Audrey Dubois
5:08 pm on August 14, 2018 Tags: audio ( 6 ), does it ever say in pgsm that ikuko ISN'T a former j pop idol, music, pgsm ( 42 ), reblog ( 929 ), there can be a whole episode about usagi getting her mom's band back together, THIS IS SUCH A FUNKY FRESH BEAT, when pgsm finally comes back in the year 2023 for a twin peaks style reboot
A CD just arrived
that I’m very excited about! It’s super, super niche, but it is tied to Sailor Moon, so; Here’s a nice clean rip of the song Samantha from the GO-BANG’S, a funky little 80s/90s J-pop band comprised of three women – Mitsuko Saito on drums, Misa Tanishima on bass, and Kaori Moriwaka as lead singer and songwriter. They were quite popular for a couple of years, but left a lasting impression with their quirky sound and irreverent lyrics. I love them and this song in particular is my favourite, and there are very few GO-BANG’Svideos online, never mind music files, so I was very happy to get this album.
So where does it tie in to Sailor Moon, how did I find out about them, and why should you even start to care?
Well, in 2003, Kaori Moriwaka – aforementioned lead singer – went on to play Ikuko Tsukino, Sailor Moon’s loving and lovable mother, in the live-action adaptation Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon!
Kaori’s reputation as frontwoman of the GO-BANG’S may have influenced her potrayal of Ikuko, who was also kind of kooky and eccentric, inserting some more personality into what had previously been a relatively minor supporting character. I love PGSM, I love PGSM!Ikuko, and I love bombastic synthy 80s J-Pop, so this is a win/win/win!
Despite this being a long and very niche post, I hope you can all dig the song.
I found this last night after work, cause YouTube recommended it to me. And…wow this is really cool. It’s “Moonlight Densetsu” played on traditional Japanese instruments!!
Featured here are two koto players (the sort of horizontal harp thing), some kind of drum player, a shakuhachi (a type of flute) player, and center stage, a shamisen player.
It’s pretty amazing what they can do with these instruments. I was able to hear the koto and shakuhachi duo Blue Kanon perform live at a festival I went to last year at a local Japanese garden, as well as a taiko performance by a different group (those things are LOUD; my video doesn’t even quite do it justice). It was really cool, though.
They can do a lot with a shamisen as well, which I first learned from the Yoshida Brothers’ famous song “Kodo (Inside the Sun Remix),” otherwise known as the catchy tune behind Nintendo’s “Wii Would Like to Play” commercials.
sailormoonsub 