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lead=yes, sometimes abbreviated to , is rock music from Japan. Influenced by American rock and British rock of the 1960s, the first rock bands in Japan performed what is called group sounds, with lyrics almost exclusively in English. Folk rock band Happy End in the early 1970s are credited as the first to sing rock music in the Japanese language. Punk rock bands Boøwy and The Blue Hearts and hard rock/heavy metal groups X Japan and B'z led Japanese rock in the late 1980s and early 1990s by achieving major mainstream success.
Rock bands such as B'z and Mr. Children are among the best selling music acts in Japan. Rock festivals like the Fuji Rock Festival were introduced in the late 90s with attendances reaching a peak of 200,000 people per festival making it the largest outdoor music event in the country.
In the 1960s, many Japanese rock music bands were influenced by Western rock musicians such as the Beatles, Bob Dylan, and the Rolling Stones, along with other Appalachian folk music, psychedelic rock, mod and similar genres: a phenomenon that was called Group Sounds (G.S.). John Lennon of the Beatles later became one of the most popular Western musicians in Japan. By the late 1960s, Group Sounds bands such as The Tempters, the Tigers, the Golden Cups, the Ox, the Village Singers, the Carnabeats, the Mops, the Jaguars, the Wild Ones and the Spiders had big hits. After the boom of Group Sounds, there were several folk singer-songwriters. They were influenced by Bob Dylan and American folk music. The Tigers were the most popular Group Sounds band in the era. Later, some of the members of the Tigers, the Tempters, and the Spiders formed the first Japanese supergroup, Pyg.
70s "New Rock" group such as the Power House, the Blues Creation, Murasaki, Condition Green, and Bow Wow released rock albums. After seeing a show by then-upcoming artist Jimi Hendrix during a visit to Europe, Yuya Uchida returned home and formed Yuya Uchida & the Flowers in November 1967 in order to introduce a similar sound to Japan.
In the 1980s, a plethora of Japanese heavy metal bands formed. Loudness was formed in 1981 by former Lazy members Akira Takasaki and Munetaka Higuchi. In 1983, they toured the United States and Europe and soon started focusing more on an international career. In a 1985 deal with Atco Records, Loudness became the first Japanese metal act signed to a major label in the United States. Their albums Thunder in the East (1985), Lightning Strikes (1986) and Hurricane Eyes (1987) reached numbers 74, 64 and 190 on the Billboard charts chart. Loudness replaced singer Minoru Niihara with American vocalist Michael Vescera in 1988, in an unsuccessful attempt to further their international popularity. Loudness were famous among heavy metal fans in the United States. In the '80s, few bands had a female members, like all-female band Show-Ya fronted by Keiko Terada, and Terra Rosa with Kazue Akao on vocals. In September 1989, Show-Ya's album Outerlimits was released, it reached number 3 in the Oricon album chart.
Carol (led by Eikichi Yazawa), RC Succession and Funny Company were especially famous and helped define the sound. Sometimes also beginning in the late sixties, but mostly active in the seventies, are musicians mixing rock music with American-style folk and pop rock elements. Folk rock musicians such as Tulip, Banban, Garo, Yosui Inoue were popular in the music scene.
In the 1980s, acts such as Boøwy inspired what is called the , popularizing the formation of rock groups. In 1980, Huruoma and Ry Cooder, an American musician, collaborated on a rock album with Shoukichi Kina, driving force behind the aforementioned Okinawan band Champloose. They were followed by Sandii & the Sunsetz, who further mixed Japanese and Okinawan influences. Alternative rock bands like Shonen Knife, Bloodthirsty Butchers, Boredoms, and The Pillows formed. Nirvana's Kurt Cobain admitted to be a fan of Shonen Knife during the girls' tour in the LA in 1991. Cobain later invited the band to join them in a U.S. tour.
In April 1989, X Japan's second album Blue Blood reached number 6 and sold 712,000 copies. Their third and best-selling album Jealousy was released in July 1991, topped the charts and sold over 1 million copies. They released two more number one studio albums, Art of Life (1993) and Dahlia (1996), before disbanding in 1997. X Japan signed an American record deal with Atlantic Records in 1992, but an international release never happened. In the 1990s, Luna Sea, Glay, and L'Arc-en-Ciel sold millions of records, while Malice Mizer, La'cryma Christi, and Siam Shade also found success.
In the 1990s, Anime song was becoming the best-selling genres of music in Japan. The rise of disposable pop has been linked with the popularity of karaoke, leading to criticism that it is consumerism: Kazufumi Miyazawa of the Boom said "I hate that buy, listen, and throw away and sing at a karaoke bar mentality." Ska-punk bands of the late 1990s extending in the years 2000 include Shakalabbits and 175R.
