Writing
記事Essays and reporting on Japanese City Pop — its records, its people, and how a 1980s genre found a second life.
かぎりなき夏 Endless Summer: A Review, A Reckoning
A review of the City Pop documentary かぎりなき夏Endless Summer.
Requiem for a Dream Catalogue: A ‘Nobody Here’ Film Review, and Rant
Disclaimer: The following is all based on personal opinions, experiences, and musings about the film. I’m not an academic or anything like that, so expect me taking…
The Art of the Gala: A Four-Year Retrospective on Design & City Pop
Designing a Tradition: Flyers, Vinyl, and the Quiet Rhythm of the Japanese Arts Foundation. My 4 years of designing gala flyers and DJing at each one.
Shikago: The Meiji-Era’s Lost Spelling of ‘Chicago’
Before the glow of City Pop reached American shores, and before Japanese jazz collectors started digging in bins across the Midwest, there was a different kind of…
Tamashii Train (Soul Train Tribute)
Graphic designed by Van Paugam Tamashii Train at Izakaya Shinya I often find myself drawn to half light. The kind that hovers just before nightfall, where neon…
Manabu Koga’s Subculture Commentary: “JAPANESE CITYPOP”
In this special discussion, artist/designer Manabu Koga is joined by music writer Ryusei Miyakodori and art critic Kiyoshi Kusumi to explore the global revival of…
City Pop’s Neo-Nostalgia: Opening Doors in Alt-J-Pop
Discover how Japan's city pop revival sparked a new wave of bilingual J-pop, with artists like CHAI, Fujii Kaze, Miso Extra, and Hitomitoi blending English and…
How Tatsuro Yamashita Became Known as The King of City Pop
The curious story of how Tatsuro Yamashita became known as the King of City Pop
Copyright On Time: Tatsuro Yamashita’s War on Overseas Audiences
A closer look at the recent copyright takedowns issued by Tatsuro Yamashita, and others, and the war on the online content creators that helped bring City Pop into…
Interview with the City Pop Godfather: Tetsuji Hayashi
An historic interview with the legendary producer of Mayonaka no Door/Stay With Me, by Miki Matsubara. I go in-depth with one of Japan’s most iconic and influential…
Anri Re-issues Iconic Vinyl LPs Signaling a New Era for City Pop
2023 is set to be a record year for City Pop with Anri releasing some of her most iconic albums, finally giving fans an affordable option to obtain her music in…
Memoirs of a Gaijin II: Teacup of Melancholy
I often lay on my bed at dusk, looking up in my dimly lit room to watch the fading light stream through my curtains while listening to city pop. It's like therapy…
Why Tatsuro Yamashita’s Vinyl Represses Are The Most Important Of The Year
2023 is set to be a record year for City Pop. From Anri getting a feature on CNN , to the huge news that a certain king of City Pop is having his entire RCA/AIR…
Barber Beats: The Future of Vaporwave
Barber Beats are simply a sub-genre of the micro-genre Vaporwave, or a spin-off, whatever. It was coined by Aloe City Records to refer to Haircuts for Men , who is…
Another Top 10 City Pop Songs List
City Pop , the sound of metropolitan Japan in the 80s has now become more widely known than a few years back. Its magical melodies and sincerely funky rhythms have…
10 City Pop Songs About Summer
Ah, feel that Yokohama breeze! The azure horizon sparkles in the distance as the ocean whispers its crescent waves coalescing onto the sandy shore to meet your…
The History of Murasaki Sake Lounge
Murasaki Sake Lounge 紫酒ラウンジ 紫酒ラウンジはシカゴ唯一の日本人経営のバーです。日本語のカラオケボックスもございます。 シカゴ最大の日本酒、焼酎、ジャパニーズウイスキー、ビールの コレクションと、豊富なおつまみをご用意してお待ち致しております。 特別イベント以外でのカバーチャージは一切ありませんし、…
Memoirs of a Gaijin
For the past 5 years I spent much of my life trying very hard to promote Japanese City Pop music, often neglecting all other facets of my life. I wanted so much to…
The Rise & Fall of Vaporwave
Vaporwave in 2021 is a bit of a quagmire. Almost everything that can be said about it has already been written or blogged about somewhere online since its early…
Why is City Pop Nostalgic?
City Pop is a nostalgic genre of music for many people in the West for several reasons. Firstly, City Pop was popular in Japan during the late 1970s to the…
The Tragic End & Lasting Appeal of Miki Matsubara
Miki Matsubara is a Japanese singer, songwriter, and composer who has become one of the most well-known artists from the country in the same fashion as Mariya…
Hideki Saijo: The Japanese Elvis Presley
Hideki Saijo was a famous Japanese music and television star who drew comparisons to Elvis Presley for his passionate stage persona that defied traditional Japanese…
City Pop & Depression
Depression. A condition many people can instantly relate to. So much of life can be consumed by a never-ending merry-go-round of emotions that lifts us up high only…
What Happened to Artzie Music
Artzie Music was hit with multiple copyright strikes by an agency called ShoPro otherwise known as Shogakukan-Shueisha Productions Co., Ltd. A Japanese production…
City Pop Aesthetics
Contemporary City Pop aesthetics are at the intersection of Vaporwave, Future-funk, and Retro Anime design ideologies. Generally a combination of re-occurring…
What is Korean City Pop
Korean City Pop is 1970s and 1980s inspired contemporary music re-imagined through the lens of a fictional past of the country’s history. Korean City Pop is…
The Top 10 City Pop Albums
In every genre there are albums that exemplify the sound, and City Pop , while more loosely defined than others, still has a distinctive style that is recognizable…
Junko Ohashi & The Magical $500 Record
They say things only cost what people are willing to pay and nothing embodies the spirit of that saying more than a very elusive and revered album by a 1980s…
Where to find City Pop in Tokyo
A lot of people ask me this question seeing as I have a collection of over 200 City Pop records and know a thing or two about record stores in Tokyo. I've put…