After Midnight

Doors and Ray Charles covers sit alongside “Kanashii Iro ya ne,” the big hit that proved Masaki Ueda could sing a Kansai lament without softening his roots. Even that song, written by Satoshi Hayashi, has an assured upper-register groove underneath it. But After Midnight offers much more than its best-known track.

“Straight Life” opens with a sound that announces itself at once. “Left Alone” has an unusual city-pop richness, close in spirit to the more polished pop of the period. “Pure Mind” pairs a chorus with a cast of musicians you might not expect to meet on the same session. The resulting album establishes Ueda as a singer with a reach far beyond any single soul or funk label.