I was sad to hear the news of Eichi Ohtaki’s passing on December 30 of last year. I first discovered Ohtaki three or four years ago when I heard his songs playing over the speakers of ZACK, a recycle shop in Sugnami-ku known to at least a couple readers of this blog.  Since then, Ohtaki’s American-influenced songs have come back into my head once or twice a year. Here are a couple of those songs: