J-pop

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J-pop is an abbreviation of Japanese pop. It refers to Japanese popular musicians, and was coined by the Japanese media, to distinguish Japanese musicians from foreign musicians.

[edit] Japanese musical trends

Hibari Misora is ranked number 5 in a list by HMV, of Japan's top 100 pops.^[1][2]

[edit] Jazz roots

J-pop can be traced to jazz music which became popular during the early Shōwa period (1926–1988). Jazz introduced many musical instruments, previously used only to perform classical music and military marches, to bars and clubs. It also added an element of "fun" to the Japanese music scene. As a result "Ongaku Kissa" (音楽喫茶—lit. "music cafe") became a very popular venue for live jazz music.

Under pressure from the Imperial Army during World War II, the performance of jazz music was temporarily halted. After the war ended the United States soldiers—who were occupying Japan at the time—and the Far East Network introduced a number of new musical styles to the country. Boogie-woogie, Mambo, Blues, and Country music were performed by Japanese musicians for the American troops. Songs like Shizuko Kasagi's "Tokyo Boogie-Woogie" (1948), Chiemi Eri's "Tennessee Waltz" (1951), Hibari Misora's "Omatsuri Mambo", and Izumi Yukimura's "Omoide no Waltz" became popular. Foreign musicians and groups including JATP and Louis Armstrong visited Japan to perform. 1952 was declared the "Year of the Jazz Boom" but the genre itself demanded a high level of technical proficiency and was difficult to play. As a result many amateur Japanese musicians turned to country music, which was far easier to learn and perform.^{[citation needed]} This in turn led to a proliferation of country-based music.

[edit] Rock-and-roll

Kyu Sakamoto, ranked 18 in the HMV top 100 pops list,^[2] poses with his school band.

In 1956, the rock-and-roll craze began thanks to a country music group known as Kosaka Kazuya and the Wagon Masters and their rendition of Elvis Presley's Heartbreak Hotel. The rock-and-roll movement would reach its peak in 1959 with the release of a movie featuring performances by a number of Japanese rock-and-roll bands. Some performers attempted to merge traditional Japanese pop music with rock-and-roll. One of few musicians to be successful in this effort was Kyu Sakamoto with the song "Ue wo Muite Arukō" (lit. "Let's Look Up and Walk"), known in other parts of the world as "Sukiyaki". The song was the first Japanese song to reach #1 in the United States (four weeks in Cashbox Magazine and three weeks in Billboard magazine) in its native language in America and also to receive a "Gold Record" for selling one million copies.[1] Other performers learned to play the music and translate the lyrics of popular American songs, resulting in the birth of "cover pop." However, the popularity of these acts faded as radio and television gave every household the opportunity to watch the original musicians perform. The concept of karaoke and its subsequent popularity can arguably be attributed to the cover pop phenomenon.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] New Music

From the early 1970s to the mid-1980s, the emphasis shifted from simple songs with a single guitar accompaniment (known originally as "folk") to more complex musical arrangements known as New Music. Instead of social messages, the songs focused on more personal messages, such as love. Takuro Yoshida and Yosui Inoue are two notable New Music artists.

In the 1980s, the term City Pop was used to describe a type of popular music that had a big city theme. Tokyo in particular inspired many songs of this form. It is difficult to draw a distinction between City Pop and New Music and many songs fall under both categories. Wasei Pop (lit. Japan-made pop) quickly became a common word to describe both City Pop and New Music. By the 1990s, J-pop became the common term to describe most popular songs. Rockers like Eikichi Yazawa, a singer who remained popular for decades with a rabidly loyal fan following, loosely fell into this category, along with more mainstream female pop idols such as the "Dance Queens" Yoko Oginome and her successor, singer/songwriter Chisato Moritaka. Hikaru Genji, the highly influential rollerskating boy band, also became popular during this time, with some of its members growing up to fame on their own. In 1980, Eikichi Yazawa, seeking worldwide success, signed a contract with the Warner Pioneer record company and moved to the West Coast of the United States. He recorded the albums "Yazawa," "It's Just Rock n' Roll," and "Flash in Japan," all of which were released worldwide, but were not very commercially successful. Mega-idol Seiko Matsuda, extremely popular through the 1980s, saw a bit more success with English-only songs released on her 1991 album "Eternal", and was hounded by U.S. tabloids for having a relationship with then red-hot Donnie Wahlberg of New Kids on the Block, who sang the duet "The Right Combination" with Seiko Matsuda. Seiko used to hold the record for most consecutive number 1 singles for a female artist in Japan (currently 25). That record was recently shattered by the singer Ayumi Hamasaki (currently 30, 18 of which are consecutive). Along with Seiko Matsuda, the latter 1980s were dominated by idol singers such as Miho Nakayama, Akina Nakamori, Chisato Moritaka, Minako Honda and Shizuka Kudo.

