I have a particular strategy to easy people into japanese music. I'm talking about ones who only listen to songs sang in english or in their mother tongue (if english is not their 1st language).

My aproach is to introduce western sounding japanese bands, usually starting with songs sang in english, or at least partially. And for that, Kimonos' Almost Human is perfect. It feels like a low-tempo and melancholic Gotye (famous for "Somebody that I used to know"). Their Soundtrack to Murder is sort of like the japanese equivalent of The Police.

Kimonos was a side project of Leo Imai, who's got some really good songs like Real and Higashi e Nishi e. He is/was also part of many other projects like Metafive (a super band with the likes of Yukihiro Takahashi, Towa Tei, Cornelius and such) and Testset, so going down the Leo Imai rabbit hole is very interesting to say the least.

For other genres, I can say Paris Match's Killing You could've easily been a lost song from Michael Jackson's Off the Wall, at least instrumental wise and with a japanese female singer.

Fans of King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard will automatically enjoy Kikagaku Moyo's Smoke and Mirrors. From there, I can introduce other great rock songs like Boris' Naki Kyoku or Yura Yura Teikoku's Nantonaku Yume O.

Towa Tei's Alpha is an easy one cause of its relative online success cause of the anime Super Crooks (adapted from an american comics), besides considering he was part of the american trio Deee-Lite. Fans of the band can easily transition to his solo works.

Nujabes is another good one, especially cause I can go from Feather to Shiki no Uta very smoothly.

Anyway, what are your japanese songs and bands that you would share with people who aren't into, or never listened to japanese music and are reluctant to give it a try?

Help! I apologize but I’ve exhausted my googling ability and I’ve been trying to find a song that popped up in a random YouTube mix with the ending of let this grieving souls retire. I was driving so I didn’t look at my phone. Saw a post where this awesome community helped find a song for another person a few years ago while trying to Shazam the song. Here’s what I remember of it

The lyrics of one part are similar to the following words

(Shigai Shigai ) starting words (I am probably very off of the part of the song I remember )

Then the melody goes do doodoo doodoo doo Do do

And the end part of the lyrics in that part have the word in an O word

It also has like a choir of deeper voices singing along at this part

I believe it was the ending song to an anime

Lastly the lyrics to the part I remember translated to English are something like We live we love we support it was very like “we” based.

I apologize asking for help, but my brain is losing it trying to find this song

I went to HYDE's concert in LA on Saturday, and it was so fun! It was my first time seeing an artist that I like so much live. It was also so fun just to see other fans talking about HYDE. Everyone was so excited that the floor was literally shaking lol

anyone have lyrics of “natsu no maboroshi”(夏の幻) by mahito the people(from GEZAN)? love this song so much!

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLx7_noyhwq00xyyye4Gr-j3N02Wk00PC-

its a long playlist but i would appreciate it if you can suggest some similar work regarding to the playlist :p
i wouldnt mind a few comments either
im thinking about catogorizing it into seperate playlists with different themes n stuff oh well
maybe later

I saw this music artist filming a video in Shibuya last year and have been trying hard to identify him.

It's a Japanese song and the singer is a girl but the mv has a two high school girls they were friends but their faces is not shown the title and everything were in Japanese that's the only things I remember so please please help me find it

And also there were really strong vocal and high note in the song and they were wearing high school uniform

Hey there everyone. I'm currently reading a manga called Choujin X, and in the tonkobon releases, the author lists the background music he imagines for certain chapters. The opening for one chapter is Strip the Ueno by Kaori Nakano. I've been trying to find it but I just haven't had any luck. I've found the artist (i think) but I haven't found the actual song yet.

Can anyone help me out? Thank you very much

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Hey yall!! No one in my friend group or anyone that I know in Detroit are super into this kind of stuff. Just looking to make friends and share music!!

about a two years ago i heard an album on youtube, the cover was all blue, it was some kind of deep-sea related, it looked like a jellyfish ofc i don't remember the name the only thing i remember that there weren't any latin letters in the name of the video how it sounded: most of it was some kind of calm ambient music But in the middle of the album there was a very fast(compared to other part of the album) track that was using midis of traditional Japanese instruments, it was upbeat and energetic. whole album sounded like smth from 90s or 80s(im not sure maybe even 2000s) please help

I recently found out about Ike's story. I'm a non-Japanese listener of J-pop/rock therefore I'm struggling to find people of my taste. I'm new to Reddit and J-music so don't mind if I seem a little weird🚣‍♀️.

The point is IKE. Finding out about him I only want to know if he's doing okay. I researched a bit and turns out he did release a song featured by him about a year ago. I was relieved to find REPLICA (if you've heard it). Hoping I get a new song good or bad I just want to hear IKE and know he's alright.

Looking to freshen up my playlist. Hit me with your favorite 2024-released songs! Also a cool recap of the year.

Here’s mine:

Same Blue - Official Hige Dandism

Wish I could see you, but - Aimyon

Otonoke - Creepy Nuts

Wakamono no subete - suis from Yorushika (this is a cover that released this year)

Imo this song deserves all the fame and recognition it's got and more!

I tear up every single time at:

その髪に触れただけで

痛いや いやでも
甘いな いやいや
グッバイ

It's so beautiful and heartbreaking and I think anyone that has ever experienced unrequited love before can totally relate.

I really wish I could get my English-speaking friends to appreciate it too but understanding the lyrics makes it hit so much harder (at least to me) it almost feels like doing them a disservice.

Sorry I just needed to get this off my chest since I don't really know anyone else that listens to Japanese music.

I don’t know if this is the right subreddit for this, but I’ve been trying to find songs in Japanese similar to goodbye, specifically the male vocals. When people recommend similar stuff it’s always entirely instrumental, but I particularly like the sound of this song with the vocals. Any recommendations? Or suggestions for a better place to ask this

https://youtu.be/e1pZIfretEs?si=cIUyWeg6BO_dwmNW

I’m specifically looking for Japanese vocals, and male. I already listen to a lot of tricot and similar bands. But it’s always female vocals . Another band that matches this vibe I feel like is yukiguni https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-p5fSjGXUVI&ab_channel=%E9%9B%AA%E5%9B%BD

But I'm looking more for the toe vibe in goodbye, so far I've found nothing like it, and it truly is just one of those songs that hits different

I assume its a video game-oriented song surrounding mechs and fighting robots, and I remember I saw the youtube video once and it had a yellow cover. Theres multiple people singing in it so its a group, a couple guys lead the opening verses then a girl sings the bridge, they all sing the Chorus in a harmony where they say some english words " .... my heart, .... my soul", and then theres a part later in the song where it says MOTO MOTO.... I hope this is enough!

I recently went to Japan and visited a ton of Village Vanguard stores. The number one thing I enjoyed at these stores was the music that was on display which ranged from emo to oi punk.

I wanted to get more Japanese music recommendations from village Vanguard because I've enjoyed everything I heard. All of it was new music and Nothing I have ever heard before.

Does anyone know if Village Vanguard has a music blog or anywhere where they recommend new music?

If not that's ok because I found this sub in my search for answers. If you know of any blogs that recommend similar music to Village Vanguard please share them