Hiromi Iwasaki -- Kiri no Meguriai（霧のめぐり逢い）

Well, it's been a few months since I brought back Hiromi Iwasaki（岩崎宏美）into the fold, certainly not since late last year. I've covered so much of her discography in the past 6 years that it's starting to become harder to find material.

However, I did find her 6th single from August 1976, "Kiri no Meguriai" (Encounter in the Fog). It's pretty auspicious since I had never heard it before until tonight. I've got a few of Hiromi's BEST compilations but "Kiri no Meguriai" didn't seem to make it onto any of them.

Seeing the video footage of her above on Fuji-TV's "Yoru no Hit Studio"（夜のヒットスタジオ）, I had to sigh and remark that she looked so very cute and adorable back in those days as a teen aidoru, especially with that short hair. Written by Yu Aku（阿久悠）and composed by Kyohei Tsutsumi（筒美京平）, the song is very much in the vein of what I've been accustomed to hearing from Hiromi when she first started out in the mid-1970s. There is that sprightliness in the melodic step and with that funky guitar, there is also that urban kayo feeling although I wouldn't exactly say it's City Pop (although she would get into that genre a few years later).

Aku weaves a tale of a woman meeting the guy she's been pining for by chance in the fog and she's not going to let him go. Gotta make the most of those opportunities, don'cha know? The lyrics rather remind me of a certain student back in Tokyo who would do anything for that chance to meet Aiba-kun from Arashi（嵐）. In any case, "Kiri no Meguriai" peaked at No. 4 and was the 49th-ranked single for that year.