The late 1980s, saw the emergence of Chage and Aska, a male singer/songwriter duo consisting of Chage (Shuji Shibata) and Ryo Aska (Shigeaki Miyazaki). They released a string of consecutive hits throughout the 1980s and 1990s. Their "Asian Tour II / Mission Impossible" tour was the single largest concert tour ever put on by a Japanese group – the tickets for all 61 concerts in Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore and Taiwan sold out on the first day. However, with the advent of the Japanese dance-pop music pioneered by Namie Amuro and Tetsuya Komuro in the mid- to late-1990s, the popularity of rock groups like Chage & Aska has declined. This period also saw the rise of the female duo Wink. Wink debuted in 1988, surpassing the popularity of the then most popular female duo, BaBe. Also, the famous j-pop idols CoCo made their hit debut with the 1989 single EQUALロマンス (Equal Romansu, or Equal Romance) for the hit anime series らんま1/2 (Ranma 1/2).

[edit] The '90s

In the early 1990s, the music scene can be split up into different parts. 1990-1993 was dominated by the Being artists (Zard, Wands, Deen), B'z, and the Southern All Stars. 1994-1997 was dominated by the TK (Tetsuya Komuro) family. 1996 is known as a year where the Okinawan Actors School became dominant, with Namie Amuro, MAX (The Super Monkeys) and Speed leading the charge. Every Little Thing also rose to success in the late 90's after their debut album sold over 2,000,000 copies. 1997 saw the introduction of Morning Musume.

The boy band SMAP hit the J-pop scene in a major way in the 1990s through a combination of TV "Talent" shows and singles, with one of its singers, Takuya Kimura, becoming a popular actor in later years known commonly as "Kimutaku". By the late 1990s an all-female band, Morning Musume, became wildly popular, with a string of releases that were sales hits before even being released. Female pop groups like Speed, Zone and Morning Musume sold millions of records with their pop-techno sounds. Following the pattern set a decade before by the 1980s all-female Onyanko Club, Morning Musume spawned several splinter bands whose members continue to be popular.

R&B became popular in Japan in the late 1990s, when young singer-songwriter Utada Hikaru debuted with her first single Automatic / Time Will Tell. Her first album, First Love, sold 7,650,000 copies (10,650,000), making it the best-selling debut album and best-selling album ever in Oricon history.^[3] B'z 'The Best Pleasure' became second best selling album at 5,129,000 million copies,^[3] Glay's 'Review -The Best of Glay' the third best selling album at 4,876,000 million copies. Pop music was still popular in Japan during the late 90s and early 21st century with solo female singers such as Ayumi Hamasaki, Mai Kuraki, and Ami Suzuki enjoying either brief or long term success. In 2000, Southern All Stars's Single CD Tsunami recorded 2,934,965 million sales.^[4]

[edit] The twenty-first century

Namie Amuro (middle) performs at MTV Asia Aid in Bangkok, Thailand. She ranks 53 on HMV's list of 100 top 100 Japanese pops.^[2]

