A little number that “took the music world by storm”
It imitated a bully and pushed the English recordings aside as it headed up the charts.
I don’t know about you but I usually don’t know all of the lyrics to most of my favourite songs. I’ve found that there are times after I have figured out the lyrics that I don’t like the song as much.
One favourite that comes to mind is a love song that has shut me out completely in the lyrics department. I didn’t understand one bloody word.
That’s because the song wasn’t sung in English. Over the last 50 years, I have seen only a handful of non-English tunes climb to the top of the music charts in North America. I can’t remember any that could compare to my little favourite that took the music world by storm.
Although it sounded naturally soft and sweet and let you feel you were in a good place, it imitated a bully and pushed the English recordings aside as it headed up the charts. With a mind of its own, it became a monster and was the first non-English, non-European song to roar up the Billboard Hot 100 chart to No. 1 in 1963. This beauty is one of the best-selling foreign singles, having sold over 13 million copies and counting.
I know that most old fogeys like me have heard this song many times, but there is a good chance that a lot of young’uns are familiar with it also. It has appeared in 15 different movie soundtracks.
I still wasn’t a teenager when it hit the airwaves in North America. I wondered, many times, how the record got the opportunity to wedge its way into the English-speaking world. It was obvious that the song just needed the opportunity to be heard and then it would thrive. The journey began when the record was released in the singer’s home country, and in a flash it raced to
No. 1. The international breakthrough came in 1963 during a visit by a British record executive.
After hearing the song several times, the executive took the record home to England, which would be a new challenge for Pye Records.
They had to wrestle with many ideas to find the proper approach to introduce an untraditional recording, in a gentle and natural fashion, to the English listeners. They were concerned the title would be too difficult for English speakers to pronounce or remember, so the song was renamed after a cooked-beef dish.
The new title was intended to be both catchy and distinctive. An instrumental version of the song sold well, reaching No. 6 in Britain. It was then released, complete with lyrics, in the U.S. by Capital Records with the alternate title where it went to No. 1.
Unfortunately, this fine artist made history for a second time twenty-two years later. He left this Earth, along with 519 other passengers on an Asian airliner, making it the deadliest single aircraft tragedy to date.
With no further delay, I will introduce you to this beauty, so hopefully it can melt your heart also. The artist is Kyu Sakamoto, from Japan. He is still the only Japanese male to ever climb to the top of the music charts in the U.S. The meat dish (um…, song) is called “Sukiyaki.”
Sakamoto’s hit, though very unique, was just another slice of music trying to climb to the top of the charts in a very competitive market, which would become known as the greatest decade of music. It was a great time to be alive, and time has also made it much clearer for me now, 60 years later, to see that his hit played another important role as well.
We were still less than 20 years from the end of World War ll, in 1963, and there were still some remnants of hostility towards Japan, in North America. The song probably became a form of reconciliation when my generation embraced it.
Here’s hoping that you will be able to find some time to take a trip down Memory Lane and see what the fuss was all about. For most people, it’s one of those performances that will make you feel warm and fuzzy inside. If you do take a quick listen, I have one request:
No English translation, please. It’s perfect the way it is.
