Translation: Schooldays Spent Daydreaming (Part 2) (Morio Agata)

One of the audacious things about Morio Agata is that he'll fill his albums with reprises... no I know, that in itself is not audacious, lots of artists do that (not, however, enough artists). But you know how standard procedure is to put space between repeating motifs? The Band on the Run chorus bookends its album; Mrs. Vandebilt's reappears only towards the end of Side B; there are several minutes of music between You Never Give Me Your Money and Carry That Weight; The Happiest Days of Our Lives divides Another Brick in the Wall 1 and 2; etc. That's standard procedure. 

But Agata's never bothered much with standard. 

His 1985 psych-folk triple-album masterpiece 永遠の遠国 (That Everlasting, Far-Off Land) is a wonderful extreme, with Side A basically being different arrangements of the same song all lined up in a row, and Side E doing the same thing again (even more transparently) for a different song. And those two songs still get reprised in a more ordinary way on Sides D and F.

And so, directly after Schooldays Spent Daydreaming (Part 1) comes Schooldays Spent Daydreaming (Part 2) (Agata/Agata, arr. Keiichi Suzuki). Honestly, listening to the album straight through, you wouldn't necessarily realize that Parts 1 and 2 are different tracks. It transitions so smoothly.

The arranger is Keiichi Suzuki of Moonriders, later of The Beatniks (with Yukihiro Takahashi), and later still of Mother/Earthbound OSV fame. Keiichi, who produced That Everlasting, Far-Off Land, learned the trade by observing Haruomi Hosono work on Zipangu Boy. As the double album took shape, Suzuki found himself wishing that Hosono would just fall asleep already, so that he (Suzuki) would have a chance to take over for half a track or two. No words were spoken about this burning desire but Hosono must have noticed, because here and there pockets were suddenly left open, as if on purpose, for Suzuki to take the lead on — Schooldays 2 being one of them.

Haruomi and Keiichi were old friends by then. Keiichi was already hovering around in the Happy End days (he and Agata, who were in a band called Hachimitsu Pie together, got Hosono to play bass on Agata's home-recorded 1970 debut album, 蓄音盤 / The Gramophone). He played piano with them at their farewell concert in autumn 1973, and liked to daydream of the band continuing with him in it full-time.

Postscript: there aren't many things better than being so moved by a song that I cry while I'm translating it. I wonder if Zipangu Boy will have moments like that. I did tear up a little bit, working on this one. But what I really want is to weep like a baby.

:::

The distant silver sea...

Schooldays spent daydreaming.

All of us enjoying

summer break together...

Schooldays spent daydreaming.

I'll be a good boy, and wait...

And where are those terraced fields

swimming off to now?

Ever closer to the sea.

Ding-dong... dreaming days.

The distant silver country...

Schooldays spent daydreaming.

And all along, the summer break...

Schooldays spent daydreaming.

I'll be a good boy, and wait

for my ear infection to get better.

It's not like I've never swum before.

We'll all go swimming,

and we'll swim fast.

Ding-dong... dreaming days.

.

And so the boy dozes, and dreams, and finds himself embarking on a journey to the Pure Land.

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