Mou Nihon ni kaeritai:The Real Folk Blues

One reason I learned Japanese in the first place was because I wanted to read manga and watch anime in their original and uncut forms, and get the small nuances that make up Japanese humor and drama that can never be translated effectively.

This song, The Real Folk Blues is one example. It's the ending theme to Cowboy Bebop, an anime made in 1998, that I got to see on this side that same year thanx to my good friend Koh. Every time I hear this song, it reminds me to try harder and push through the sadness. The song does have some emotionally powerful lyrics, but the music itself can transmit that; it is blues after all, and that is the same language anywhere. Its sentimental for me because its the first song I think I understood in Japanese, and I used to play it a lot on the Kintetsu and Hankyu Densha (trains in Japan) in my headphones whenever I was having a bad time in Japan. One of my friends there heard me playing it, and got me the entire Cowboy Bebop soundtrack double CD. It was also my ringtone on my keitai (cellphone).

This is the actual live concert of the band The Seatbelts. The chick with the Native American headdress on keyboards is Yoko Kanno, the lead composer of the band. I wonder if she's taken... And that's Mai Yamane doing the singing. I am in love with her voice.

Enjoy.

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