1,183.) Fri Feb. 28, 2020

The Song of the Day is:

Kyu Sakamoto – “Sukiyaki (Ue o Muite Arukō)”

From the album Sukiyaki and Other Japanese Hits (1961)

Translated:

I look up when I walk
So that the tears won’t fall
Remembering those spring days
But I am all alone tonight

Hachidai Nakamura – Rokusuke Ei

Junior has been on a big Tokyo kick lately. He’s got all sorts of questions about Japan, and is telling me that he wants to visit there as soon as possible (he’s five, his sister is an infant and we are pretty far from being able to afford lavish vacations, so it won’t be any time soon). Yesterday, while in the car, he asked me to play some Japanese music. I don’t really have any J-Pop music (or K-Pop for that matter, something to work on), so I played some traditional Chinese music. I know,l that there is a vast difference between Japanese and Chinese cultures, but I’m no anthropologist, and I used what I had in my music collection. Well Junior liked that just fine, but he wanted something with lyrics. I relied on what is perhaps the greatest Japanese to American crossover single of all time: Kyu Sakamoto’s “Sukiyaki”. American audiences know this song as “Sukiyaki”, which is actually a term that many people were already familiar with since it referred to a traditional Japanese beef dish. Yes, this is terribly culturally insensitive, and it would not stand today, but then and now there is no way that American audiences would refer to the song by its actual title: “Ue o Muite Arukō”. The title may have helped the song’s popularity, if only because it could be easily discussed by English speakers. The song was given this title by a British record exec who had been visiting Japan and became enamored with it. He renamed the song after the culinary dish and had re-recorded it for a western audience, but through that radio play, the original began to gain more exposure. It would reach number one in the US and Canada, and six in the U.K. It is a very catchy song, and if I knew more about Japanese culture of the 1950’s and 1960’s I could probably tell you what whether this song would be standard for that time and region, or whether it was an anomaly. It was, for a brief moment in time, how American pop sounded, which is why it earned its success. It wouldn’t be hard to imagine Andy Williams, Gene Pitney or even the Supremes singing to this melody if Sakamoto’s version hadn’t been a success. It’s lyrics are bittersweet though, about one holding their head high to keep the tears of pain from rolling down their face. “Yukisaki” is actually the 17th highest selling single of all time, which is quite a remarkable cross-cultural feat. This song got Sakamoto in the record books, but he’s also in the record books for another sad, tragic reason: he was aboard the single deadliest plane crash of all time. He was among the 520 who died when Japan Airlines Flight 123 crashed in 1985 (4 survivors). He was 43 . “Sukiyaki” was covered very successfully (with English lyrics) in 1981 by R&B/disco act A Taste of Honey, and it was interpolated in Slick Rick and Doug E. Fresh’s “La-Di-Da-Di“, as well as that song’s Snoop Dogg cover (“Lodi Dodi”). This might not be the best example to cite as Japanese music, but it is worthy of mention. It entertained Junior enough while I do my own research on the subject.

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