Hiroshi Sato – Bad Janky Blues
From Hiroshi Sato – Time
Released on Wave Concept, 1977, Japan

We never made a post about Hiroshi Sato, but it was as if he has been around since the launch of OYT. Indeed, the man highly influenced our views on music, opening for us a whole new dimension of Pop music.  So it’s no surprise that we pay him a little tribute by sharing a tune from his overlooked album, Time.

Hiroshi Sato has always been influenced by Western Pop music, but on this album, we can particularly hear the influence of Californian music and especially the sound of 1970’s Westcoast soft rock and post-What’s Going On Motown‘s production.

On Bad Janky Blues, Hiroshi Sato shows us his mastery at arrangements, using the horn section and an harmonica with great refinement. The result is a Japanese-Californian jewel of light bluesy disco ! The album features other soft rock beauties, such as Yamate Hotel, and it definitively shows an other side of this synthesizer genius.