"Turning Japanese"
Standard European picture sleeve
Single by the Vapors
from the album New Clear Days
B-side"Talk Talk" (USA/Canada)
"Here Comes the Judge" (live) (international)
ReleasedJanuary 1980
Genre
Length
  • 3:40 (Album version)
  • 3:19 (7" edit)
LabelUnited Artists Records
Songwriter(s)David Fenton
Producer(s)Vic Coppersmith-Heaven
The Vapors singles chronology
"Prisoners"
(1979)		 "Turning Japanese"
(1980)		 "News at Ten"
(1980)
Audio sample
  • file
  • help

"Turning Japanese" is a song by English band the Vapors, from their 1980 album New Clear Days. It was an international hit, becoming the band's most well-known song. The song prominently features an Oriental riff played on guitar.

Composition and recording

According to songwriter David Fenton, "Turning Japanese is all the clichés about angst and youth and turning into something you didn't expect."[2] Fenton intended the song to be a love song, with the character of the song "pining over a photograph of his ex-girlfriend" in his bedroom, drawing from Fenton's own experience of being rejected. Fenton wrote the song in his flat, but had problems writing the chorus. He said that the chorus then came to him suddenly when he woke up at 4am with the line "Turning Japanese, I think I'm turning Japanese" in his head, and he used it even though the words and the song title did not "really mean much".[3]

The song was produced by Vic Coppersmith-Heaven, who had previously rejected a request to produce for the band after listening to demos sent to him by the band's managers John Weller (father of Paul Weller) and Bruce Foxton. The band's unsuccessful first single "Prisoners" was therefore produced by someone else. He later had another listen to the demos and agreed to produce "Turning Japanese" for them. Coppersmith-Heaven proposed several changes to the arrangement of the song, so the finished recording has a different arrangement from the demo. He recorded the Vapors live to capture the energy of the band, before stripping it down to just the drums, and then overdubbed the song. According to Fenton, the drummer did not like the song, and "just went "Boom! Splat!"" in the recording, but the band thought it sounded good and kept it.[3]

The band suspected they would score a hit with "Turning Japanese", even delaying its release in order to make it their second single, hoping to avoid becoming "one-hit wonders". Nonetheless, they never matched the single's success.[4] In Australia, it spent two weeks at No. 1 during June 1980,[5] and, coincidentally, the song was also a minor hit in Japan.[2]

The music video was directed by Russell Mulcahy.[6]

Covers

The American ska punk band, Skankin' Pickle, covered the song on their 1994 album Sing Along With Skankin' Pickle.[7]

A cover of the song was also featured on America singer-songwriter Liz Phair's 1995 EP Juvenilia.

The song was featured on the soundtrack of the 1997 movie Beverly Hills Ninja covered by the band The Hazies.[8]

Kirsten Dunst recorded a cover, with an accompanying video filmed and directed by McG and produced by Takashi Murakami in Tokyo in August 2009.[9]

On the Canadian sketch comedy series Second City Television, Rick Moranis performed a lounge-style version of the song as the character Tom Monroe.[10]

Charts

Certifications and sales

Region CertificationCertified units/sales
Australia (ARIA)[23] Platinum 100,000^

^ Shipments figures based on certification alone.

See also

References

  1. 1 2 Mason, Stewart. "Turning Japanese – Song Review". AllMusic. Retrieved 28 June 2013.
  2. 1 2 "Turning Japanese by the Vapors". Songfacts. Retrieved 4 April 2009.
  3. 1 2 Simpson, Dave (13 February 2023). "'I'd rather be a one-hit wonder than a no-hit wonder' – the Vapors on Turning Japanese". The Guardian.
  4. ↑ Davis, Andy. "On the Vapor-trail". Parengstrom.com. Retrieved 23 June 2008.
  5. 1 2 Kent, David (1993). Australian Chart Book 1970–1992 (illustrated ed.). St Ives, N.S.W.: Australian Chart Book. p. 320. ISBN 0-646-11917-6.
  6. ↑ Dendle, first (2012). The Zombie Movie Encyclopedia, Volume 2: 2000-2010. McFarland & Company. p. 168. ISBN 9780786492886.
  7. ↑ "Skankin' Pickle - Sing Along with Skankin' Pickle". Discogs.
  8. ↑ "Where There's Smoke". Billboard. Vol. 109, no. 4. 25 January 1997. p. 27. ISSN 0006-2510.
  9. ↑ Schuker, Lauren A. E. (2 October 2009). "The Artist and the Director". The Wall Street Journal. Archived from the original on 19 December 2014.
  10. ↑ "Rick Moranis' Classic Cover of 'Turning Japanese' on SCTV (VIDEO)". HuffPost. 17 July 2011. Retrieved 28 August 2020.
  11. ↑ "Top RPM Singles: Issue 0274." RPM. Library and Archives Canada. Retrieved 30 May 2013.
  12. ↑ "The Irish Charts – Search Results – Vapors". Irish Singles Chart. Retrieved 28 July 2013.
  13. ↑ "The Vapors – Turning Japanese". Top 40 Singles. Retrieved 28 July 2013.
  14. ↑ "Official Singles Chart Top 100". Official Charts Company. Retrieved 28 July 2013.
  15. 1 2 "The Vapors – Awards". AllMusic. Archived from the original on 15 January 2013.
  16. ↑ "CASH BOX Top 100 Singles – Week ending NOVEMBER 29, 1980". Cash Box. Archived from the original on 15 September 2012.
  17. ↑ "Songs from the Year 1980". TsorT. Retrieved 27 April 2014.
  18. ↑ "National Top 100 Singles for 1980". Kent Music Report. 5 January 1981. Retrieved 17 January 2022 – via Imgur.
  19. ↑ "Forum – ARIA Charts: Special Occasion Charts – Top 100 End of Year AMR Charts – 1980s". Australian-charts.com. Hung Medien. Retrieved 17 October 2016.
  20. ↑ "Top 100 Singles". RPM. Vol. 34, no. 6. 20 December 1980. Retrieved 17 October 2016.
  21. ↑ "UK Singles of the Year" (PDF). Record Mirror. London. 27 December 1980. p. 30. Retrieved 17 October 2016.
  22. ↑ "Top 100 Singles of 1981". RPM. Vol. 35, no. 22. Retrieved 25 March 2018.
  23. ↑ "International Certifications" (PDF). Cash Box. Vol. XLII, no. 24. 25 October 1980. p. 43. Retrieved 3 December 2021 – via World Radio History.
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