Japanese City Pop and the Rise of Future Funk
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- Опубліковано 21 сер 2024
- You've plunged down the UA-cam rabbithole, mainlined 'Plastic Love', and emerged with a burning question: What is City Pop? If you're a fan of anime and Japanese video games, your connection to this music runs even deeper than you know.
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The City Pop Listening Gude: / getting-into-pop-29936088
Support me on Patreon: / michaelsaba
Email me: askdreaminginneon@gmail.com
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The Shared Psychosis of Perfect Blue: • The Disturbing Reality...
A Guide to City Pop, the soundtrack for Japan's Bubble Era: www.nippon.com...
Why does the soundtrack to Tokyo's tech boom still resonate?: www.rollingsto...
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B-roll of 70s/80s Japan source: • [Doc] Tokyo Landscapes...
Now that I'm 30, I've come to realize that the future I was promised is never going to come. Future Funk, Vaporwave, and lo-fi hip hop (beats to study/sleep/whatever to) are basically a soundtrack to the alternate future where I'm happy.
they got away with it
for many, the age of 30 is the start point of their life, to prosperous and exciting decade.
Jesus that comment hit me hard.
Yeah, just hit 30 at the start of the year myself. The future really was stolen from us by the older generation.
Same
I'm 52 years old and I've finally learned there is an actual name of the music that I love to hear since I teenage. Thank you.
Maybe "Kayokyoku" is the term.
The Kayoukyoku infomercial said it was the predecessor to J Pop.
They wanted like $ 200 for the box set,I said naw.
Look into Simpsonwave, Synthwave, and Vaporwave.
I really like Dan Mason ダン·メイソン, LUXURY ELITE, Windows96, D/A/D The Construct.
All these are on Bandcamp. For Dan Mason look up the albums Miami Virtual and Lovers.
@@LeeePowers I do know what is Kayokyoku... I got a small collection of them thanks to my dad. The term isn't well known in the west.
@@allenslau I never knew what it was. There was an infomercial on NHK world for a box set.
Mariya Takeuchi and Akiko Wada were amongst the featured artists.
To me I just referred to it as Vintage J pop.
@@LeeePowers oh man.. I watch NHK World all the time. How come I didn't see the infomercial? no matter, Kayokyoku are all on UA-cam. Interestingly thou, not sure if you are aware of this... Quite a few well known singers from the West have been singing Japanese songs or Japanese version of their songs from the 60's to 70's . Like Peggy March to Andy Williams... they are consider the same category as Kayokyoku.
'80s US: dark, gloomy, distopic, pessimistic.
'80s Japan: cutesy, romantic, upbeat, hopeful.
Future funk: mix the two.
@@pippo9830 yeah for the uk it's ecconamy collapsed. in fact Italy had a higher GDP then the uk in the 70s! the uk had a total economical collapse and mass amounts of British business were sold off by thatcher in the 80s (another bad decade for the uk) too USA, mainland Europe and India just to save the uk economy. the 90s were ok though, but the 2000s were not with the whole recession. but things started getting back on track until 2016 and brexit. so yeah now we are facing a politically charged forced isolationism which will result in economical collapse top that with an ideological clown as pm and that is the recipe for fun times ahead for sure.
The OG 80's Yugoslavia was both
80's USSR, existencial angst, dreamwave, and spiritual materialism.
Check sovietwave, is a pleasure in itself
80s America is beautiful and a awesome time
80’s US wasn’t pessimistic. I’m old enough to remember some of it. And the City Pop genre draws heavily from the popular upbeat black American music of the time.
Michael Jackson-Rock With You (1979)
ua-cam.com/video/OvzJZTkWYoY/v-deo.html
Stephanie Mills and Teddy Pendergrass-Two Hearts (1981)
ua-cam.com/video/uJ7HN1nNdbc/v-deo.html
Last Dance-Donna Summer (1978)
ua-cam.com/video/vqZY8P42pLo/v-deo.html
Never knew Love Like This Before -Stephanie Mills (1980)
ua-cam.com/video/LExCRKCS5SM/v-deo.html
Bill Withers-Lovely Day (1977)
ua-cam.com/video/bEeaS6fuUoA/v-deo.html
Papillon [aka Hot Butterfly]-Chaka Khan (1980)
ua-cam.com/video/Kv1UmWJFFA8/v-deo.html
Patrice Rushen-Remind Me 1982
ua-cam.com/video/RUOGWCWHjwc/v-deo.html
Sweet Love-Anita Baker (1986)
ua-cam.com/video/MZ1S7x0q_Iw/v-deo.html
Until You Come Back to Me (That’s What I’m Gonna Do)-Aretha Franklin (1973)
ua-cam.com/video/tOSB4Y8e3Z4/v-deo.html
Forget Me Nots-Patrice Rushen (1982)
ua-cam.com/video/Amzp7W0RkPA/v-deo.html
Lovin’ You-Minnie Riperton 1975
ua-cam.com/video/l2ctolUaRpg/v-deo.html
Bill Withers-Just the Two of Us (1980)
ua-cam.com/video/jEy6MGu3bIA/v-deo.html
I'm from the future and this was good. Thanks.
I'm also from the future, but from 11 hours ago. And I agree, the video was good.
*inserts wanna be like you theme song*
I'm from even further ahead and I can assure you, this video makes even more sense today
Hi. It's September of 2020. Go back. Don't come here.
I’m from the future and the just fucking sucks now thanks China 🇨🇳
7:20: all rise for our City Pop/Future Funk anthem!
Basic
Right? I's such a bop!
😂😂
Plastic love 🤣
True
We all want to live in Japan now, in the early 80s.
We would live there right now !
The most hedonistic decade of Japan. 😍😍⛩️
Me too!
I want 2 go back 2 the 80s, PERIOD!
You are so right on time
Man, I would give my life's savings for a movie about Tatsuro Yamashita's life done in a Studio Ghibli style!
Shit, that's actually a great idea.
City pop makes me feel good and hopelessly depressed at the same time
UA-cam's algorithm is working as it should.
Really nice video, informative and coherent in the feelings it's emanating.
Tatsuro Yamashita deserves a Grammy, and be inducted in some Walk of Fame.
For doing what? Most of his music is just sampled america soul/RnB music.
@@bobmarley4272 Feel free to "sample america soul/RnB music" and come up with something even remotely similar. Also, try to be a guitar player, vocalist, songwriter, arranger, and producer. Then show us what you came up with.
@@bobmarley4272 don't use the name of legend .You name should be 'Bot Marley .'
@@bobmarley4272 They sampled each other
Also Toshiki Kadomatsu too, his songs are amazing..
Tatsuro Yamashita is freakin god of city pop alongside Mariya Takeuchi
well he’s her husband 🤷🏻♂️
Well he wrote all her music so..
Toshiki Kadomatsu is arguably the only one who ever reached their level. I'd say let's call it a Holy Trinity of City Pop instead.
His music was sooo good
The King and Queen of City Pop. Toshiki Kadomatsu is the High Priest
don't cry because it's over, cry because it's never happened
Wanna experience bubble era and that time long gone? Play Yakuza 0 and Shenmue 1/2.... goosebumps on how close they get the feeling and looks!
Man this hits home hard, somthing as plain as just walking is so enjoyable in Yakuza 0, just taking in the sights. Im addicted to 80s Japan, but i can only experience it through relics and simulations.
I wish they just made a walking simulator in 80's Japan
Shenmue is definitely one of my favorites. You don't really get these kind of slow, relaxing exploration games nowadays.
Yakuza 0 is an amazing game. Now I'm wishing for a GTA style game set in 1980s Tokyo.
Oh how I wish the dragon engine from Yakuza 6 and Kiwami 2 could have existed for Yakuza 0, it'd make everything even better. But at least Yakuza 0 is still one hell of a game
Van Paugam defined the City Pop style of mixing. His channel was the first real community for fans of the genre. The livestream was a goldmine. When his channel was taken down, the community suffered a huge loss. He’s one of the few people who actually DJ City Pop at real venues, with the real vinyl at that. If not for him, lots of people who never have heard of the genre. VP is a living legend, change my mind.
I'm definitely going to do more research on VP -- I remember hearing one of his mixes / compilations from the label My Pet Flamingo, but I didn't really have a sense of just how influential he was. I appreciate the recommendation.
