On Christmas Day, December 25, 2024, a single record was quietly released. The A-side features a remix by Van Paugam, a Chicago-based DJ who pioneered the global City Pop boom, of “Kagirinaki Natsu” (Endless Summer) sung by the legendary singer-songwriter and composer Yoichi Takizawa, who passed away in 2006 at the young age of 56. The B-side contains the “phantom recording” “Kagirinaki Natsu 1982 Mix,” discovered by chance on an open-reel tape found in Takizawa’s home. Each of the two versions of “Kagirinaki Natsu” contained on this single record carries its own miraculous story. Here we present the “secret tales” surrounding the unknown City Pop masterpiece “Kagirinaki Natsu” and the two tracks featured on this single release.
The Trans-Pacific Connection: Hideki Saijo and Yoichi Takizawa’s “Kagirinaki Natsu”
Hideki Saijo’s 1984 album “GENTLE・A MAN” (RCA) is now being reevaluated as a City Pop masterpiece. One track on this album, the second song on the B-side, is “Kagirinaki Natsu,” composed by Yoichi Takizawa, who is also being reevaluated as a City Pop artist.
This song was originally scheduled to appear on Takizawa’s “phantom 2nd album” “BOY,” which was shelved just before its 1982 release. When the album was cancelled, Takizawa brought the song to his longtime acquaintance at RCA, director Tasuku Okamura, who arranged for it to be provided to Hideki Saijo.
Through three years of research, I discovered that this song was performed by members of Takizawa’s backing band “Magical City”: Hiroshi Shinkawa, Jun Aoyama, and Koki Ito. This led me to discover an American man who had become captivated by this song.
Van Paugam,
a DJ living in Chicago, had been uploading City Pop mixes of Japanese music from the 70s and 80s to his YouTube channel since 2016. His subscriber count easily exceeded 90,000, with some videos garnering millions of views.
Internet archive
However, his account was banned in 2019 for allegedly violating YouTube’s terms of service at the time. His great achievement of “spreading Japanese City Pop worldwide through YouTube” remained unknown to Japanese people, and even overseas internet users rarely remembered his name anymore.
Van’s City Pop mixes can still be heard on “Mixcloud” today, showing that he introduced City Pop, now a global standard, earlier than anyone else. I learned about this through his blog and articles about him on overseas music sites.
When I discovered that Van had encountered Saijo’s “GENTLE・A MAN” album, found the charm of “Kagirinaki Natsu” within it, and even created a special page on his website to introduce it, I reached out to him for an email interview.
Here is the interview I conducted with him in 2023:
Interview with DJ Van Paugam, Pioneer of the Global City Pop Boom (Recorded in 2023)
— Thank you for accepting this email interview despite your busy schedule. I learned that you’re a big fan of “Kagirinaki Natsu” (1984) sung by Hideki Saijo. What led you to discover this song?
Van: I first heard the song when I was researching Hideki’s music a few years ago. Since hearing it, it has become one of my favorite songs from him, which I often credit as one of his best works.
— Why do you like “Kagirinaki Natsu”? What aspects of this song appeal to you?
Van: It’s difficult to say other than that its a beautifully constructed piece of music that speaks to the senses. It has differents modes in which the listener builds up the expectation of the roaring chorus that sweeps over you. His voice is perfect for the song, and his delivery of the lyrics in sync with the melodies works to a spectacular effect. The subject matter of the song is also very beautiful, and also melancholy. It’s simply a perfect song.
— How did you come to know that a music genre called Japanese City Pop existed?
Van: I discovered City Pop as a proper genre in 2015, but it wasn’t until 2016 that I started to buy records and make mixes of the music. I honestly had to idea that the music existed beyond snippets of it being used for remixes. I was naturally gravitating towards certain albums as being City Pop without really knowing. It wasnt until I ordered a book called called ‘Japanese City Pop Disc Collection‘ edited by Kimura Yukata in 2011, that I confirmed my ideas that many of these albums were in some way connected. I was naturally organzing music according to the book without knowing, this is what made me believe that I should continue working with City Pop.
— I listened to your City Pop mix uploaded in 2016. I believe you are the person who “discovered City Pop” earliest in the world. So why was your YouTube channel closed and why is your name unknown to Japanese people?
