Strange Habits Manifest with Jet Lag
Actually that’s not exactly true. I’m back, without the tea, chocolates or the sweater I meant to buy. Damn it.
Anyway I’m like listening to the new Nogawa Sakura (野川さくら) album, Kazeiro Renpu (風色恋譜), which you can purchase here. I am not exactly a rabid fan but I’ve always tried to pay attention to her ever since I discovered what I consider to be her best song to date, Do your dream.
There’s actually a pattern to the way I listen to songs. There are usually a couple of long-term favorites that I stick to for extended periods. So far that spot has been held by only a few singers and groups, among them Tanaka Rie (田中理恵), ROUND TABLE featuring Nino, and Kawasumi Ayako (川澄綾子) [who currently holds this spot]. These groups may not necessarily be the top-ranked for a given week, but over a period of at least 4 weeks or so consistently they do rank in the top 2 or 3. Next would be the weekly favorites, which are too numerous to list. Generally for singers like Nogawa Sakura they’d normally occupy the top weekly spot (or top few) for just a while, which typically comes with a new album or single, after which I’ll like semi-forget them until they have a new release. Nevertheless these singers are definitely good by my definition, as are the top 40 places or so on my all-time listings, in general.
On a related note, I’ve also noticed a particular composer/arranger by the name of Ookubo Kaoru (yes it doesn’t look very nice but that’s how I write his name in romaji for my song translations) [大久保薫]. His pieces are generally good (even close to outstanding), so I’ll be sort of looking out for them. I’d also like to take this opportunity to comment that Hata Aki [畑 亜貴] writes extremely impenetrable lyrics, as if she hates English or maybe just people like me (who try our darnedest to translate accurately). Oh well. It’s always a challenge to translate her works, but I’m a little sick of trying to make sense out of lines that seem to go ’stack our hearts in the clouds’ or something similar when translated literally…