I was at the Half Price Books in Seattle this morning, where I found a vinyl copy of Origato Plastico, the second LP by the late, great Plastics.

Plastics were made up of Toshi Nakanishi, Chica Sato, Hajime Tachibana, Masahide Sakuma, and Takemi Shima. During their relatively brief time together, they released three LPs and a few singles; the third album, Welcome Back Plastics, consisted of re-recordings of songs from their first two albums, and was released worldwide—including the US, where it was called simply Plastics. If you were around back then (1980/81), you might remember them from the video for ‘Top Secret Man’ that was shown on SCTV (the video for Talking Heads’ ‘Once in a Lifetime’ was aired during the same episode). If you weren’t, you might still be familiar with the Stereo Total cover of ‘I Love You Oh No!’ (re-titled ‘I Love You Ono’) that was used in a number of commercials.

In any event, when Plastics split, Toshi and Chica went on to form Melon, a more club-oriented group. (Tachibana continued making music as a solo artist, while also doing graphic design; Sakuma became a respected producer (he died of cancer in 2014); Shima joined Sakuma in the d.e.p, but I don’t know what else he has been up to.) Melon released two albums and a number of singles, including the club hits ‘Serious Japanese’ and ‘Hardcore Hawaiian’, before Toshi went on to form the Major Force label and Chica moved into the fashion world.

You can find a number of Plastics and Melon videos on YouTube; they’re well worth checking out.

Anyway, to finally get to the point, I wrote the following poem using as many Plastics and Melon song titles as I could…

Can I help me?
I don’t want to be desolate
but I can’t forget the complex
I love you—oh no!
That’s too much information, isn’t it?
Ignore the top secret man with the digital watch
he’s headed back to Wigtown
on the last train to Clarksville

I stepped into a quiet village
and found myself in a blade-runner city
I fell into an optimistic depression
The gate of Japonesia
was somewhere faraway
there wasn’t time enough for love
But I will call you
(and other famous last words…)

(8 January 2015)