Van: Unfortunately, I was forgotten by much of the world once my YouTube channel was taken down for hosting the mixes. The Recording Industry Association of Japan personally requested my channel be taken down, which permanently casted a shadow on my credibility in the eyes of many. I had petitioned for them to remove the strikes, and I would work with them on promoting the music in a legal way, but they refused to do so.
Many years of my working to promote the City Pop, which is now being celebrated worldwide, had been taken from me. It made my life very difficult after. I felt very lost, and wondered if it was even worth it in the end to be humiliated in such a way for trying to share this music with the world. To add insult to injury, many of the songs I was using had been licensed to YouTube afterwards, so my channel was a needless victim. Many City Pop mixes from other channels are still available on YouTube currently, so I never understood why only my mixes needed to be taken down, when they could have just been licensed to YouTube instead. I was never given a chance.
— I want to spread your name, as a pioneer of the global City Pop boom, to more Japanese people. Please tell me in detail about discovering City Pop music and how much you love this music.
Van:As a second-generation immigrant to America born in Miami, Florida, I never felt connected to American culture.I have always admired Japanese culture, and throughout the years my love for it blossomed. I spent many times wondering what my purpose in life would be, because I never fit in where I was. When I found City Pop it was like finding my reason for existing. By spreading the music which many had forgotten, It brought much happiness to many people, including myself. I found a way to reconnect with something inside me that had been asleep. City Pop became a ritual for my awakening to new understanding about myself, the west, and Japan. The fact that so many had forgotten the music was incredible to me, and being the first one to put many of these songs together in mixes felt like a new frontier. I was doing what my spirit instructed me to do.
Years later, an American record label called ‘Light in the Attic’ used many of the songs from my mixes for vinyl compilations, while I was left uncredited for any of my work in rediscovering the music in the west. When my channel was taken down I felt betrayed, because it felt as if I was not taken seriously for my passion for Japanese music. I thought maybe if I had been Japanese it would be more acceptable. To this day I find it very difficult to speak about the subject, and often try to not think about it, because of the pain it causes me. My intentions have always been good, and even without my channel I still take opportunities to play the music at live events for people to enjoy. The music still brings me a sense of happiness, albeit melancholy, but I will always love it for the magic that it provides. City Pop is something that has the power to bring people from many parts of the world together, and now that it has been released into the hearts of newer generations it will never be forgotten again.
— Finally, I recently learned that an original version (1982) of “Kagirinaki Natsu” sung by composer Yoichi Takizawa exists. If that source is found, would you like to listen to it?
Van: Of course! I’d be happy to re-edit it if given the opportunity.
— Your responses to these questions will be published on Japan’s Alfa Music official note. Thank you for your responses despite your busy schedule.
Van: No Problem. Thank you for the opportunity.
[Originally published in: “Kagirinaki Natsu” by Hideki Saijo and Yoichi Takizawa Across the Ocean. The Universality Discussed by DJ Van Paugam, the Key Figure Who Spread City Pop to the World (ALFA MUSIC official note)]
After this interview, we continued communicating through messengers for about two years. In 2024, when Takizawa’s “phantom 2nd album” “BOY,” which had been tragically shelved in 1982, became available for release through new mixing work from multitrack master tapes, we officially commissioned Van to remix the Takizawa version of “Kagirinaki Natsu.”
Being able to provide Van with the multitrack source made the remix work possible. After struggling and taking a journey to trace the roots of the music he had encountered, he completed the track after about two years. This source was included as a bonus track on the CD version of Yoichi Takizawa’s “BOY” released on December 18, 2024—42 years after being shelved—and was also released as an analog single record by Warner Music Japan on December 25th.
The distributor is “Magmag Inc.,” the company that operates the news site “MAG2 NEWS” where this article is published, and a special sales page was also opened on BASE.
Yoichi Takizawa『かぎりなき夏 Endless Summer』Van Paugam 2024 Remix EP
The single’s jacket features an illustration by Eizin Suzuki, the illustrator familiar from City Pop albums like Tatsuro Yamashita’s “FOR YOU,” titled “Endless Summer.”
Eizin Suzuki ‘Endless Summer’
This was chosen because Van is the greatest contributor to the rediscovery of City Pop, Takizawa also made significant contributions to City Pop music, and Suzuki’s illustrations symbolizing that boom were deemed most appropriate.
