Soul Sister Tokyo-Style

Shawn Stockman and Nathan Morris of the U.S. doo-wop quartet Boyz II Men did more than produce 20-year-old Yuki Koyanagi’s latest CD, Intimacy. By executing a transpacific high five, they helped legitimize one of the strangest social trends in the land of the rising sun: Japanese who want to dress, act and sing as black as they can.

For nearly a decade, a subcult of young Japanese has tried breaking free of the country’s conformity by replicating and co-opting ‘hood images they’ve been fed by Hollywood. Japanese girls are so into the trend that marketers have invented labels for them: they’re called shisutaakei, “the sister group,” or “hip hop” after the music they like. Japan’s streets are where they fight their battle against the tired, older generations, with feather cell-phone straps, dreadlocks and black face paint.

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Now they have their own siren. Koyanagi not only resembles Alicia Keys in appearance, but she’s got similar pipes too. Koyanagi’s smooth ballads and hip-hop dance track Boyz Don’t Cry are worthy additions to any R. and B. collection. Most female J-Pop music is as heartfelt as sliced toast. In Koyanagi’s case, her soulful, ballsy croon sounds genuine, albeit incomprehensible at times. That Koyanagi sings in English—a language she does not understand—makes the album an even greater achievement.

Morris and Stockman met Koyanagi on a Tokyo television show and Koyanagi breezily suggested they sing together sometime. Nearly every song on the album was written by either Morris or Stockman and recorded at the Boyz II Men studio in Gladwyne, Pennsylvania. The two Boyz even lend their Grammy-winning vocals to the track I Don’t Want to Think About It, giving Koyanagi even greater opportunity to prove her mettle. The World Cup surprised us enough by showing that Japan’s got game. Watch out world: now it has soul.