Yuuri – Kakurenbo

I recently stumbled across another song that I’m currently in love with. I was first struck by the title, “Kakurenbo”, which means Hide-and-Go-Seek in Japanese. I was immediately curious to know why a song with such a childish title would be popular here.

The singer, Yuuri, has quite a powerful voice that grabbed my attention, but as I listened to the lyrics, the song immediately made its way into my usual rotation of music.

The song tells the story of a guy growing increasingly desperate for his loved one to return after they have walked out. The guy likens it to the lover merely playing a game of hide-and-go-seek, at one point crying, “Stop playing around, the sun’s about to go down.”

I love these kind of songs that mean more than they say. I think Japanese songs, in general, do a great job of writing intricate stories into their songs. Of course there are the vapid, “I love you. Yay!” songs here as well, but I have found more songs that have meaningful, interesting lyrics here than in a lot of Western songs I’ve listened to.

If you have time, I hope you’ll listen to it.

This is the original song
For some reason this video of the song has closed-captioned English subtitles, so if you’re curious about the meaning of the lyrics, check this video out.