During the mid-2000s, Rhythm and blues and Hip hop music influences in Japanese music started to gain attention in popular mainstream music. J-Hiphop/rock bands such as Orange Range and Ketsumeishi have been at the top of the Oricon charts, with more established artists such as Spitz, Mr. Children, B'z, Southern All Stars, Glay and L'Arc~en~Ciel. There are production groups specialized for music talents as Johnny & Associates with female pop slowly declining since the 1990s, but artists such as Ayumi Hamasaki (Japan's highest selling female and solo artist), Utada Hikaru, and Every Little Thing during the late 90s and early 21st century able to reach the number 1 sales slots with most of their releases.^{[citation needed]}

In 2005 the Oricon charts were briefly ruled by hip-hop group Orange Range, Ketsumeishi, and R&B solo male singer Ken Hirai, with the Orange Range's 'Musiq' album selling over 2.5 million copies, making it the number one album for the year followed by Ketsumeishi's 'Ketsunopolis 4' album, and Ken Hirai's 'Sentimental Lovers' album.^[5] Shuji to Akira's 'Seishun Amigo' topped the annual singles release at 945,315 copies. The second and third best selling singles went to Ketsumeishi's 'Sakura' single at 942,675 copies, and Mr. Children's 'Yojiken -Four Dimensions-' at 924,379 million copies.^[6].

For 2006, Ken Hirai managed to come out on top with the release of '10th Anniversary Complete Single Collection '95-'05 Utabaka' selling over 2,000,000 million copies and becoming the number one album for 2006^[7] followed by new popular Japanese pop artist Kumi Koda's 'Best ~Second Session' album at 1,768,658 million copies,^[8] and Kobukuro's 'All Singles Best' album selling 1,748,682 million copies.^[8]

A shift took place in 2007 in regard to the music scene with the top 3 selling albums for the first half of the Oricon year going to Mr. Children's album 'Home' with 1,125,017 in sales,^[9] Koda Kumi's 'Black Cherry' with 998,230 in sales,^[9] and Ayumi Hamasaki's best of album A Best 2 -White- selling 720,120 copies.^[9] The top 3 singles for the first half of the year went to Japanese tenor singer Masafumi Akikawa's 'Sen no kaze ni natte' single which became a smash hit, managing to eventually sell over one million copies^[10], with Utada Hikaru's single 'Flavor of Life' selling 629,904 copies,^[11] and Arashi's 'Love so sweet' single selling 420,894 copies.^[11] Celebrating 15 years on the music scene, Japanese rock group Mr. Children passed 50 million sales in albums and singles sold, making them the second highest selling artist of all time in Japan,^[12] and Japanese pop singer Utada Hikaru sold 10 million digital ringtones and songs, making her the first artist ever to have this many digital sales in one year.^[13] In regard to concerts and tours, Mr. Children's 'Home' arena and stadium tour managed to have the most attended at 550,000 fans^[14], with Jpop singer Namie Amuro having the longest lasting tour for the year at 65 dates.^[15]

[edit] Impact on popular culture

J-pop music is an integral part of Japanese popular culture. It is used everywhere: anime, stores, commercials, movies, radio shows, TV shows, and video games and other forms of J-ENT. Some television news programs even run a J-pop song during their end credits.

In anime and television shows, particularly dramas, opening and closing songs are changed up to four times per year. As most programs have both opening and closing songs it is possible for one show to use 8 tracks in a single season.

Over the past decade, J-pop has continually gained fans worldwide through video games and anime. Many videogame fans import games from Japan well before they are released in their respective countries. The theme songs and soundtracks from these games can be a gateway to further interest in J-pop and other genres of Japanese music. One example of this can be found in the games Kingdom Hearts and Kingdom Hearts II, in which popular J-pop singer Utada Hikaru performs the main theme songs. Her song "Easy Breezy" was also used to promote the Nintendo DS. In the case of anime, shows are normally sold in the West with their original soundtracks untouched, affording more direct exposure. Some shows aired on television in the United States, for example, have seen their themes go so far as to become commercially available as ringtones through mainstream vendors in that country.

[edit] See also

• Oricon
• Bubblegum Pop
• J-ska
• J-rock
• K-pop
• Idol
• Music of Japan
• List of J-pop artists

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Oricon.co.jp
• Recording Industry of Japan
• nt - 2099 Media and Entertainment
• JpopAsia
• JpopMusician Database