Death Valley Driver Anime Review #18
"J-Pop And Anime"

It doesn’t matter the show, whether you watch “Neon Genesis Evangelion” or “Excel Saga”, “Jigoku Sensei Nube” or “Dragonball GT” the first thing that will stick out to you is usually the opening song that palys over the credits of any show. These songs get stuck in our heads, doesn’t matter if the show is good or not, the song is planted there for the express purpose of getting you to seek out a copy for yourself. Anime songs are a hot commodity to the Japanese recording industry. Twice in the history of the Japanese charts have anime records topped the chart (first back in 1977 with the firtst soundtrack to “Galaxy Express 999”’s opening theme and then again in 1997 with the third “Neon Genesis Evangelion” Original Soundtrack).

I could rattle off dozens if not hundreds of songs that I know from all my years of watching anime. Since the late 80’s the Japanese Record labels have gotten smart, cross breeding potential hits with anime shows. Top J-Pop bands like PSY-S, Chage & Aska and many others would get exposure for their work through various shows. PSY-S got incredible play out their song “Angel Night” not only because it was an awesome tune but because Sunrise used it as the opening song for the “City Hunter 2” TV series. They weren’t the first band to do it and they certainly weren’t the last..

The good people at Sony took it a step further when Sony Pictures Entertainment started producing anime with Fuji television. The gold mine they struck with Rurouni Kenshin led to wider exposure for bands like Judy&Mary, Bonnie Pink, The Yellow Monkey and Animetal all of who contributed at least 1 track to the series in the form of a closing song or opening song. Kenshin ended with 4 opening segments and 7 closing segments. The J-Pop wave eve nhit Dragonball. After 10 years of having the music to the TV series of Dragonball and Dragonball Z produced by the Dragonball Project, Toei Doga went ot ZAIN records for their new series Dragonball GT. The band Field Of View had their song “DAN DAN Kokoro Hikareteku” recruited to be the opening song for the show as well as the closing for the 10th Anniversary Dragonball Movie “Road To The Strongest”. DBGT itself had no less than 4 closing songs for its 64 episode run (though “DAN DAN” remained it’s only opening).

Of course Pop Bands aren’t the only ones who get their music picked, several J-Metal bands like X Japan, Dragon Ash and FEEL SO BAD (my personal fave) have gotten the call to do music for anime. Imagine the delight of FEEL SO BAD fans when on April 13 1997 they heard “Bari! Bari! Saikyou No.1” play over the opening animation sequence to “Jigoku Sensei Nube”.

Of course J-Pop doesn’t rule the roost entirely as plenty of shows still rely on old fashioned theme songs to get show over. “Yuush-Ou Gaogaigar” used “Yuusha-Ou No Tanjou” (Story of The Brave King”) to tell you what the show was about. Still, the glory days of the 70’s, when theme songsactually used the name of the show they were hyping in the lyrics, are fading fast to the encroaching J=Pop horde. Th end result in anime fandom is that many people get exposure to bands they never would have bothered with before. Over the past 10 years I’ve listened to records by many of the above artists and other J-Pop faves like Hikaru Utada, ZARD and Two Mix.

What does this mean?

The music of Japan is seeping over here at a slow but steady rate. Now this is no music invasion, but I don’t think this will be catastrophic failure like the infamous “Pink Lady Fiasco” of 1979.

What’s that? You never heard of the “Pink Lady Fiasco”? Sit back then and listen.

In 1978 Japan was being taken over on the music scene by poppy disco tunes. The epitome of this was a Japanese vocal duo named Pink Lady. Pink Lady were 2 japanese teenagers by the names of Kei and Mie and they had insanely high, squeaky singing voices. When they conquered Japan they set out for America in 1978. They appeared on a Bob Hope Holiday Special, they appeared for a show at the Tropicana Hotel in Las Vegas and in 1979 they released their first US single “Kiss In The Dark”. This was followed by the short lived TV Series “Pink Lady & Jeff”.

What sis this result in?

“Kiss In The Dark” was not nearly the hit everyone hoped for. The girls went back to Japan and tried to maintain their grip on the Japanese charts. Scandal followed when they tried to go against “Kohaku Uta Gassen” a yearly song contest held every New Year’s Eve (and traditionally, the highest rated show of the year on Japanese Television). The girls tried to hold their own TV Special on a rival network and sunk as low as to brining deaf and blind children to the taping to beg people to watc hthem. Do I need to say anymore about this? (Ironically Mie now is the lead singer of Animetal Lady, a band that covers old Shojo anime songs as if they were played by Judas Priest)

No Japanese bnad has had success in the States since though X Japan did tour the States several times and FEEL SO BAD made a tour in 1997. Shonen Knife is of course an exception to this rule but they haven’t exactly had mainstream success in the US either.

Pink Lady damaged the Japanese music industry’s plans t ospread to the United States. Now in their wake bootleg CD’s of popular anime soundtracks find their way here and fans, desperate to get heir hands on their favorite shows music buy the stuff in droves. Not all fandom does this but a large chunk does. Many Anime Conventions ban pirate CD’s from their dealer rooms. The 2 biggest bootleggers are Son May out of Taiwan and Ever Anime out of Hong Kong. Still, the fans buy the CD’s and many artists get exposure but not the money.

To sum up, anime music is big business both overseas and in the US of A. A trip over to the Anime Web Turnpike (www.anipike.com) reveals a ton of anime music sites. Do a yahoo search for many of the bands I’ve rattled off and you’d be surprised what you’d find. But in the end, its music and bootlegged or not doesn’t this prove that music is universal despite the language barrier?