Friday, November 03, 2006

There's no accounting for taste

It's the wee hours of Friday and I feel that it's only appropriate that I should start the day off with a lovely list of 5 random things. Today's list will be . . . five foreign musicians or bands that are hugely popular in Japan (to this day) for reasons that are beyond me, well that's not entirely true . . . but oh whatever.

1. ABBA
2. The Beatles
3. Queen
4. Elvis Presley
5. The Carpenters

Doesn't that seem like an odd bunch? The only thing that they have in common is that their songs all have relatively easy lyrics, in the sense that even if you didn't know what the words meant you could still recognize them. They're all of a certain era too. And they're not all necessarily very quality writers either, not that I'm knocking their skills but have you actually listened to ABBA lyrics? They're certainly catchy but they really make very little sense.

On this list I find Elvis' presence to be the most amusing. Not only is he an American icon but he also happens to be the former Japanese Prime Minister Koizumi's favorite musician. In the heyday of Koizumi's popularity he released an album of his favorite Elvis tunes. Mind you, Koizumi didn't actually sing or do anything on the album besides pick out the songs. Isn't that bizarre? And of course how can we forget that he burst into song while visiting Graceland with President Bush . . . oh such priceless moments. I can only hope that the new Prime Minister Abe comes out with a compilation album of his own.

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