he was most generous in inviting us over for a while. It was basically a moving lounge so some of us enjoyed some drinks.

I will commemorate the 60th anniversary by putting up this also kid-friendly song titled "Go! Shinkansen" which was written and recorded last year by Ayako Suzukawa（鈴川絢子）with the composer being Akinori Suzuki（鈴木秋則）. The Chiba Prefecture-born Suzukawa is a YouTuber and a comedienne who is also a huge train fan. Therefore, I'm pretty sure that she's been on a lot of those frequent train-focused variety programs. 

Her YouTube channel, unsurprisingly, has a lot of similarly-themed videos including this one where she is heading from Tsuruga City to Kinosaki Hot Springs on a tourist train.

Miki Nakatani -- Frontier（フロンティア）

 

It may be a little bit of an overgeneralization but whenever I think of Miki Nakatani's（中谷美紀）discography, which has often been handled by the late great Ryuichi Sakamoto（坂本龍一）, I figure that I will usually get something avant-gardish or hauntingly indies. Her 1997 album "Cure" comes to mind.

Her July 1999 7th single "Frontier" is no different. Written by Nakatani and composed/arranged by Sakamoto, the song was used as the theme for her 1999 NTV drama "Joi ~ Nothing Lasts Forever"（女医...Female Doctor） in which she plays a cardiac surgeon. Once again, there is the matchup of the singer's high, innocent and floaty vocals and the composer's mesmerizing melody but this time, the arrangement is joined by Luna Sea's Sugizo and his guitar.

Yeah, I kinda figured that the opening credits for "Joi ~ Nothing Lasts Forever" would be appropriately atmospheric...and hot. "Frontier" peaked at No. 18 on Oricon and is also available on Nakatani's 3rd album "Shiseikatsu"（私生活...Private Life） which was released in November 1999 and got as high as No. 11 on the charts.

Yoko Nagisa -- Tasogare Minato Machi（黄昏みなと町）

 

2024 has been the year that I first found out about the late singer Yoko Nagisa（渚ようこ）, a somewhat mysterious figure who loved to sing her own brand of Showa-era pop music in a way that brought back memories of the 1960s and 1970s although she recorded her songs in the 1990s and 2000s.

The last time I wrote about her was back in late July with her 2003 single "Ai no Toubousha"（愛の逃亡者）, a reminder of all things American Sunshine Pop and Burt Bacharach. Well, apparently the coupling song, "Tasogare Minato Machi" (Sunset Port Town) is much more of a return to Japan. In fact, there is something downright Ayumi Ishida（いしだあゆみ）and her classic 1968 "Blue Light Yokohama" about her vocalization and the arrangement surrounding this song. I don't get any hints of the 2000s here; musically, I get shot back to when I was only four years old.

The composer was Gary Ashiya（ゲイリー芦屋）while the lyricist has been listed on the JASRAC database as Kazuki Tozai（東西蘭月）, although his real name was Akihiro Yoshida（吉田明裕）according to this tweet on Twitter. Unfortunately, he passed away in early 2022.

Peace City/Joji Ai -- Jiyu Douri no Gogo（自由通りの午後）

 

It's been almost a month now, but back in early September, I wrote about singer-songwriter S-KEN and his New Wave-y "Saku Saku"（サク・サク）from 1981. I also noted that he, under his real name of Tadashi Tanaka（田中唯士）, has had quite the interesting odyssey of a music career beginning from a shift from the sciences into music in the early 1970s.

One thing that I left out intentionally from Tanaka's history because I felt that it deserved this article was that during that part of the decade, he had gotten involved with a band called Peace City（ピース・シティー）. It didn't have a particularly long life (two singles, as far I know) but it did have a few members who would go on to make their own mark on music. Of course, guitarist and percussionist Tanaka would go solo but Peace City also had guitarist Motoaki Masuo（増尾元章）who has already appeared on "Kayo Kyoku Plus" with his chill 1982 "Oahu-to no Kaze"（オアフ島の風）. Not only that but there was also bassist Ken Sato（佐藤健）who would create a lot of songs for other artists including his wife, City Pop chanteuse Junko Ohashi（大橋純子）, who he would marry in 1979.

In the "Saku Saku" article, I mentioned that Tanaka had participated in the Poland Music Festival in 1971. Well, that was actually with Peace City who performed this number which would end up as their second (and presumably their final) single from 1972 called "Jiyu Douri no Gogo". It directly translates into "Afternoon on Freedom Road" although the official English title just kept it as "Freedom Road". Written by Takeshi Matsuyama（松山猛）and composed by Tanaka himself, it's a folksy tune and along with the title, I got images of Woodstock and endless rides with hippies in Volkswagens. Good heavens...I can even hear more cowbell!

The thing is that "Jiyu Douri no Gogo" was also offered to singer Joji Ai（アイ・ジョージ）in 1971. Up to now, I had treated Ai as an enka/Mood Kayo crooner through songs such as his 1965 "Akai Glass"（赤いグラス）, a duet with Chinami Shima（志摩ちなみ）. But I guess he wanted to let his hair down, so to speak, and he released his "Jiyu Douri no Gogo" on New Year's Day, right after he had performed on the Kohaku Utagassen the night before. Ironically, he would perform the single almost a year later on New Year's Eve for his final appearance on the NHK special. The arrangement for his take is definitely more along the lines of psychedelic rock and kayo soul.

Junko Mihara -- Datte ~ Fall In Love ~ Totsuzen（だって・フォーリンラブ・突然）

 

Reporter: Congratulations on your new post, Prime Minister Ishiba.

Ishiba: Thank you.

Reporter: What do you plan to do first?

Ishiba: Uh...dissolve the Lower House in about a week and then have general elections on October 27th.

Reporter: Ah....

Well, I guess the newest Prime Minister of Japan didn't waste time and actually, this is the second time that a Japanese head of government called for dissolution and elections right after he got the job, so it isn't exactly unprecedented. But I'm not here to focus on the PM but the JM...Junko Mihara（三原じゅん子）, to be specific. I've noted in her file on KKP that she has been a Parliamentarian for a good long while now and she now has her first portfolio as a cabinet minister; she'll be taking care of child policy.

But of course, over four decades ago, Mihara was in the entertainment industry as a singer and an actress. She released 21 singles and 15 albums between 1980 and 1991 and though from the brief file she has on the blog has also covered some of her City Pop material, whenever her name pops up in my memories, I usually think of her as an 80s rock-n'-rolling lass because of the time that I first got to see her on the 1982 edition of NHK's Kohaku Utagassen singing "Honki de Love Me Good"（ホンキでLove Me Good).

"Honki de Love Me Good" was her 10th single released in October 1982 which did OK by peaking at No. 28 on Oricon. However, her 8th single from earlier in May did even better by scoring a No. 11 ranking. "Datte ~ Fall In Love ~ Totsuzen" (But...Falling in Love...All of a Sudden) is a twist-happy rock-n'-roll number that was written by Reiko Yamada（山田麗子）and members of the rock-n'-roll band The Crazy Rider Yokohama Ginbae Rolling Special（T.C.R横浜銀蝿R.S.）and composed by TAKU. If anything, "Datte ~ Fall In Love ~ Totsuzen" is an even faster-paced rocker that brings up images of those dancers in Harajuku that I mentioned in yesterday's article on Toshihiko Tahara's（田原俊彦）"Harajuku Kiss"（原宿キッス）. Man, time does fly!