Sachiko Kanenobu

Sachiko Kanenobu (aka Japanese: 金延幸子 and かねのぶさちこ), is generally acknowledged as Japan’s first female singer-songwriter. Discovered as an precocious 18 year old (in Osaka, Japan), Sachiko was signed in 1968 to Japan’s first ever independent record company, URC (Underground Record Club), who changed Japan’s musical landscape irrevocably, in the late 60s and early 70s, with artists including: はっぴいえんど, Folk Crusaders and 遠藤賢司. She was the only female artist, on this era-defining label. The fact that, as a female, Sachiko wrote and sang her songs, made her a rarity in Japan. A few months before the release of her début album, "Misora" (1972 - aka 金延幸子's "み空"), Sachiko secretly emigrated, from Japan to America, to marry music critic Paul Williams (Crawdaddy Magazine, Rolling Stone). "Misora" was released in her absence and promptly disappeared, not having an artist to promote it. She did not record again for almost a decade and didn’t release another album until 1992. Instead she settled with Williams in small-town California and raised two sons. World renowned science fiction author Philip K Dick, a Williams family friend, actually encouraged Sachiko to return to music in the early 80s. He was executive producer for a single recorded in 1981, but sadly died before he could realise his ambition to produce Sachiko’s comeback album. Still, Sachiko was inspired by his encouragement and reinvented herself with gusto as a ‘folk-punk’ singer, forming new band Culture Shock in the mid 80s. Sachiko still performs to this day and since Misora was rediscovered by Japanese fans in the early 90s, has returned to her homeland many times to perform. Misora is now regarded as a landmark in Japanese musical history, and Sachiko is revered there as a true underground folk pioneer. Sites: Discogs and Ja.Wikipedia. Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.