Apr 02, 2023 mobilephoneshell

Ongaku Natalie EXILE "Ti Amo"

"Gota Nishidera's POP FOCUS" is a series in which Gota Nishidera selects one masterpiece of Japanese popular music for each episode and explains the songwriting and arrangement from an artist's perspective. Nishidera, frontman of NONA REEVES, who is active as a music producer as well as appearing in various media as a successor of 80's music, introduces his beloved pop songs with some personal opinions.

In the 21st installment, EXILE's representative ballad "Ti Amo" announced in September 2008 will be featured. Nishidera delves into the charm of the song while looking back on his encounter with Kiyoshi Matsuo, who was involved in the songwriting.

Text/Gota Nishidera(NONAREEVES)Illustration >/Shimaomaho

Interviews with numerous legends as a music writer

EXILE's 28th single "The Birthday ~Ti Amo~" was released on September 24, 2008. It's a song from 14 years ago. Personally, one of my favorite hit songs born in the 2000s (00's) is this "Ti Amo" produced, written and composed by Mr. Kiyoshi Matsuo (composition is co-written with Mr. Jin Nakamura). . never waver.

When this song was born, Mr. Matsuo, who is 6 years older than me, and I had a particularly intense time together. For this column, I felt the significance of writing down exactly how the historical masterpiece "Ti Amo" was born, so I asked him for a direct interview. It was composed by having you accept willingly.

Originally active as a music writer when he was a student, he experienced interviews with many legendary musicians such as James Brown, Quincy Jones, Janet Jackson and deepened exchanges during his repeated overseas interviews. Mr. Matsuo had his own R&B interpretation and sensibility. He said, "I think Goda-kun is the same, but most Japanese music fans, maniacs, musicians, and producers, when they were kids, admired foreign artists more than the Japanese popular songs they heard on TV. It's a long history, isn't there? Everyone remembers the lyrics and sings along.It's not a high-end, maniac thing, but R&B hit songs are familiar "popular songs" that are closely related to Japanese people's lives, like those sung at bar bars and karaoke. The original roots are very simple.I try not to forget that the feeling is the same even if the country is different.”

Since the mid-1990s, what awaited Mr. Matsuo, who had shifted the focus of his work from being a music writer and introducer of R&B, to music production and lyric writing, was a further leap forward. Ken Hirai's albums "THE CHANGING SAME" (released in June 2000) and "gaining through losing" (released in July 2001) have become million sellers. At the same time, the duo CHEMISTRY, which was born from the planning of the popular TV Tokyo program "ASAYAN" and became the godfather, is a high-quality song and a collection of high-quality songs by Yoshikuni Dochin and Kaname Kawabata. It becomes a social phenomenon due to a chemical reaction with singing that is full of sorrow. As you know, ATSUSHI, who later became EXILE's vocalist (retired from the group in November 2020), and NESMITH were among the finalists in this "The Last Male Vocalist Audition of the 20th Century." Once again, I am amazed at the high level of the challengers.

The impact I felt from "Ti Amo" from the bottom of my heart, the conviction that "it will definitely sell"

Looking back, I first received a job request from Mr. Matsuo in South Korea. He wrote the lyrics for K-kun's song "Last Love" (included in the album "Music in My Life" released in December 2006). As a result, Jun Miura and MEGUMI performed comic songs for TV Tokyo's late-night program "Symbols", such as "Koibito wa Indian" and "Invited by the Tyrolean Wind". It was early summer 2008 when Matsuo-san, Taishi Mohri, a multiplayer player, and I made it. At the exact timing of the production, while we were on the train together to Mohri's studio in Kawasaki, Mr. Matsuo said, "I'm making a new song for EXILE, can you tell us what you think?" You let me. That was "Ti Amo" sung in the temporary song.

After the recording work for "Symbols" is over, it's customary for the three of us to go to Kawasaki to eat and drink. Mr. Matsuo and I, who usually travel by car or taxi, used to meet up on the train and commute. Take a box seat on the Shonan-Shinjuku Line from JR Shinjuku Station and head for Shin-Kawasaki Station for a short trip. It seems that there was a summer festival and fireworks that day, and a college girl in a yukata was sitting across from her friends looking excited. So Mr. Matsuo and I would ask, "Where is the festival going to be held?" It was a face-to-face seat, so I think it was easy for us to talk naturally. After that, I listened to "Ti Amo" while looking out the train window and crossing the Tama River. It will be,” with a shock that I felt from the depths of my heart. Even though the music I heard for the first time echoes in my ears, when I open my eyes, even though it's a song at night, I can see the scenery of an ordinary Japanese city. It was strange that from the very beginning, all the people who sent me, men and women of all ages, were completely mixed in with their casual warmth. Ah, I wonder if this is the power of a hit song... I will never forget the moment when I caught a glimpse of the process of its birth.

Three Inspired Songs

Before creating “Ti Amo,” Mr. Matsuo had three songs that came to mind. First, the single "You'll Never Know" released in 1981 by Hi-Gloss, a planning band formed by 13 studio musicians. The melancholy sound of this song, which was also selected for the popular compilation "FREE SOUL DREAM" released in 1998, is "more wet than necessary", and it is also perceived as an enka-like and groovy mood song, and it is truly an aesthetic eye.