Van Paugam was more of a complete experience than just a City Pop stream, the japan driving video playing in the background, the live chat and the fact that it was 24/7 were so instrumental, i cant imagine the amount of copyright strikes the had to deal with DJing on youtube, should have moved to twitch since theyre more lax with copyrights, but then again i doubt that he would get as many views there...
Oh God the hours I spent there. I was devastated when his channel got terminated. Good memories...
shiiit just saw that his channel got killed, damn, took me quite a while to realise.
I miss him
Future Funk is one of the last genres that has me holding onto the future that my generation was promised in the late 80s and early 90s. It’s the one style of music that has put a complete smile on my face during this uninspired, drab and dystopian present. I think the future will be brighter and Future Funk might be one of the catalyst for it!
Thank you so much for this video ✌️❣️
millenial
@@styraxgum problem?
Lol, whenever I drive Uber, I have a collection of old Japanese songs that I play on the radio via a little usb. Hell, if I'm gonna work for 60 cents per mile, I might as well enjoy the ride with music from Tatsuro Yamashita, Mariya Takeuchi, Miki Matsubara, Minako Yoshida, Junko Ohashi, Anri, Cindy, Junko Yagami, Kimiko Kasai, Makoto Matsushita, Meiko Nakahara, Miki Matsubara, Noriyo Ikeda, Tomoko Aran, Toshiki Kadomatsu, Yuko Asano, Yuko Imai, and so many more. Passengers seem to like it, especially Japanese passengers who suddenly remember their youth lol!
Anyway, I also love that song "Sparkle" by Tatsuro Yamashita. I have the English version. Hmm it kinda sounds similar to Toshiki Kadomatsu's "Don't Speak Again" or whatever its original Japanese title was. It's a very nice and calming tune especially as I drive into the sunset going home after a long low paying day's work. "Plastic Love" by Mariya Takeuchi is definitely my favorite!
Speaking of Mariya Takeuchi, did you know that her song "Single Again" has a Philippine version called "Lumayo Ka Man" (Even if You Go Away)? A Philippine singer named Rodel Naval heard Mariya's "Single Again" song while he was on tour in Japan, and according to the story, he was depressed at the time about his mom's death, so he wrote a different lyrical interpretation of the song. Still sounds the same, but it's not just about romance.
On the topic of Japanese songs being adapted to other countries, another singer named Hideaki Tokunaga had his song "Saigo no Iiwake" adapted in the Philippines by a singer named Ted Ito and the song was called "Ikaw Pa Rin" (Still You) over there.
will you be my personal driver
I guess your car stereo loves to play randomly "Midnight Driver" by Minako Yoshida at 00:00. Nice list of artists by the way!
Grab / uber ka ba? Omg hahaha
Dam good comment my dude. Cheers !
Vitezslove Sichtar I remember blasting midnight driver like 15 years ago. I forget how I discovered it. Always loved that song
i remember music very close to city pop in mexico when i was a child, kinda interesting, because it was also for us during the era of the "Mexican Miracle"
There's a song that represents perfectly that age in Mexico is called "Mexico de noche" by silvetti
Recuerdo que mi mamá ponía cassettes con canciones mexicanas parecidas a city pop cuando yo era pequeño. Creo que es gracias a eso que tengo cierto apego a las melodías tipo city pop que no sabía que estaban ahí hasta que escuché plastic love.
@@tama7026 WOW! wow . muchas gracias por compartir no habia escuchado esa cancion.
That's very interesting. I guess the style wasn't just isolated in Asia. A few Southeast Asian countries also have a genre similar to City Pop.
Luis Miguel's music especially on his albums "20 Anos" & "Amarte Es Un Placer" sounds just like citypop
In 2016 I discovered “vapor wave” & my life was never the same. I would wake up around 3-4am just to open UA-cam to listen to that style. Then I found city pop the beginning of this year!
RiCardo Picena saaame
remember mackintosh plus?
Spoofy Tofuwu one of that albums songs was the reason I dove deeper to the sub-genre 🙌🏽
In case you get famous, we’re your biggest fans:)
No me
No, me
And in case you go, take me with you
Now more than ever, we NEED city pop, considering how positive and hopeful the songs are, they help us feeling better and give us hope during this terrible period of time, and at the end of this, we’ll also have our glory time and our period of never ending luxury and happiness
This was fantastic. I want in on this new thing I've found.
_ALL OF THE FUTURE FUNK, PLEASE_
This is honestly therapy to explain the nostalgia i feel when i listen to city pop thank you.
I can just say WOW. I have been listening to this genre and hadn't been able to understand why I liked it so much ( I'm from Mexico and Japanese culture was most discovered through anime) Thanks for the video.
Dude you gotta check out mexican city pop, always listen to it in the shower even though I don't speak any spanish
U should listen to this powerful Macross soundtrack theme song
1. Chieri ito - Merry Christmas
2. Mari iijima - Do You Remember Love
Still learning Japanese (to understand my husband's culture better even though both of us are fluent in English) and being Filipino who loves karaoke...it's sad that when I try to sing in Japanese, my alto voice really matches well with the City Pop genre.
I found your channel when you uploaded your Nier video and even since then your content has just kept improving. The UA-cam video essay scene is becoming more and more saturated, but you're definitely headed for the top.
Same here, his nier automata video is the best I've ever seen on the subject and I've been following since
Same
You ever thought that all these type of videos are the only ones on UA-cam where you can actually scroll down the comments and get that warmth heart high instead of eye cancer? I can really relate to most of you. It's gotta mean something, godammit. May the vibes be riding along with you. Yes, you.
I literally just found CityPop a month ago and my life has not been the same. I'm glad I'm not the only one that felt this way about it.
It's perfect and just what I needed now.
This is so fascinating..... What I _really_ love about your videos.....is the EMPATHY you clearly have.
I think that's something about all this vaporwave city funk retrofuturism post-post-reality etc stuff we don't talk about enough....I think, deep down, a LOT of it has to do with people now....feeling this aching yearning *_empathy_* for the collective confused mass of humanity that came before us, exists now, and will continue on long after us. When I watch videos like this.....that's the emotion it conjures in me, more than anything else.
This deeply felt sense that...we're all so confused, we're all trying so hard, we all feel so deeply, and then we die....and it's so tragic, but so beautiful.
And recognizing that we're all genuinely in this together....feels good. It feels very good.
Sometimes it's the only thing that makes it possible to keep going. Knowing we're all, literally, doing this together...making sense of this immense world and our immense yet miniscule lives....together.
As someone who is very introverted....it's this kind of take on what humanity is all about that makes me fall in love with humanity. I am an introvert....very much so. But I love humanity so much. I just don't want to hang out... ;P
Now Germany has their own spin on it and it takes you back to the B-Boy era of the underground. They call it City Beat Records. If you love the 80’s and love to Break dance and love Electro Hip-Hop, then I suggest City Beat Records. And I do love Japan Anime.
Never heard of it though I'm german
Thanks for the recommendation i'll search it up!
Yeah! The Egyptian Lover does a few songs with them. But mainly with E-Rocker. Look up The Dark Side of Dance. DJ Salva 808. The Audio Sonic Crew, and the albums of Electro Underground. Also look up Debonair, and Ceeonic.
Interesse ist geweckt.
I'm from the future. You made it guys. The tomorrow that was promised you but never given, you manufactured with the tools of your day, in the mold of the vision of yesterday; and it was good. And we owe it all to City Pop.
The most interesting thing to me, is how this can be applied to 80's USSR. As someone who is very familiar with people from that region/time, the vibe that they speak of is super similar to this.
One of my og students said natsukashi is like Marcel Proust with the smell of madeleine, the feeling the smell gives him. Also, growing up in 80's continental europe, I am so happy a younger gen appreciates this fantastic music, that even Alain Delon recorded a song in the style called "comme au cinéma " . French people and japanese people it's a whole thing....
i rewatch this vid monthly. and honestly, i just think it's so rad that you put yourself out there and rock out at the end!!! bless you
man I feel so isolated...no one I know irl listens to Fture Funk besides me lmao
Me too. And wen I bring it up, they dont feel the feel, u know
Same here, man :(
Then spread the faith on non listener
same lmao
dony worry we are here
4 years on, this is still an indelible masterpiece of UA-cam
This video made me cry with how fucking accurate it is.
