Tatsuro Yamashita’s For You at 40

Yo Ho, WeRCatz here!

In January 1982, City Pop master Tatsuro Yamashita released his sixth studio album For You.

After the huge success of his fifth album, Ride On Time in 1980, Yamashita spent 1981 on tour. This would prove both hard and fortuitous: Yamashita’s next album would be difficult to make but his band kept on improving their skills while performing live. Because of this occurrence, Yamashita’s dream of producing his works came true: he would be able to focus on recording everything he wanted without the need for time and money budgets.

With the coming of the Walkman and advances in car stereo sound, production would craft the sound quality of the album. This would help retain sound quality when one were to pop in a cassette tape or drive around town. By doing this, For You created an atmosphere of summertime fun and resort pop; Yamashita would then be known since then as the “Summer Song Guy.” Who wouldn’t pop on a fun album during summer and take a joyride just for fun?

The cover art for the album is itself bright and full of summer fun before the fun starts. Originally, Yamashita wanted Hiroshi Nagai to make the cover. However, it wasn’t possible due to Nagai’s commitment to his work on Eiichi Ohtaki’s album A Long Vacation. The cover art was then completed by Eizin Suzuki.

Only two singles came out of this album: “Loveland, Island” and “Your Eyes.” “Your Eyes” was written by Yamashita and songwriter Alan O’Day in 1981. This would start a collaboration between the two and would eventually create the 1984 soundtrack album Big Wave; the album would win a Gold Disc Award in Japan.

For You would be Yamashita’s second big album that would prolong his success. City Pop would have a lasting legacy thanks in part to this album. Try it out whenever you have time to joyride in your car. It works best when driving around the coast during summer!