Music Natalie EXILE

And the second song is "Hoshifuru Machikado" (1977) by Satoshi Ito and Happy & Blue. It's a nostalgic hit song, but this song is not a melody, but a Latin rhythm that Japanese people like, "the image of the night world" was a hint. According to Mr. Matsuo, in September 2003, Kyohei Tsutsumi composed the song, and Matsuo wrote the lyrics and producedGoro Noguchi's single "Sweet Rain" was produced. and. When he was entrusted with EXILE's single, which was gaining momentum, he felt that it was time to once again face the "fusion of mood songs and modern rhythm interpretation" that he had already tried with Kyohei. In that sense, the effective "Ti Amo" whispered by Fumika Hideshima is faithful to Kyohei Tsutsumi's method of saying, "It would be nice if there was a change and hook before the chorus with words that weren't Japanese." It can be said that there is a certain proof.

The third song isEric Benay's 'Why You Follow Me'. Co-written by Ali Shaheed Muhammad of A Tribe Called Quest, legendary guitarist Chalmers "Spanky" Alford, who was admired and worked with by D'Angelo and members of The Roots, and Eric Benay. However, Mr. Matsuo says that the influence of the remix version by D-INFLUENCE, rather than the original version recorded in the album "A Day in the Life" released in 1999, is connected to "Ti Amo". When he produced the single "baby baby, service" by singer Momoe Shimano who debuted from Pony Canyon in 1998, he asked D-INFLUENCE, who had established a solid position in the British acid jazz scene, to remix it. First of all, I had the experience of being The fact that D-INFLUENCE can be used to remix a rookie's single seems very "90's", but when I heard D-INFLUENCE's rearrangement of "Why You Follow Me" after that, It was wonderful that he thought, 'I didn't make a mistake in judgment, rather, it was a little early.'

In other words, in 2008, Mr. Matsuo condensed the musical style of ``It was a little early, but it wasn't wrong'' in the production work that Mr. Matsuo has been producing for nearly 10 years, and he said, ``The most ``Kiyoshi Matsuo''. These testimonies tell us that "Ti Amo" was the song that was completed as a work with a strong color.

Repeated "brain voice"

One more. Matsuo, who is "not a singer," says that the way he writes and composes music is different from that of ordinary singer-songwriters. In fact, Kyohei Tsutsumi, the composer who studied under Mr. Matsuo, was also of that type, but they do not hum the melody themselves or sing temporary songs quickly. According to Mr. Matsuo, "I just keep imagining it in my head. I imagine what it would be like if I sang with the voice of the requested singer. Speaking of EXILE Works during this period, "Lovers Again" (released in January 2007) produced and written by Mr. Matsuo was already a big hit as a famous ballad, but this song was . TAKAHIRO and AKIRA joined and it was also the theme song for "EXILE VOCAL BATTLE AUDITION", which was held in preparation for the opening of "EXILE Chapter 2", so at that point, Mr. Matsuo only sang ATSUSHI's voice. I couldn't imagine. Compared to that, "Ti Amo" is a fresh collaboration in the sense that Mr. Matsuo is "the first song that I was able to create while playing the unique voices of ATSUSHI and TAKAHIRO in my head at the same time." That's why.

Mr. Matsuo said, "If you assume that other singers will sing, 'Ti Amo' sung by Mr. Hirai may fit perfectly." There was a sense of pleasure as an interviewer. In other words, when a “singer” writes a melody, as I do, there is a danger of being easily satisfied by singing to the end with a kind of instinctive comfort as a singer. I feel the same way about flowing solos played by skilled guitarists and pianists. It's technical and good, so it's possible to make a certain shape so that it flows naturally. However, since Mr. Matsuo does not actually sing, he tries to imagine the "voice in his head" and tries to find the best answer as a craftsman by keeping a certain distance from the work.

Mr. Matsuo's deep love of music, knowledge, experience, and detailed and objective creations that are repeated "inside the brain". Above all, the members of Hyakusenrenma, who have built up their careers, and the freshness of the new members of the younger generation mixed together, and in 2008, EXILE, which was on a perfect upward trajectory, is a group that can spread the charm of adult men in all directions. I think that was the biggest point, but this "Ti Amo" has a perfect combination of performance and songs, individual personalities, and a miraculous highest boiling point of love, calculation and freshness.

“Ti Amo” has already become a timeless classic, loved by many singers, including Koji Tamaki, Hideaki Tokunaga, and Toshinobu Kubota. This "vivid yet somewhat nostalgic" masterpiece of the 00's, full of mood-popular Latin grooves, will surely be sung by more people than ever before.

Gouta Nishidera

Born in 1973, while active as the vocalist of NONA REEVES, he also produces and provides songs for other artists. In July 2020, he released his second solo album "Funkvision", and in September 2021, he released the album "Discography" with the band. He is also active as a writer, and has written books such as "The New Michael Jackson Textbook," "The Curse of We Are the World," "Prince Theory," "Transmitted Note Magic," and "Starting Note Method." In recent years, he has appeared on TV and radio programs as a successor of 1980s music, and is currently distributing the podcast "Gota Nishidera's Best! Fan Club" on Amazon Music.

Maho Shimaomaho

Born in Tokyo in 1978, illustrator. She made her writing debut in 1997 with the manga "School Girl Goriko" while still a student at Tama Art University. Since then, he has published books such as "Tavilion", "Bonnari Komachi", "Maho no Hitori Olive Research Team", "Maho-chan's House", "Manga Maho-chan", "Girlfriend", "Souvenir", and "Family". The latest issue is "Shimao Maho no Oshiete Kodomo NOW!". He has also appeared in many events and radio programs. His father is the photographer Shinzo Shimao, his mother is the photographer Tokuko Shiota, and his grandfather is the novelist Toshio Shimao.

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