Masayoshi takanaka is an absolute gem... The greatest guitarist of all time.
this might be overshooting by just a bit
I've watched this 3 times now because you just understand it all so well and I wasn't even really fully aware why city pop has captured me in quite a strange, almost obsessive way like no other music genre has... but I sensed it was for the reasons you said. It's all written so well. Thank you.
As a Japanese, your pronunciation is very good. And this was a great introduction to City Pop. I grew up in the era in Japan, and did not fully internalize that the genre had a name, or it was Japanese only phenomenon. Now I hear some new music (Lover Boy, for example) and I was calling it nostalgic or retro for some reason, but I understand why that was. Never quite realized why all the anime music has "the sound", either. Very informative and interesting video. Thank you!
I commend your usage of Hiroshi Nagai's artwork. Finally someone else who likes his stuff.
Kara of Mazov One of my favorite artists ever
This music makes me wish I could get a time machine and experience the bubble era first hand
13:15 Shit, that's straight up Hall & Oates mixing the Mario theme with "I Can't Go for That".
Exactly what I thought too
For me as someone who grew up in the 2000's (I'm currently 22) consuming 90's Anime like Shin-Chan and Ranma 1/2 as a kid definetly had a huge impact on me when it comes to nostalgia when I listen to citypop music.
Ik that 90's and 80's are different (especially in japan since we're talking about the golden age and the lost decade) but I feel like in these anime I grew up with, there are still a lot of citypop vibes in it.
So there has to be some kind of connection idk 🤷♂
It's even more confusing for me, I was born in 2002 and I'm Indian. We only had a very few select anime to watch, which included stuff like Shinchan, Doraemon, Perman, KochiKame, etc. These do not have much of a city pop aesthetic tbh.
But I still absolutely LOVE it for some reason. I heard it once, and knew I had to listen more.
I don't have a car, nor do I like cars too much, but city pop still conjures the image of driving a car into the night for me. It's kinda magical really.
@@deki9827try listening Kyoko Koizumi - Nudist
I agree! I’m 25 now, grew up watching anime in the early 2000s and city pop reminds me of watching Inuyasha, Sailor Moon, etc like it shared the same vibes even those these anime didn’t come out in the 80s. I also felt like there was a connection somehow and couldn’t explain it so I’m glad I’m not the only one feeling this way lol
Please take attention to this another killer citypop tracks
1. NUDIST -
KYOKO KOIZUMI
2. GIVE ME TABOO -
YUIKO TSUBOKURA
3. CATCH ME -
MIHO NAKAYAMA
4. PARTY NIGHT -
AYA MATSUMOTO
5. GIVE ME UP -
BaBe
6. CECILE NO AMAGASA - MARI IIJIMA
7. AQUAMARINE NO MAMA DE ITE -
CARLOS TOSHIKI & OMEGA TRIBE
8. OLDER GIRL -
CARLOS TOSHIKI & OMEGA TRIBE
9. KIMI HA 1000% -
CARLOS TOSHIKI & OMEGA TRIBE
10. CRAZY FOR YOU -
MARINA SAITO
I've probably watched this video 50 times, and recommended it about that many times as well. You inspired me to talk about Natsukashii in my own videos. What an interesting concept!
If I could only take 10 youtube videos with me to a desert island, this is one of 'em.
OMG THAT LAST BIT I COULDN'T HOLD MYSELF I SANG THE WHOLE THING WITH YOU I'M GLAD I FOUND THIS VIDEO!! CITY POP IS THE BEST!
What song was that?
As a music producer, I have really wanted to make future funk (and other vaporwave subgenres too) but never actually got to making it. Hopefully one day I can give it a go :)
This genre always gave me this feeling, but I wasn’t ever able to fully deduct what it was until now. God it’s so strange to me how music from a time before I was born made an ocean away makes me feel nostalgic for it. This world is hectic and this genre of music feels like it belongs in the alternative world japan hoped would soon come, this world we live in is too depressing to compare and doesn’t deserve this music.
