J-Pop Music: Top Japanese Pop Artists, Songs and Albums

Utada Hikaru is a J-pop artist born in New York who is also known as Hikki, Utada and Cubic U. Her combined record sales of over 35 million put her in the top 10 list of highest selling Japanese artists.

I was into Shibuya-kei back in the 90s but my foray into J-pop came when Utada burst into the music scene. Her melodic songs and crystal-clear voice captivated me, as well as millions of other fans all over the world, obviously. I love anything by her but if I absolutely have to choose a favorite, my iTunes tells me (based on the number of plays) that it's "Distance" from her 2001 album Distance.

Learn more about Hikki!
- Official Website
- Wikipedia entry
- Utada Hikaru on Twitter

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Ayumi Hamasaki is a Japanese singer-songwriter, record producer, model, lyricist, and actress. Fans call her "Ayu" and she was also dubbed the "Empress of Pop" due to her popularity and widespread influence in Japan and Asia. Since her 1998 debut with the single "Poker Face", Hamasaki has sold over 50 million records in Japan, making her the best selling solo singer in Japanese history and ranking her among the best-selling singers in the country.

Learn more about Hamasaki Ayumi!
- Official website
- Wikipedia entry

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Namie Amuro is a Japanese R&B and pop singer, entertainer, and former actress. She was once referred to as the "Teen Queen" and was also given title "Queen of Japanese Pop Music". Her single "Can You Celebrate?" (1997) became Japan's best selling single by a solo female artist.

In the 90s, Amuro was known as a fashion leader in Japan and is often credited as with starting the Ganguro trend in Japan. Girls all over copied aspects of her look, dubbed as the "Amuraa" craze, including her clothes, tanned skin, hair, and pencil thin eyebrows. She also popularized body wire (nylon accessories that resemble tattoos), baggy socks, and skin-baring clothes.

Learn more about Namie Amuro
- Official website
- Wikipedia entry

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Koda Kumi is a Japanese singer and songwriter from Kyoto known for her urban and R&B songs. She debuted in 2000 with the single "Take Back" and gained fame for her seventh single, "Real Emotion/1000 no Kotoba" -- both songs used as themes for the video game Final Fantasy X-2. Her popularity grew with the release of her fourth studio album Secret (2005), her sixteenth single "Butterfly" (2005), and her first greatest hits album Best: First Things (2005), reaching the number-three, number-two and number-one spot respectively. Koda Kumi is one of Japan's most popular artists, having many endorsements and was even dubbed "Japan's Christina Aguilera".

Learn more about Kumi Koda!
- Official Website
- Wikipedia entry

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GLAY is a rock / power pop band from Hokkaido formed by guitarist Takuro and vocalist Teru in high school in 1988. Glay primarily composes songs in the rock and pop genres, though they also experiment with different styles such as reggae and gospel. As of August 2010, Glay has sold about 37.5 million albums in Japan, placed as the 7th best selling artist of all time according to a ranking presented on the TV show Music Station, with data from the Oricon charts. Glay is often compared to Bon Jovi in terms of their popularity in Japan and their similar brand of music.

Learn more about Glay:
- Official website
- Wikipedia entry

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B'z is a Japanese hard rock duo composed of Takahiro "Tak" Matsumoto (producer, composer, guitarist) and Koshi Inaba (lyricist, vocalist). B'z is among Japan's most popular musicians. As of 2008 they have released 45 consecutive #1 singles, 24 #1 albums, and sold more than 79 million records in Japan alone. Their' 2001 album "The Best Pleasure" has holds the #2 spot in Japan's top 5 best-selling albums of all time. Under the recommendation of Grammy Award-winning musician Steve Vai, B'z became the first band from Asia to have their hand prints and signatures put up in the Hollywood's Rock Walk.

Learn more about B'z:
- Official website
- Wikipedia entry

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Mr. Children is a Japanese rock band formed in 1988 by Kazutoshi Sakurai, Kenichi Tahara, Keisuke Nakagawa, and Hideya Suzuki. As a group, they are one of the most successful Japanese rock artists, having sold over 50 million records and creating the "Misuchiru Phenomenon" in the mid 1990s in Japan.

I spent a lot of time going back and forth to Japan in the mid-90s so I witnessed the Mr. Children phenomenon. "Tomorrow Never Knows" (off the fantastic Bolero album) was the song that got me hooked. If you're wondering about their sound, I guess that song's title itself reveals that they are most heavily influenced by the Beatles.

Learn more about Misuchiru!
- Official Mr. Children website
- Wikipedia entry

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Gackt is a Japanese singer-songwriter, actor, seiyuu and author though he is best known as a solo artist and as the former vocalist for the now-defunct Malice Mizer.

He has released fourteen albums and thirty-nine singles as a solo musician and holds the record for the most top 10 singles by a male soloist in Japan's music history. His music has been used as theme songs for anime films, video games, and television series.

Learn more about Gackt!
- Official website
- Wikipedia entry

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Arashi is a Japanese boy band under the Japanese talent agency Johnny & Associates. Their debut single titled A-ra-shi debuted in 1999 on top of the Oricon weekly chart and sold over half a million copies. In 2009, Oricon declared Arashi the best-selling artist of the year and awarded them the "Artist Top Sales" (ATS) award with 14.46 billion yen worth of total sales in the singles, album, music DVD, and music Blu-ray categories. In 2010, Arashi became Japan's top-selling artist for the second year in a row, with more than 17.16 billion yen worth of sales in seven categories.

Arashi is currently enjoying their peak in Japan, having been named the country's tourism ambassadors. I like their happy, shiny pop and if I were to name a favorite song, it would be "Doko ni Demo Aru Uta" from their 2011 album Beautiful World.

Learn more about Arashi!
- Official website
- Wikipedia entry

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Exile is a 14-member all-male Japanese pop dance group. Their 2007 studio album, Exile Love, became the highest selling album of Japan in 2008, selling nearly 1.5 million copies on Oricon charts. Their compilation album Exile Ballad Best sold nearly 1 million copies in its first week on Oricon charts, making it the highest first week sales for an album of Japan in 2008. The song, "Ti Amo", was certified Million by the Recording Industry Association of Japan (RIAJ) for 1,000,000 full-track ringtone digital music downloads and also won the Grand Prix Award at the 50th edition of Japan Record Awards.

Learn more about Exile!
- Official website
- Wikipedia entry

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AKB48 is an enormously popular Japanese female idol group produced by Yasushi Akimoto. They have been topping the album sales charts in the last two years. Nine of their latest consecutive singles topped the Oricon Weekly Singles Chart and the singles "Beginner" and "Heavy Rotation" placed 1st and 2nd respectively in the list of Japan's best selling singles for the year 2010 while "Everyday, Kachusha", "Sakura no Ki ni Naro", and "Flying Get" lead the 2011 rankings so far.

Learn more about AKB48:
- Official website
- Wikipedia entry

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SMAP is a Japanese boy band formed by Johnny & Associates, consisting of current group members are Masahiro Nakai, Takuya Kimura, Tsuyoshi Kusanagi, Goro Inagaki, and Shingo Katori. Their first CD debuted in 1991 and they have since released over forty singles and twenty albums. Approximately half the singles and a third of the albums reached the top of the Japanese Oricon music charts.

The members of SMAP are immensely popular and have also pursued careers outside of music, including involvement in television variety shows, doramas, commercials, and movies, making them one of the most popular Johnny's groups.

Learn more about SMAP!
- Official website
- Wikipedia entry

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