The B-side of this single features Yoichi Takizawa’s “Kagirinaki Natsu 1982 Mix.” This source was discovered through a series of coincidences, and it miraculously became possible to include it on this single. Here is that episode, revealed for the first time.
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The “Miraculous City Pop” That Fortunately Escaped Tape Deterioration
On April 20, 2021, I published the world’s first article researching and introducing the musical activities and life of singer-songwriter and composer Yoichi Takizawa, who made great contributions to City Pop.
After publishing this article, I continued interviewing related parties to search for the source of Takizawa’s “phantom 2nd album” “BOY,” which was shelved in 1982 and remained postponed. With cooperation from the director and live bar owner at the time, I was able to contact Noburo Ishizaki, the former house engineer at Warner Pioneer who handled the recording of “BOY.”
From my phone conversation with Ishizaki, I obtained testimony that he had “a memory of giving Takizawa an open-reel tape copy of the ‘BOY’ source.” I then asked Takizawa’s family, “Could you look for any open-reel tapes that Takizawa might have preserved at home?”
Takizawa’s wife reported, “We found them. They had been in moving boxes for a long time,” and I received those tapes.
TAPE
However, the “BOY” tapes discovered here were severely deteriorated and unusable. Instead, from another tape recording performances with “Magical City” found in the same box, unknown history and the existence of sources by Takizawa and his band members became clear.
Multiple tapes marked “BOY” were found at the Takizawa residence and handed over to Yoshikazu Ozawa of Warner Music Japan’s Warner Hybrid Strategic Japanese Music Division.
These tapes were severely deteriorated after 40 years and couldn’t be used as masters for a complete CD album. However, among them was one tape containing just “Kagirinaki Natsu” that had escaped deterioration.
This meant we could release the sound exactly as it was mixed in 1982 when it was recorded. However, even though it escaped deterioration, there was still slight hiss noise, making it unsuitable for CD inclusion.
When Ozawa messaged that “it cannot be used for CD, but could be released as an analog record,” I decided to use this “phantom 1982 Mix” as the B-side source for Van’s remix analog single record.
This version contains “wave sound effects” that weren’t in the 2024 new mix version. While this version should be the original, the wave sound effects weren’t preserved in the multitrack master, so the 2024 mix couldn’t reproduce the wave sounds in either the CD or analog album versions.
However, this “phantom 1982 Mix” allows City Pop fans to hear everything exactly as it was mixed in 1982, including the wave sound effects.
This source is currently available on various music subscription services including Spotify and Apple Music. However, as a physical format, it can only be heard by obtaining the analog single “Kagirinaki Natsu Van Paugam 2024 Remix” released on December 25, 2024.
かぎりなき夏（1982Mix）／滝沢洋一
オンエアー！
このバージョンはこのレコードでしか聞けません！#キュウオン https://t.co/JkcLXRnb3N pic.twitter.com/2uvSASWTLm— BAYFM 9の音粋 (@cue78MHz) July 17, 2025
Please take this opportunity to experience the original 1982 sound through the warmth of analog records.
Yoichi Takizawa’s “Kagirinaki Natsu 1982 Mix” was a source made possible by a series of miracles: Van, who became the catalyst for the global City Pop boom, encountered Takizawa’s “Kagirinaki Natsu” (reevaluated in the City Pop context) through Hideki Saijo, leading to the decision to release this remix analog record.
The Takizawa version of “Kagirinaki Natsu,” which was revived after 42 years at the end of 2024, will experience its “first summer” this year.
Hideki Saijo, Yoichi Takizawa, and Van Paugam. For this fortunate masterpiece where the baton has been passed, an “eternal summer” now begins.
● MAG2 NET SHOP EP Special site
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Related Articles：
- The miraculous story of the discovery of a phantom Japanese City Pop album “BOY” sealed away for 42 years, and the timeless masterpiece “Endless Summer -Kagirinaki Natsu-“
- The 47-Year Truth of the Global City Pop Boom Created by Takizawa Yoichi and “Magical City” [Vol.1] Miraculously Discovered Mass of Demo Tapes
- The Miracle Trajectory of City Pop: Takizawa Yoichi and Magical City – [Vol.2] Demo Tapes Filled with Masterpieces
- The Miracle of City Pop “Endless Summer,” the Masterpiece Neither Tatsuro Yamashita nor Hideki Saijo Noticed: Yoichi Takizawa and Magical City – [Vol.3] Final Chapter