I’ve been digging out my old mix tapes from my early days of J-pop lately, and the one I was listening to was from era 1999 or so, with songs from the (then) current shows like WITH LOVE and OVER TIME, the latter featuring the terrific “There Will be Love There” by the Brilliant Green.
As the mix wound down, I was wondering which song I had chosen to be its closer, and when the peppy Qlair song “Summer Lover” came on, I figured I had decided to end the mix on a high, happy note!
But when the track ended, there was one more song to be played,and as SOON as the opening notes of Kaze Wo Kanjitai came on, I INSTANTLY broke out in goosebumps! “Holy CRAP…I had forgotten about this song!” was my initial thought, but as the song played and Satoko’s mesmerizing, soothing voice rang out, it ALL came back to me, and MAN, when she went into the sweeping chorus, I just lost it! Yep, there I was, sitting in my car, in the middle of traffic, with tears trickling down my face, and me not giving one single darn!!
I’m telling you, this has to be one of the gentlest, moving songs ever. Sounding a bit like ASKA of Chage and Aska fame’s style of writing, it hits you in the SOUL and makes your heart ache with loneliness and wanting… Simply PERFECTION.
PS: As some of you may know, my initial spark that interested me in J-pop was the idol group CoCo. At the time, my friend Dan-o who introduced me to CoCo also turned me on to other pop acts like Wink, Judy and Mary, and Lindberg.
He also tried to introduce me to what looked like a mature adult contemporary singer, saying, “You should get this album, this lady is reallllly good.” At the time, I told him I was trying to concentrate on getting J-pop and wasn’t interested in branching off into “regular” vocal songs.
Fast forward a year later, and after seeing a stunning performance of Satoko singing the Hibara Misora song “Hana”, decided to pick up her album INNOCENT...
As I went to pay for it, I told Dan, “Brah, this lady sings so good, she does this version of Hana that will blow you away.”
Dan-o looks incredulously at me and says, “DUDE, that’s the lady I tried to get you to listen to MONTHS ago and you said “Not interested!”
WELL! I had my foot in my mouth THEN!!! I apologized and told him he was absolutely right and I SHOULDA listened to him back then! And I meant every word- Because not only was Satoko’s version of “Hana” great, the entire ALBUM was incredible as well, and out of all of them was what came to be my favorite song from her, Kaze wo Kanjitai!!
