The Endless Life Cycle of Japanese City Pop

https://pitchfork.com/features/article/the-endless-life-cycle-of-japanese-city-pop/

by tintinnabula • 5 years ago

42 17 5 years ago

pitchfork.com

AdmiralAsshat• 5 years ago

The article seems to be accusing Americans listening to city pop through YouTube of light Orientalism.

If people enjoy it, what's the problem?

ghgdynb1• 5 years ago

Legitimately thank you your comment saved me a click.

tomdell• 5 years ago

Pitchfork editorials almost always skew more political than musical.

krapp• 5 years ago

Nothing. I don't think it is Orientalism, to me that implies dehumanizing or infantilizing Japanese people or fetishizing their culture, but city pop and other vaporwave genres just appreciate the aesthetic. It has a particularly nostalgic quality for a lot of Westerners who grew up with Japanese media.

And Japanese culture does the same thing with Western pop culture, Western music and English.

mc32• 5 years ago

It’s complete BS. People can like whatever the F legal thing they want to like no explanation necessary.

This is absurd. So overseas people can’t listen to American music or cinema unless they “understand us” and the culture? Likewise I can’t like French wine unless I’m a connoisseur? Or I can’t listen to Swedish pop or death metal unless I immerse into Swedish culture etc?

Or I can’t eat tacos unless I’m Mexican or no one can eat hamburgers or play basketball but Americans, etc? Eff off.

People can fetishize whatever they want when they want. Some guys like Kanye and Tiger fetishized blondes. Guys like Nick Cage and George Soros fetishize Asians, etc. Get over it.

This is just childish and absurd.

teterphiel• 5 years ago

The problem is that journalism doesn't pay much anymore and confers less status and prospect than a coal miner. To make up the difference, they pick up arms against imgainary foes (secret, undetectable yet very dangerous orientalism) to give their lives a meaning it wouldn't otherwise have. Young woke liberals roughly go through the same as the members of UFO cults in the 70s: Unable to accept being discarded by society, they place themselves at the center of a galactic conspiracy.

claudiawerner• 5 years ago

There are some points I want to make about the article; firstly, the article doesn't paint listeners (including myself in that group as an owner of ~100 Japanese 70s/80s records) as orientalists. Rather, it claims that the surge in the popularity of city pop has emerged out of stereotypes and biases about Japan, the past, and past Japan. Those stereotypes, and being built into a fetish, is the orientalist element.

The Pitchfork writer doesn't say that's a problem. It's more of an article along the lines that the unexamined life is not worth living. Neither the writer (nor the academic they cite) are going to be starting a campaign to get Google to take down city pop album rips on YouTube. They're not on a campaign to get it banned. They're not going to be breaking into your house to confiscate your headphones. They're not calling me racist.

If someone had written an article about the rise in popularity of Jazz in the 50s being founded in the idea of the black entertainer to be appreciated for his amazing skill in contrast to other blacks (think along the lines of the movie Green Book for an exploration of the ideas), that might be a valid observation, and something to think about. What attracts you to jazz? Do you know what attracts you to jazz, and how do you know that? It doesn't mean you're a racist, in the same way liking porn doesn't mean you're a misogynist.

So there is no 'problem', but maybe it's something to think about and reflect on. I think the article prompted me to do that, but maybe not in the way it intended. Desires and preferences (as much as people can pass things off as 'just what I like') may be worthy of moral consideration, according to some philosophers. I'll keep listening to my records, but I'll also examine what's behind them in my mind. The article does a good job of pointing to the phenomenon of 'Cool Japan' without actually mentioning it. In particular, the last sentence.

On the other hand, it's worth considering what effects articles like these have on listeners. If they come away with the impression that it's wrong to listen to city pop or any music that isn't from "their culture", there's been a failure in communication that would seem to encourage people to become cloistered in the superiority of their own cultures, which reduces the recognition of what we have in common as humans.

It's a complicated issue. I don't think the article does a great job of addressing it.

627467• 5 years ago

Appropriating culture appropriation.

jniedrauer• 5 years ago

There was a time in the recent past where musicians waning in popularity in the United States frequently found fame in Japan. Would the author accuse Japan of "Americanism"?

The way we perceive other cultures' pop culture often doesn't line up with the way they perceive their own pop culture. I don't see why there's anything wrong with that. Speaking for myself, I tend to listen to music with no lyrics or with lyrics in languages I don't understand because it lets me program without becoming distracted.

actionowl• 5 years ago

I tend to listen to music with no lyrics or with lyrics in languages I don't understand because it lets me program without becoming distracted.

This! When I started programming full time my music interests started shifting into what they are today which is just that. Either music with no lyrics or are mostly in a foreign language to prevent being distracted by it.

benrbray• 5 years ago

Speaking for myself, I tend to listen to music with no lyrics or with lyrics in languages I don't understand because it lets me program without becoming distracted.

Same here, plus it helps me better appreciate the human voice as an instrument. Composers tend to rehash the same few topics over and over, even across languages, so rarely does understanding the lyrics actually add to my listening experience.

I'm sure lyrics are just as hokey in other languages, but this way I don't need to care!

(I'll also use this as an opportunity to recommend songs by Tinariwen [1], Mazouni [2], and Stromae [3])

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vACZA9dGvV4 [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mnsa9dazW04 [3] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oiKj0Z_Xnjc

cooper12• 5 years ago

If anyone wants to be ahead of the next trend of listening to nostalgic Japanese music, check out enka. [0] Even when it was contemporary, it was harkening to a bygone past. Kidding a little though, ballads probably don't appeal to modern listeners.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enka

Lammy• 5 years ago

For a real crossover episode check out the City Pop album released in 1982 by Benito Mussolini's granddaughter https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S1moXXQmdZE

andrewzah• 5 years ago

So, city pop is somewhat personal to me here. Like others I discovered it through youtube, and ended up going on a deep, deep rabbit hole journey. I'm talking about albums like Tatsuro Yamashita's FOR YOU, and Come Along. and Toshiki Kadomatsu's After 5 Clash, City Shore, Sea Is A Lady, and Sea Breeze. Of course, there is the iconic Plastic Love by Mariya Takeuchi. [0]

My curiosity was initially piqued by the energetic and expressive bass lines (compared to e.g. modern pop). Tetsuo Sakurai (of Casiopea) and Tomohito Aoki (who played on After 5 Clash) are/were phenomenal players and their tracks still inspire me. I also started studying guitar, which lead to me discovering Issei Noro (of Casiopea) and Masayoshi Takanaka. The musicianship on a lot of these albums is fantastic, particularly the bass players. There are so many tracks like Airport Lady that are inspiring, if intimidating.

I have discovered so many good albums here that I can't list them all. For the curious, I have a lot saved to my wantlist on discogs [2], and a youtube playlist of mixes/albums. [3] Note that for the YT playlist, some of the albums are ones I intend to listen to later. I love Takanaka's album covers as he always looks so happy. [6]

Takanaka's Rainbow Goblins [1] may be one of my favorite live albums, ever. His performance directly inspired me to get into guitar as well. Check out the slap bass intro to Asayake from Casiopea's 1985 concert. [5] I liked these so much that I purchased them on laserdisc via Japanese ebay and am working to find a high quality laserdisc player to rip them properly.

It's been months and I keep on discovering new albums, most of which get uploaded by Xerf Xpec [4]. It can definitely be hit or miss, with some albums sounding very cheesy.

---

So naturally people have to write "articles" like this that somehow paint a revitalization of a genre/time period by another culture/generation as somehow bad. It's political drivel that benefits no one. I was born in '96. My bad for not being born in Japan in the '70s.

My Korean friends also like city pop (even the ones that really dislike Japan/the Japanese government), so this article's premise doesn't make sense.

The algorithm likely recommends these albums because people, well, like it. Retro stuff is in.

[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FUQWaQtpaKU

[1] https://youtu.be/1MXIz_-5ZBU?t=432

[2] https://www.discogs.com/wantlist?user=andrewzah&page=2

[3] https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLSxs5PgbqSvpORXzEkBn7...

[4] https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCkfmbKrdAH3_NHkbAZhWqIw

[5] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T6vkDc6CJeA&t=2379s

[6] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WAEU9q1kLvk

JetAlone• 5 years ago

The Rainbow Goblins is great! Really fun storytelling musical journey.

I was born in '96. My bad for not being born in Japan in the '70s.

Yeah... Yeah. It's like that sometimes. Keep listening to the good music, not the baseless hate.

dylanwisor• 5 years ago

This article hits many of the same beats as this Ars Technica article from November 2020.

https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2020/11/how-old-ambient-japan...

caseyross• 5 years ago

There's plenty of good reasons for city pop to see a resurgence at the current moment. Many of which are mentioned in the article, such as the now-lost innocence of a time when capitalism seemed fun rather than threatening.

But one factor I think is underappreciated is the copyright environment surrounding these songs.

Having no remaining commercial value in the Japanese domestic market, let alone the global market, city pop songs were able to spread widely and quickly on YouTube instead of languishing forever in their labels' respective back catalogs. In addition, even if the labels knew about this and wanted to reassert their ownership, policing Western streaming sites would have seemed an unpleasant distraction from the real goal of selling more CDs to Japanese buyers.

Sure, there's artistic reasons for Americans to be rediscovering these decades-old Japanese pop songs --- but there's structural reasons as well.

The Endless Life Cycle of Japanese City Pop

Related Stories