The fifth track of the 1995 album Smoochy, Tango shares the touch of bossa nova and heavy Latin-American images as some other tracks in this album. The lyricist Taeko Ohnuki covered this song in UTAU and brought more charm to this song with her crystal, nostalgic voice.
To celebrate that UTAU finally becomes available for streaming and downloading internationally, I plan to translate all the lyrics of the songs composed by Sakamoto in this album.
Tango
曲：坂本龍一
詞：大貫妙子
スペイン語文：フェルナンド・アポンテ
Composer: Ryuichi Sakamoto
Lyricist: Taeko Ohnuki
Spanish lyrics by Fernando Aponte
乾いた道をころがる太陽
うちすてられた望郷の想い
時の狭間をさまよう情熱
空を映した瞳の色
The sun that tumbles the parched road
The nostalgia abandoned
The passion that wanders the slit of time
The color of eyes reflecting the sky
すべてを無くしすべてを手に入れ
場末の店で踊るtango
君の前ではただの道化
激しく不在に苛まれて
Losing it all and getting it all
Dancing tango in a rundown store
In front of you, I’m just a clown[1]
Tormented by the vehement void[2]
Un viaje sin luz
Un mundo sin sol
あなたを
失ってなお
追い求める
夢の果てまで
A journey without light
A world without the sun
Even though
I lost you
I’m still pursuing
To the end of the dream
視線を拒まぬあなたのすべて
裂けたドレスの甘い闇よ
誘惑に咲く紅い薔薇よ
結末の無い愛の黄昏
Everything about you who won’t refuse the gaze
The sweet darkness of your torn dress
In temptation blooms the red rose
Twilight of love without an end
El sueño se fue
Memorias de amor
あなたを
失ってなお
追い求める
夢の果てまで
遥かな旅へと
The dream is gone
Memories of love
Even though
I lost you
I’m still pursuing
To the end of the dreams
To a journey far away
ああ、La Plata の流れに
身をまかせ歌う
マテ茶をふくめば
ああ、 La tierra del fuego
短い春が 地の果てに薫る
O to the flow of La Plata
I surrender myself and sing
Sipping mate tea
O, La Tierra del Fuego[3]
A fleeting spring, fragrant at the end of the earth
窓の外に立ち止まる亡霊
止むことのない風の叫び
死者に繋がれ生きるのなら
土塊になりここで眠ろう
The ghost that stands still outside the window
The cry of the wind that never stops
If I live tethered to the dead
I shall sleep here turning to a clod of earth[4]
Amor y dolor
Unidos estan
あなたの
面影を今
追い求める
夢の果てまで
遥かなあなたを
Love and pain
Are united as one
Your image
Until now, I’m
Still pursuing
To the end of the dream
To you far, far away
Translator’s notes:
[1] In Sakamoto’s original version, the second person pronoun in this stanza is 君 (kimi), usually used by males. Ohnuki changes it into あなた (anata), the more common way to address others in her cover.
[2] 不在 does not only refer to one’s physical absence but also indicates a state of being emotionally distant, therefore, I chose void to suggest the double meaning- the narrator could be tormented being apart from the other or by the feeling of want because of the other’s indifference.
[3] The island in Argentina is known as “the end of the world.”
[4] I have not found Ohnuki’s own interpretation of the lyrics. Still, this stanza reminds me of the ending of Joyce’s timeless The Dead, and another piece by the Japanese novelist Tatsuo Hori 堀辰雄 on living “tethered to the dead,” “Yes, indeed-let the dead depart quietly away from us, let them go. How sinful is it to stir up the nostalgia for life in them and make them enter our sorrows and sufferings!” （さう、さうだとも、――死者達は私達から靜かに立ち去つて行くがままにさせよう。彼等の裡に生への郷愁のやうなものを掻き立てて、私達の悲しみや苦しみに立ち入らせることがいかに罪深いことか！）
It is not the dead that tethers themselves to the earthly world and keeps haunting the living. We the living are also “the victim of love,” as in Anne Carson’s poem, that cannot let go of our memories. This stanza adds to the ambiguity and the dark appeal of the whole song- do the recurring images of loss, desolation, and travel actually suggest the distance between life and death?
Between Thought and Expression 