Katsushika no Masayukist - A Dedicated Program Cut Short

It was late 2022, and Masayuki Yamamoto recently released three highly anticipate albums. Radio personality Kenji Shimizu formed a new program on Katsushika FM at Tuesdays 11PM (or 23:00 in Japan) dedicated only to Masayuki's songs and nothing else. It was what Masayukists wanted for a very long time.

Now before I continue on, I wanted to share a similarly related fact that Masayuki has hosted a special radio program titled "Yoru wa Garagara Dondondon" that aired from April to September 1993, alongside Mikako Shiroyama. The talk segments wherein Masayuki and Mikako talk on random hilarious topics like summer vacations can be heard in The Series Best compilation album. I should really know 1993 is Masayuki's busiest year he has done in his entire career; not only that, but also two original albums, an anime themed mini album, and Time Bokan Royal Revival.

November 1 was the first episode of the program known as Katsushika no Masayukist and premiered with the opening number Bouken Langerhans-tou, the exact same song that opened The Series Best radio album. With only 50 seconds in length, it sounds like a perfect song to open a program that actually was about treating pancreatic islets fantasized as an adventure. Ironically, this song WASN'T the track opener for COLORS -- it was the seven-minute long Brooklyn Monogatari.

We began the program for real with the song that started it all -- Moeyo Dragons! by Eiji Bando. This was written as a contest made to create a new root song for the Chunichi Dragons baseball team for a hell-ton of yen. While the contest ended up as a scam according to him, luckily, it plummeted in record sales and was a powerhouse for the Yamamoto-Jinbo composer duo.

The next track to play was the satirically horny Uguisudani Music Hall. Yamamoto's first ventures as a songwriter was writing kayokyoku inspired novelty songs that went well in the airwaves in the mid-seventies, and this was one of them. This, alongside Hirake Tulip, were two of his earliest successful songs.

After a year of getting into the kayokyoku market, he landed his anison debut with the eponymous Time Bokan opening theme, and from there, he went more successful than ever. Ushiro Sugata from episode 27 of the anime, and what was, to me, considered the end of the first arc, also played for this setlist; even a BGM track also played as some sort of intermission.

Then listeners get their ears blasted with the bossa fusion Chicago from Shounen no Yume wa Ikiteiru. This is one of my favorite songs of his, with its unbelievable arrangement done by Kohei Tanaka and its fascinating lyrics on experiencing what America feels like.

Closing off the first broadcast was the full version of Eki from SOLO Hiki no Yoru on the piano, at the time his latest album...and it still is as of this writing. The charming and soft piano arrangement is enough to bring listeners into a tender sendoff to the program.

Listeners were amazed at Shimizu's song choices and some tidbits on his discography, and from then on, they were looking to see what songs of his were he gonna play in the succeeding episodes. Weeks passed, listeners tuned in at the same timeframe on the same station....only to find out Katsushika no Masayukist was no longer broadcasting. The program was replaced by a generic filler spot that simply played a random selection of some recent songs. This had happened for the next few weeks. Listeners were wondering what was going on with the program.

Then, on December 6, Kenji Shimizu tweeted some unfortunate news that Katsushika no Masayukist was no longer on-air. He decided to cancel the program as he couldn't keep up with his packed schedule. Outrage and disappointment filled the reactions. For a program on a very prolific singer-songwriter, it only managing to broadcast twice before its sudden cancellation was something I can remember every now and then, but recently it has become a forgettable moment as a Masayukist.

I do remember Shimizu did broadcast a second episode of Katsushika no Masayukist the following week on Nov 8. I unfortunately couldn't find the setlist that played for that episode.

I also had a hard time listening to the program as a certain radio provider site that I used disallowed non-Japanese users, and it utterly pissed me off.

In the end, a radio program dedicated to a single popular musician sounds amazing on paper, but having to actually broadcast it could be really difficult. I feel bad for Kenji Shimizu feeling pressurized on his schedule that prevented him to keep broadcasting Katsushika no Masayukist, and it would be fascinating to have listeners relieve more of his songs and more in-depth history had the program given the chance to continue. 'Til then, Katsushika no Masayukist keeps swimming in the hearts of Masayukists.