Found your channel with this great video, can't wait to watch the rest of your catalouge 🥰
I just found City Pop about a year ago and I absolutely adore it! It's upbeat without being pulse pounding. It's a happy, smooth kind of music that's meant to be fun to listen to when you drive
13:55 I'm also reminded of the Fairy Fountain theme from Zelda. I'm not big into the franchise, but it's also used on the intro screen of Skyward Sword
It's almost exactly the same music
Yes. Its actually the same song that was used as an easteregg.
ROFLCOPTER That's pretty cute, just puttin' your favorite song at the beginning of your game (and it becoming a franchise staple eventually) heh
Great video! These are subgenres of the umbrella of SYNTHPOP and SYNTHWAVE
Great work, as always. I like your positive approach to the cyclical theory of history, specifically, as it's often a pessimistic statement of the bad things coming back to haunt us.
After listening to the playlist you posted, I was blown away by how influential City Pop was in building the global synthetic music aesthetic. I have heard those sounds in all sorts of music my whole life and thats the Genesis. What an invisible touch. 😘
This is why I listen to citypop, the sound and instrumentals of the music I grew up to. The originality of it. It had soul, the vocals were amazing and that beautiful nostalgia I feel keeps me listening.
Beautiful. This video got me very emotional and indeed natsukashii. This ephemeral thread that is art that connects feelings and people across space and time. I really love your channel and the particular angle you tackle culture. I think it is an important perspective you bring. Thank you and keep dreaming
I'm so glad vinyls aren't region locked.
City Pop recommendations just "popped" into my feed in recent weeks... after years of listening to vintage and new retro synth music. Better late than never. I appreciate that someone on YT not only shares that interest but took the time to inform us on its origins.
We Portuguese have a word Saudade that expresses what future funk feels
Saudade de um futuro que nunca aconteceu.
For alot of us Japanese people that are in their 20s and 30s, city pop is something that would be playing in our parent's car when we were growing up. The majority of my generation's parents are the ones who actually experienced living the bubble economy era in the 80s as young adults, so they always tell us about how awesome life was back then making us jealous lol
80s Japan, particularly Tokyo would've been splendid just like Hollywood Los Angeles in the 80s also.
I love when you’re not looking but you find something completely new and absolutely amazing lol. And I had heard this style of music from different media but never knew it was this deep
Jesus Christ, just in the first few minutes you have me instantly hooked. Subscribed
For me futurefunk was my favorite discovery in the vaporwave scene. Once I started listening to Macross 82-99 I was down the rabbit hole and before I knew it I owned a pile of futurefunk vinyls and cassettes. Props for making a video fam, I will gladly take anything promoting this beautiful genre. And also props for talking about the timing of it, it's a musical trend of wanting to go back to simpler times and serves as a wonderful reprise from the hectic dystopia we live in.
I should note that I was already a city pop fan going into futurefunk. One day my UA-cam feed was infected by the junko ohashi song telephone, then came plastic love and a whole myriad of city pop. And I would have never clicked it if someone didn't make the telephone awoo touhou meme.
Hahhaaaa loved the singing in the end! And all the rest of the video! Great, thanks.
Nice job, Michael! As a long-time enthusiast and participant in the City Pop scene since the late 70s in my various radio shows and recordings in Japan, I thoroughly enjoyed your well-researched presentation and the music and colorful videos within. "Dreaming in Neon!" what a great saying! Love it and have been dreaming in neon since the early 80s. Finally, I enjoyed your singing of "Sparkle" (the opening theme song of my daily M-F show on FM COCOLO) a few years back.
This .. makes so much sense. And explain a feeling i was never able to address before. Thank you
What a great perspective on City Pop! Thank you!
Also, don't forget Hiroshi Nagai for the retro style artwork
Excellent work. And you just might be the first person to include Morikawa Miho (my favorite Japanese artist of all-time, but she was never that well-known) in a City Pop video.
I've been listening to City Pop since the mid-80's as a teenager, except the term "City Pop" didn't exist back then, as it was coined decades later. Back then, I always referred to it as "Vacation Pop" whenever I made cassette mixtapes for friends, because that's what the music felt like to me, conveying the kind of mood you'd feel while on a vacation, cruising down the street with the beach boardwalk to one side, and gleaming skyscrapers on the other, or driving towards the neon glow of the night city, where exciting possibilities await you.
