THE Masayuki Paradise

 Some of his albums include song commentaries for each track, detailing the inspiration on how the song was made. Here, I translated the commentary taken from Sainou no Rakuen  by none other than Yamamoto sensei himself. Zensen Tabitachi! Otazuneman no Uta [ 前線旅立ち! オタズネマンの歌 ] - Every two years, the Masayuki Zensen event is held throughout Japan. 2002 was "THE Masayuki Zensen"; 2004 was titled "Tropic of Capricorn edition: The Journey of the Sea, Gourmet and Friendship". Then in 2006, we opened "Escape From Love: Around the Stylish Whereabouts" with this song. The intro and interlude are amazingly played on a real trumpet. We hope those railroad fans will rejoice this. This event is really hard and redundant for a 50-year-old, and I have to arrange the chairs by myself, but it's fun! I'm so absorbed. Oouso Shinsengumi Kiru! <BUSHI> [ 大嘘新撰組・斬る! <BUSHI>]  - I was aiming for a second "nantoka" for the popular "Oouso Chushingu...

 Another month, another time for an anniversary week, and it's the first one of 2024! Alright, this one isn't that big compared to the last two anniversary weeks that I covered. That's because, while I double checked Yamamoto sensei's discography, it seems that there's only two days where we see some original albums and some anime singles turn a year older. January isn't a pretty big month of album releases. January 24, this Wednesday, sees the 28th anniversary of Masayuki Tengoku , which is where I got the fan site name from! With Yamamoto's signature simplistic art style in the front cover, some catchy tracks will always have fans suffer from earworm as soon as Nippon Jindaman no Uta, Ikeike Ikebukuro, and Sora no Tantei start playing. One day later, on January 25, will see tons of album anniversaries! First off are the three Yatterman vinyl EPs that were released during its series run; two from 1977 and another from 1978. The first opening theme song, Yat...

I wanted to do something with this for a long while, and that's translating the entire Zunbara Zuihitsu  from the Bella Beaux website. Yamamoto made this essay-type collection of experiences he had done the moment he wrote chapter after chapter. Since many are based on outdated events, the Zuihitsu page nowadays only includes selected stories based on the sensei's past and then-current experiences. To begin this series, I had translated the very first chapter with more to come real soon! Recording production for Juusan no Maou  (Thirteen Devils) was so much fun, and yet it was very interesting. The karaoke making in its early stage reminded me of an unrelated topic with Masaaki Jinbo-sensei. In fact, Mr. Jinbo had been naturally talking about that same story for a very long time: Yamamoto: Hello, Mr. Jinbo. Jinbo: Oh, good day! Yamamoto: How is your father? Jinbo: I talked to you the other day that he got cancer, or maybe he was diagnosed with stomach ulcer... Anyways, he's...

Yamamoto-sensei has seemingly made pseudonyms for the past couple of years, all of which had been retired to rightfully choose his real name. These are: Miho Touda  - Miho is a particularly female name, but using this name as a male is very peculiar; I doubt Miho is named after his daughter. This was used when he wrote  Tadashii Seishun for Kyuukyoku Choujin R, Harukaze ABC  for One Two Jump! and Aishuu Madonna . INDEPENDENCE  - A one-off alias used for Nekketsu Fighters no Uta , a fight song for the Hokkaido Ham Fighters. Kururo Fujiwara  - I thought it could be an alias of Ikuro Fujiwara, but when the Rekishi Series compilation album was released, the songs with Kururo as the arranger are instead credited to Yamamoto, so it's speculative that it could be another pseudonym of Yamamoto-sensei's, and it's used solely for songs under the Rekishi Series, which was sadly done in only two albums. Pseudonyms can confuse some people as they might think it could be...

With another year coming to an end, it's time to summarize what the sensei has done throughout. As much as I am looking forward for next year -- and his 50th career anniversary, it's a bummer that this is the first year in a while that Yamamoto hasn't released at least one album, whether a maxi single or a full-length one, since 2014; all the years between them have album releases, if you wanna count THE Jitaku Live in 2021. To start the second post-COVID year, Yamamoto returned to the stage in January with the Tatsunoko 60th anniversary concert, since he is a prominent person who worked on not the Time Bokan Series, but two super robot shows. Although Ichiro Mizuki was part of the main performers, he sadly passed away one month prior. Thankfully, Birthday Song paid a tribute with a prerecorded video of Mizuki singing the theme to Tekkaman the Space Kinght . Yamamoto still got the energy and stage presence to keep the audience rockin'! Oh, don't forget that he even ...

 December is a big month for Masayukists when it comes to album releases, whether it be original albums or singles. Now that I am free from all those college stuff and it's about time I forget about it for a while, we got another whole week of anniversaries. Starting with.... Megami no Jiyuu  on December 18! In case you haven't checked the album yet, it was released under Yamamoto's own record label at that time, which was unfortunately discontinued shortly after. Yamamoto had once again blended a variety of music genres in time for the new millennium. You can hear two baseball related tracks, a peppy pop song for the title track, a 50s style love ballad, and an anime melody style on the final track to finish the 55-minute runtime. I saw some misinformation that Akemi Takada made the cover illustration. It's clearly Yamamoto's, just by looking at his art style. Takada, known as the character designer for Creamy Mami, actually did cover art for '88. December 19 ...

 Hey y'all! It's been a while since I last made a post for this website, but it's certainly not because I got lazy or something; I am too busy with college and other stuff. This week, we see three releases from Masayuki Yamamoto's discography getting an anniversary. The first one is the first box set The Pokopokkon  on November 22nd . Not only does it contain remasters of Yamamoto's first five original albums, but also the first live album, Namakemono ga Miteta OVA soundtrack, and some extras: image songs from Kyuukyoku Choujin R, three self-covers and selected karaoke tracks. The booklet  also features cool photos of Masa in New York, which I would love to see (I'm guessing half are from New York Whisper)! November 25th will mark the 31st anniversary of Yamamoto's first live album Aah Garagara Dondondon , which was also included in The Pokopokkon. Running a total of over two hours, this is the first of four live albums he's released throughout his disc...

 On this day in 1975, Tatsunoko Production premiered an anime series that not only saved the company from falling in grace, but began a somewhat successful anime franchise. Time Bokan  started broadcasting on Fuji Television on Saturday 6:30PM and the rest is history! This was also the debut of Masayuki Yamamoto as an anime composer and anison singer-songwriter. If not for this series, he wouldn't become popular in the first place. His prominence in this franchise made him a  Tatsunoko Legend , which could explain why he was part of the 60th anniversary concert. May they continue to save and preserve history!