The first Fuji Rock Festival opened in 1997. The following year, Supercar released its influential debut album Three Out Change. Characterized as having "almost foundational importance to 21st century Japanese indie rock", Supercar remained active through 2005 with their later albums containing more electronic rock.
Around the same time, bands such as Quruli and Number Girl had begun heavily influencing Japanese alternative rock. Music critic Ian Martin wrote that, along with Supercar, these groups had demonstrated that "Japanese rock bands could take on the British and American alternative bands of the 90s at their own game ... and in doing so, they had laid new ground for Japanese rock to develop in its own way from this point on."
Rising Sun Rock Festival opened in 1999. Summer Sonic Festival and Rock in Japan Festival opened in 2000. New bands such as Bump of Chicken, Radwimps, Asian Kung-Fu Generation, ONE OK ROCK, Orange Range, Uverworld, Remioromen, Sambomaster, and Aqua TimezSherman, Jennifer (May 8, 2018)."Aqua Timez Band Breaks Up After 2018". Anime News Network. have achieved success. Established bands as B'z, Mr. Children, Glay, and L'Arc-en-Ciel also continue to top charts, though B'z and Mr. Children are the only bands to maintain a high standards of their sales along the years.
Japanese rock has a vibrant underground rock scene, best known internationally for noise rock bands such as Boredoms and Melt Banana, as well as stoner rock bands such as Boris and alternative acts such as Shonen Knife, Pizzicato Five, and the Pillows (who gained international attention in 1999 for the FLCL soundtrack). Other notable international touring indie rock acts are Mono and Nisennenmondai.
In the 2000s, the number of all-female rock bands all-female band started to grow. Two of the first of such groups to achieve success were Zone and Chatmonchy. Zone, which was planned to be an Japanese idol group, became a rock band thanks to one of their producers, who had decided to let them play with instruments, and was well received.
The quartet from Osaka, Scandal, was created in 2006 and sold 52,956 copies of their debut album in 2009. Later, their albums also became top ten bestsellers. This success led them to become famous worldwide and later took them on several tours abroad. In 2018, Scandal established their own label "her".
Veteran rock bands like L'Arc-en-Ciel and X Japan sold out concerts at Madison Square Garden in 2012 and 2014, respectively, among other large arenas through the United States. As of 2015, slap-guitarist Miyavi, who had performed the most successful international tour by a Japanese artist in 2008, has performed at 250 concerts in more than thirty countries around the world. In 2016, One OK Rock became the first Japanese band to perform at the Taipei Arena in Taiwan, and it has sold out concerts at venues such as AsiaWorld-Arena in Hong Kong and Mall of Asia Arena in the Philippines, making it one of the band's biggest performances outside of Japan, with an average attendance of twelve thousand people at each concert.
The year 2014 brought the international success of self-described "kawaii metal" idol act Babymetal, through the Viral video YouTube hit "Gimme Chocolate!!". They were the opening act to five of Lady Gaga's concerts on her 2014 tour. In 2016, Babymetal began a world tour at London's Wembley Arena, becoming the first Japanese act to headline the venue, and their album Metal Resistance reached number 15 on the UK Albums Chart, marking the highest ever entry by a Japanese act. They also made their US television debut by performing "Gimme Chocolate!!" on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert.
Band-Maid earned worldwide attention circa 2015 for their "submissive" maid appearance contrasting with their aggressive music. They began international activities the following year, including signing to JPU Records.
In 2018, Lovebites won the Metal Hammer Golden Gods Awards for Best New Band and became the first Japanese all-female heavy metal band to perform at Germany's Wacken Open Air.
The 2010s
New band boom, further overseas recognition
During the late 2000s there was an increasing number of bands that had built up a strong fan base prior to their main break-through in the music industry. Indie band flumpool sold over one million copies of their first digital single "Hana ni nare". Sakanaction performed their first live concert at Nippon Budokan while enjoying major success with their singles "Aruku Around" and "Rookie". Sakanaction was pinned as a different type of band since they experimented with electronic music and synthrock. Other bands that have gone mainstream included Gesu no Kiwami Otome, Sekai no Owari, and Alexandros. Because of the sudden major increase on indie bands and rock bands in general which competed with contemporary J-Pop artists, the movement has been referred to as a band boom by the media and has been praised as a change to the Japanese music in general. Since these bands don't rely in a very heavy sound but take a softer, catchier approach, they proved to be more appealing to pop fans that are not familiar with rock.
Girls Metal Band Boom
The decade saw a , with a large number of all-female heavy metal bands forming and gaining mainstream attention. Although not the first to form, Aldious have been cited as the initiators of the movement when their debut album Deep Exceed (2010) topped the Oricon Indies Albums Chart and reached number 15 on the main chart. Another notable girls metal band is Cyntia, who are believed to be the first of the movement to sign to a major record label when they joined Victor Entertainment in 2013.
See also
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