Translation: Focus (Yellow Magic Orchestra)

Hosono's words, Hosono/Takahashi tune: Focus. I don't understand enough about photography to get the technical (or just metaphorical?) details of the shutter and position, and I'm iffy about the Japanese in a couple of places. Chinese YMO fans have translated all the songs on Naughty Boys, and their versions have been a key reference/comparison point as I make my own, but Focus seems to have confused the Chinese translator too.

So the words below are just an approximate version, one that gets the basic meaning across but misses the nuances. I'll give it another go in six months. (Edit: I did, and the translation is much improved now.)

The chorus, translated by Peter Barakan, appears in parentheses.



:::



Seems that it's happened again:
the day grew dark when I wasn't paying attention.
But these feelings boiling inside me
are not ordinary.

Out on the boulevard, it's a normal weekend.
The position is fixed, the shutter set.
Out on the boulevard, it's a noisy weekend.
The nausea's suppressed by the focus.

All of a sudden, at the street corner,
I get caught in a whirlpool of jealousy.
I saw a face I could never forget
in the company of a secret silhouette.

(You'll be burning with a new love tonight,
and I'll be burning old pictures on my mind.)

An unexpected weekend —
I'm crushing the TRY-X I'm holding.
An apocalyptic weekend —
there you are, distinctly in focus.

My smile stiff,
I shut my eyes.
The girl who, just now,
had turned her face

towards the camera
is already as distant as a star.

(You'll be burning with a new love tonight,

and I'll be burning old pictures on my mind.)

(Back to: List of Translations)