Where is Japan's Gangnam Style?

Would you rather a catchy novelty song or a soul crushing anthem on Japanese work culture?

Which foreign language songs make it big in the English speaking world?

Sure, BTS, Shakira, and Edith Piaf are international icons. Just as common though are the meme songs that are popular both for their catchiness, associated dances, and pure absurdity. Your La Bambas, your Gangnam Styles, and La Macarenas. These aren’t bad songs, but they all have a hook that gets repeated, and repeated, and repeated… It makes the song and lyrics easy to remember, even without knowing anything about the meaning.

All this to say, I wondered why Japan didn’t have that one big novelty song? Sure, creating something internationally famous isn’t something that you can wish into happening (otherwise this Substack would be required reading for everyone everywhere). The idea of whether Japan ever had a novelty song fad kept niggling at me [Editor’s note: apparently Pen Pineapple Apple Pen doesn’t count].

It was not long after that I heard it. The song that promised to change everything.

Oyoge! Taiyaki-kun

Imagine you’re living in 1975 Japan. Ok, scrap that. Just imagine you’re an office worker in a society that values productivity often at the expense of humanity. This should require a lot less imagination. What sort of music would capture this feeling of malaise?

Rock and roll? Blues? Probably not a song made for children’s television about a red bean filled snack. And yet.

Below is a recording of the song and the translated lyrics.

Lyrics (slightly different translator from Youtube)

Every day, every day, we are getting fried

On an iron plate and now we have had enough

A certain morning, I fought with the old man

Of the shop and managed to escape to the sea

It felt so good the first time

I swam at the bottom of the sea

The anko in my belly is heavy (2)

But the sea is so vast, my heart races

The pink coral waved its hands at me

Gazing at my swimming

Every day, every day, it's only about fun

A shipwreck is my house

Sometimes, I get bullied by the sharks

But when that happens, that's alright, I escape

By swimming all day long, I got hungry

[So much that] I got dizzy

By not even eating a shrimp once in a while

I got all swollen from only having salt water

I took a bite from the other side of the rocks

But that was a little fish hook!

No matter how much, how much I wriggled

The hook would not come off my throat

At the foreshore, an unknown old man

Was surprised to pull me in

Of course, I'm just a taiyaki

A taiyaki that's a little burnt

The old man gulped down his saliva

And ate me with great appetite

The Cultural moment

I assume you’ve watched it now. You’ve heard the generation defining song. The question on your lips might well be… that’s it? This was just a story about a cartoon fish, admittedly with a great hook (sorry). Some might even draw parallels to the Baby Shark song (not linked, just google it if you've somehow avoided it) that drove every parent crazy in the 2010s.

Baby Shark has no lyrics, no story, no tale of woe. Oyoge Taiyuki-Kun isn’t being subtle when discussing the the daily grind of work “Every day, every day, we are getting fried”, the dream of escape “I fought with the old man, Of the shop and managed to escape to the sea” and the inevitable pull of working life “No matter how much, how much I wriggled, The hook would not come off my throat”.

This is a horrifying tale that reinforces the status quo of working life because it’s asking… well, what’s the alternative? Sure you can swim around the pink coral for a while, but the anko gets heavy (hello debt my old friend), and the hook of the old man will pull you in once more.

Baby Shark, you and I are not the same.

It is accurate to say that this wasn’t meant to be a major hit. Like other more familiar one hit wonders, no one involved in the production predicted this success. The song was written for a Sesame Street type show “Hirake Ponkiki”, and only expected to be popular among the children. Singer Masato Shimon received a fee of 50,000 yen, which was around 200 USD at the time. Without going into the story of the royalty battles, he was screwed out of a lot of money.

The song became big overnight. By big, I am not talking single generation big like other one hit wonders who are very of their decade (Vanilla Ice). A better comparison would be Lennon’s Imagine. I know you’re skeptical, but the statistics speak for themselves: this was Japan’s biggest song of 1976 by record sales. Not content with outselling 1976 music, it still holds the record sales record almost 40 years later.

Photo by Kelly Visel on Unsplash

Big red bean?

The biggest beneficiary were taiyaki vendors. Taiyaki is a traditional fish-shaped pastry snack that has been in circulation since the 1900s. While the stores have been popular for years, this song was an unofficial non-stop advertisement for the snack. Plushies of the cute fish were made, balloons were flown, and the song was incessantly played.

The legacy

This is a song that every child learns. It now reminds adults of their youth. The joyful tune about a personified fish mixed with the mournful lyrics has kept the song relevant for all listeners. As recently as 2008 Oyoge Taiyaki-kun made a resurgence in the Japan charts, coinciding with the GFC (better known as the Lehman moment in Japan).

What does the song teach us about Japan? Maybe that tough life lessons are best delivered through cheery music. Maybe that it’s not so bad being a fish. Or maybe, this song’s next resurgence is the best economic indicator of recession.

Shimon, the songwriter and singer, may be the only one who learnt anything from the craze. After the hit, he became a recluse from show business. He famously refuses interviews, and has chosen life away from the daily frying on an iron plate. He has taken on the mantle of the Japanese JD Salinger, making one hit and choosing a life away from work.

Oyoke Taiyuki-kun stands alone as a work of prophecy, while other novelty songs only capture the zeitgeist through dance and cheery tunes. Do you know any other examples of this phenomenon? Comment below other songs that have merged novelty music and satire of society.