Despite this, she has said she never felt any need to branch out worldwide even though she could have easily done so. In other words, unlike most Japanese singers past or present, she's near-fluent in English. Also, that contest was always intended to have one boy and one girl win. * That's Japan's longtime English-language newspaper. Shortly after she returned to Japan and enrolled in Keio University (where she majored in English Literature), she was one of two winners of a 1974 English recitation contest sponsored by The Japan Times. She spent her final year of high school in Illinois under an international exchange program.
Despite such a rural lifestyle, her family loved music and she quickly took a liking to Western songs, especially The Beatles, and used that to broaden her horizons. She is from ultra-rural Shimane Prefecture in far-west Honshu, the third daughter of an innkeeping family. She is one of the best-selling female artists in Japan with a career spanning over 40 years. Plastic Love (2021), a single by CHAI, is available on Sub Pop Records.Mariya Takeuchi (竹内 まりや) (born March 20th 1955) is a Japanese Singer-Songwriter signed to Moon Records, currently owned by Warner Music Group, who is best known for being one of the defining voices of the " City Pop" movement in The '80s- think 60's Western rock-&-roll mixed with some funk or jazz, and you'll have kind of an idea of the genre she tends to work in. In spite of the irony of the post-internet age, a heartfelt joy shines through. The journey through Tokyo that CHAI takes listeners on is also a historic one, connecting the time of Mariya Takeuchi to the reality of current urban life. Their video’s lo-fi dreaminess alludes to the peculiar mark that 1980s Japan made on the popular imagination through the lens of the internet-but in sharing their favourite places, the band addresses audiences in the present. While showering listeners with immaculate City-pop instrumentation, their up-to-date production style is matched by soft and playful Shibuya-keivocals, echoing other moments of the band’s post-modern legacy. Meanwhile, as the new flag-bearers of Japanese pop music, CHAI’s rendition shows a self-awareness towards the band’s own position in cultural phenomena by forming connections through time. For future generations, ‘Plastic Love’ has become an imaginary reference point for a historical moment of extreme optimism. But now, having had one of her hit singles circulated ubiquitously online in various remixes and mashups by fans, she has become known as a figure of vaporwave meme culture. She was a best-selling legend of the bubble era, forever immortalised in the ongoing international craze for City pop music. Shortly beforehand, CHAI released their cover of ‘Plastic Love’, the most iconic single of chart-topping 1980s idol Mariya Takeuchi, alongside a video in which the band, dressed all in white, guide viewers across Tokyo.ĭuring the disorientating changes that rapidly unfolded in Japan’s 1980s post-war economic boom, Mariya Takeuchi’s song was a universal anthem for modern love amongst idol-obsessed youths.
While known for an explosive sound and chaotic performances, amidst disruptions of the 2020 global pandemic, the band reinvented themselves through the softer melodies of their most recent release, WINK (2021).
Originally based in Nagoya, the ‘neo-kawaii’ frenzy of MANA, KANA, YUUKI, and YUNA has become an international phenomenon since the releases of albums PINK (2018) and PUNK (2019). Linking back to the era, CHAI’s rendition recharges Tokyo’s urban scenery with joy. Their cover of 1980s city-pop star Mariya Takeuchi’s ‘Plastic Love’, released by Sub Pop Records in November 2020, pays tribute to a moment in Japanese pop-cultural history that was as age-defining as it was timeless. Japanese four-piece rock band CHAI have been gaining a reputation for their self-conscious song writing, going far beyond the surfaces of bubblegum pop. The moment CHAI begin performing-with the sweetest incantations of the line ‘I’m just playing games, I’m just playing games’-listeners are electrocuted by a sugar-fuelled sense of deja vu. Artwork for ‘Plastic Love’ Single (2020) Courtesy of Sub Pop records.