Ballsack’s J-Pop Midlife Crisis, pt. 12: 山口百恵

Starting sometime last year, I started really getting into Japanese music. This came as a bit of a surprise to me, because I had always thought I hated singing in Japanese. Turns out I don’t! In the night threads for the following week, I’ll write a little about each of my favorite artists that I’ve discovered, and share a streaming album for you to dutifully ignore.

Momoe Yamaguchi (山口百恵) is kind of a curiosity. Again, I don’t know much about here. I came across her because of her 1980 album, 『不死鳥伝説 』(Fushichō densetsu): apparently a rock opera. It’s a lovely, corny, delight, and you can listen to it below. She was an idol singer between 1973 and 1980, during which time she released twenty two albums (!). So, clearly she was pretty popular at the time. Additionally, it looks like a number of her albums were re-released in Japan in 2004 on SACD, so it’s not like she’s unknown now. But she isn’t available streaming, at least in the US. Obviously Sony doesn’t think she has much crossover potential.

『不死鳥伝説 』 is in the mail along with 『酒場の唄』 from yesterday, so I’m looking forward to dropping the needle on those two. In the meantime here’s someone’s YouTube rip.