Well, here it is, that magical performance that introduced me to the Eight Wonder of the World that is---CHISATO MORITAKA’S LEGS!!!!
Yes, after coming off of Chisato’s incredible 1995 Red and White Festival performance of “Futari wa Koibito”, I was riding high on Moritaka Adoration, and was hungry for more! Seeing me recently consumed by Chisato-luv, one of my co-workers at Tower let me borrow his copy of the PREVIOUS year’s Kohaku (that would be the 1994 festival, natch), and once again I was wowed and just about floored by Chisato’s happy and genki tribute to Birthday celebrating with the peppy song SUTEKI NA TANJOBI!
Chisato’s segment begins with a rousing guitar chorus of The Beatles’ “Birthday” as the curtains open and the audience is treated to a HUGE birthday cake the size of which could only befit Godzilla, but the REAL treat is yet to come, as curtains in the middle of the “cake” part and Ms. Moritaka steps out- wearing the Prettiest Christmas outfit and YES!!!! Her Lovely legs clad in black stockings and topped off with high-laced boots, this was truly the stuff Birthday wishes are made of!!!
Like many of her energetic performances on her concert laserdiscs, when the song is an upbeat or frenetically paced song, Chisato rarely stops moving for even a second, and this bubbly perf of Suteki Na Tanjobi is NO EXCEPTION!!! Swaying side to side and bouncing back and forth this is the dance that my friend Gold dubbed the “Jiggly Dance”, especially at the end during the guitar outro! Chisato herself is fun- happy and beaming like she always is, and one cute thing is how her styled bangs curled back into her eyes and she spent most of the time blinking them back…!
Later I was to get Chisato’s latest (at the time) PV Collection, and though I was excited to finally see the video made to accompany Suteki Na Tanjobi….I have to say, quite frankly, I was disappointed. Instead of a sexy’n’fun dress, stockings and boots, we got Chisato dressed as a…farm hand? Yes. And no backing band or anything…well, except for the dude dressed in a cowboy puppet costume. Gack! Though many people associate this video with the song, give me that Live Kohaku performance ANY DAY!!!
In an interesting side note, I later acquired another live performance of Chisato doing Suteki Na Tanjobi, and what made THIS one interesting is that in the background, you see on rhythm guitar none other than future MR. Moritaka himself, EGUCHI YOSUKE!!
