Pink film's obscure spin-off

Flower and Snake (1974)

Do you know anything about pink film? Pink film is a style of Japanese soft-core porn theatrical film that was popular in the 60s-70s. Unlike the Western counterpart, pink film was in a sense not merely porn. While there were bunch of craps, you could also find artistic creativity and freedom there, launching many talented film directors. Underground, independent, anti-system, and critical art scene was there.

Here, I introduce you one of the weirdest music genres: pink film's spin-off music. As you can imagine, we had many popular porn stars back then. Some of the porn stars found opportunities to get into music business and recorded obscure songs. We call the style oiroke kayokyoku (お色気歌謡曲), which can be roughly translated as "sexual pop music" or something.

This is Ike Reiko (池玲子)'s "Kokotsu no Sekai" (恍惚の世界) from the album with same title.



While Ike Reiko's are pop music, you can also find more art-oriented avant-garde variation. This is Masami Kawahara & the Exotic Sounds (川原正美とエキゾティック・サウンズ)' "Taboo" from Kokotsu/Ecstasy (恍惚/エクスタシー). This conveys sadomasochist joy with voodooistic atmosphere.