Back in my early days of J-pop discovery, my co-worker would make me compilations of all the latest Japan hit singles, but occasionally he’d throw in a song from out of left field- an obscure song from an Anime Compilation or an album-only track that he particularly liked. And so it was with a certain song from Miss Miho Nakayama way back in 1995 which he put on the very first J-pop compilation I ever got.
There were actually two songs from Miho on this compilation. Her current single at the time was her sultry “Shiawaseni Naru Tameni”, and while this song was included later on in the mix, it was another groovy song off of side one that really grabbed my attention. I had to know more about it, and queried my friend upon return to work the next day…
“Hey, you know that J-pop mix, who sings track four on side one?” I asked.
“Ah, that would be Miho Nakayama”, he replied.
“And what’s the title of the song?”
“Title.”
“The title of the song is TITLE?” I asked, a bit confused.
Laughing, he said “Yeah, Title!”
So anyway, years later and I’m trying to get together all the CD singles from the original Cassette compilation, and at some point I realize that Title doesn’t appear on ANY of Miho’s Greatest Hits collections. “Hey was that Miho Nakayama song Title even a single? I asked my co-worker the next time I saw him. “Cause I can’t find it on any collection!”
He laughed, “Oh yeah, that was just a song I liked off of one of her albums. It wasn’t a single.”
“Well…what album was it from?”
“Ehh.. I forget.”
Whaaaa!
Well, it wasn’t until much later that I found out that the album the song was from was a CD called Pure White, and it was even later than that that I finally was able to purchase the album (off of the mighty Otokichi Premium site, that magical place where I found so many of my rare j-pop discs)!
Such a groovy song, and looking over the lyric booklet, says the song was written by To Be Continued, is this THE To Be Continued, AKA Kohki Okada and the gang? Makes sense since To Be Continued have such catchy tunes, but wouldn’t it be credited to the actual guys writing rather than the name of the group?
Besides being a terrific album, Pure White also features a photobooklet with the PRETTIEST pics of Miho ever ...what a cutie!
