Translation: Spring is Here (Chu Kosaka)

Say what you might about the lack of verisimilitude in Country Roads, you can't fault Kosaka and Hosono for not being playful or imaginative enough. Hosono, a Tokyo native just like Kosaka, contributed his own "country boy who moved to the city misses the countryside" song. Spring is Here, Hosono's take, opens Side B, and Country Roads, Kosaka's take, closes it, which makes me think they knew what they were after.

As you'd expect of someone whose other contributions to the album were Festival of Mud and Thank You, this is one gorgeous song. The chorus sounds odd but the lyrics ground it. 

On the album tracklist, it's an unassuming prelude to Evening Firefly, the album's long and jammy centerpiece. But lately I've found it nice to put Spring is Here on repeat and play it for an hour or two at a time. It's really soothing.

Come to think of it, this song's gently meditative spirit might make it the earliest stirring of the Hosono who would later bring us Watering a Flower, Mercuric Dance, and Medicine Compilation from the Quiet Lodge.



:::

Spring is here.

But where is "here" ?

Coming over the mountains

and down through the valleys.

In my old home village.

In the mountains of my home.

In the countryside

I've dreamed about —

the countryside I dream about

no matter how much time goes by.

I'm facing the window

and humming a song.

Yupita iyaio ~

(One year has passed.)

Yupita iyaio ~

(On into the second year.)

Yupita iyaio ~

(Now it's been three years.)

Yupita iyaio ~

(Through the fourth year too.)

[ repeat all of the above, then — ]

The countryside keeps moving

further and further away,

further and further away.

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