THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD
1,508) Emy Jackson – “涙のゴーゴー”/”You Don’t Know Baby”
From Japan . . . in English, by England born Emy Jackson. This ‘66 A-side is a barn burner: “Don’t know what I was expecting, but it wasn’t that, a hidden gem. Those surf guitars, the way she belts out the chorus. Cool then, cool now. What a great track!” (jamesowen5702, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GJLmoYns8i4) “This is so groovy! I love it”. (1mollietenpenny4093, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GJLmoYns8i4) As do I!
Liz Shaw writes that Jackson’s “great grandfather was British and one of the first to settle in Japan after it opened to the west.” (https://garagehangover.com/emy-jackson/)
Sheila Burgel gives us more history:
Emy Jackson was born Emy Eaton in Essex, England . . . and raised in Yokohama. When Radio Kanto put out a want-ad for a bilingual teenaged DJ to host the Good Hit Parade show every Sunday, Jackson applied and got the job — despite being unable to read Japanese. But her DJ career was cut short when her colleague Reiko Yukawa found Jackson singing “You Are My Sunshine” whilst strumming the guitar and sent word to A&R man Akira Izumi at Columbia Records. In devising a strategy, Akira insisted that Jackson break with the cover-pops tradition and tackle original songs written by Japanese songwriters in her native language of English. To add further confusion, Jackson’s records would come out on CBS, an imprint of Columbia normally reserved for Western artists. . . . [Her first single reached #16] attest[ing] to the success of their plan, but follow-ups . . . didn’t have the same impact.
liner notes to the CD comp Nippon Girls: Japanese Pop, Beat & Bossa Nova 1966-1970
Poppy Burton gives us even more:
[S]he became the first Japanese artist to have sold a million pop records that were sung in English. . . . After being released as an import in Japan, her single, “Crying in a Storm”, became a hit in 1965. At the time, the Japanese recording industry worked under an “exclusive writers” system, meaning Columbia artists could only sing material written by Columbia’s own writers. Jackson sidestepped this by releasing the surf-style song as a foreign artist on the CBS imprint despite being fluent in Japanese. In doing so, her songs ushered in a new era of English pop in Japan. Although imported music was more expensive than Japanese pop, her singing in English was a bold move that translated well in sales – “Crying in a Storm” reached number four on the foreign release chart that year. . . . Not only did Jackson introduce Japanese audiences to a new sound, but she paved the way for other bands to do the same. CBS used the same method . . . when they released the Blue Comets single “Blue Eyes”, a track also written by outsider writers and released on the imprint for foreign artists, despite being an all-Japanese band. Other labels started to follow suit, and the exclusive writer’s system started to crumble. Jackson’s efforts on her debut single revolutionised the antiquated system and allowed freelance writers to work on tracks. . . . Labels increasingly using the foreign artist formula gave rise to Group Sounds music. Often referred to as the GS sound, it was a genre of Japanese rock that fused Western rock and traditional Japanese kayōkyoku music, and it was Jackson who first dared to fuse the two.
https://faroutmagazine.co.uk/emy-jackson-the-singer-who-changed-japanese-culture-forever/
Chris Bishop writes that:
Most of her songs were composed by her vocal coach Yasutoshi Nakajima. . . . Her initial recording career was very brief, consisting of eight singles released in 1965 and 1966, always with a ballad on one side and an uptempo pop song on the other. . . . Emy retired from the music business by 1973.
Burton got to interview Jackson. He asked how she got her start in music, to which she responded: “The director of a radio program asked me if I could sing. I picked up my guitar and sang – that’s it. I had no intention of becoming a singer.” He also asked “Did singing in English limit your career at all? Why were your records were released as imports in Japan?” Jackson responded: “To get my start, English was a requirement to satisfy the foreign element of my contract. At the time there were no more openings for local contracts. Therefore, it was the idea of Columbia Records to introduce me as a foreign singer. In actuality my records were made in Japan but marketed as foreign records.” (https://garagehangover.com/emy-jackson/)
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