I was obsessed with anime, manga, J-pop/rock, J-dramas/movies, etc., and I'm glad I got to experience that era in real-time. I only got to visit Japan once around 1983, and it was an amazing experience. During that era I lived in the Bay Area, so I made frequent pilgrimages to Japan Town in San Francisco, where I got to browse and shop all the most recent Japanese music, magazines, books, Cassettes, VHS tapes, Laserdiscs, posters, etc., and the video/CD rental shops allowed me to experience all kinds of stuff without breaking the bank. When the 90's came and the sound I loved went away, I lamented the shift in tone in J-pop, and was not a fan of the whole Komuro Tetsuya produced/Avex label/Nami Amuro Euro-dance movement that took over, as it simply felt cold and unromantic to me.
Decades later, I was ecstatic when the City Pop revival happened, and the sound I loved starting showing up again. Just last year, my favorite album of 2020 was Yukika's "Soul Lady," which is a Korean City Pop album made by a Japanese singer. It's like everything just went full circle.
Good video. Thanks for the solo at the end. Nothing moves me like seeing another human display passion
im not currently in a youtube hole but got linked from r/ANICOMMUNISM sooo uhh yeah lets see how far down a hole this can get me, i love some plastic love. 16:40 i uhh wasnt expecting that LUL.
This video taught me about the genre that i love so much. Im going check out your other videos now thanks for the amazing work.
Yoooo THIS is the reason I love youtube :) Thank you for this trip through the past and ourselves
I grew up watching Yu Yu Hakusho (aka Ghost Fighter) ever since I was pretty much a child. I'm now in my mid 20's and but for some reason, I've always favoured City Pop music over any other music genre I listened but could never figure out why I liked it so much. Even my parents tell me that City Pop is the kind of "oldies" type of music they used to listen to - a style of music that isn't/shouldn't be "suited" for young adults my age. As I watched your video, I straight up started tearing up the moment you explained that Yu Yu Hakusho had a deep rooted connection to City Pop mainly from it's opening theme. I remember memorizing that opening theme as a child simply because of how much I liked the sound of it even though I knew little to no Japanese. That point in your video invoked so much nostalgia, memories and just a deep understanding of why I love City Pop music so much. Thanks so much for making this video.
This video was really an awesome recommendation for once, thanks a lot for this video!
As someone who grew up in the late 90s to early 2000s, City Pop has a very peculiar and special feeling for me. I played alot of video games when I was younger, many of which were japanese imports. This music has that very difficult to find quality of hireath for me. Hireath is a welsh word that roughly equates to a longing for a warm feeling of home, a home that is gone and can never be returned to, only longed for. I watched many anime as kid, then got out of it for over a decade and a half. Now years later in my 30s I am a fan of anime again. And you know what. Many of the sounds of anime of the past are able to evoke those feelings of nostalgia, yearning, homesickness, wanting the future that was promised but never came to be. Only because of the internet was I able to figure out what City Pop and Future Funk are a few years ago after listening to vaporwave for a few years. Now I have a small collection of japanese city pop vinyl alongside Vaporwave and Future Funk vinyl with no record player. Kinda appropo. I loved and still love really old school arcade games and video games as well as anime from that era. I miss that feeling of a bright, sun bathed future with the ocean in background that is represented in City Pop. The soft melancholy glow of neon lights allowing us to gaze on a future that should have been except for human brokeness. I listen to City Pop and Future Funk whenever I have to work overnight shifts at work and it really makes time seem to disappear and even hard work less of drudgery. Thanks Michael for making this video and putting to words what so many of us are feeling. City Pop truly is a genre that should be appreciated all over the world for its beauty, hopefulness, relaxing melodies and ability to speak from the heart.
Thank you. Such a great analysis.
I've been a fan of Shibuya-kei, particularly Pizzicato 5, and sampling artists, like Koop or Nujabes or TV Girl. Didn't really loved the 80s music until I heard City Pop, but even so, I couldn't put into words why I love these types of music, until this vid. Thanks do much for doing this.
Truly AMAZING Job. Sharing to all my friends, the ones who know and the ones who (now) don´t know about City Pop and Future Funk.
Keep it up Man!
It is very interesting to see what your interpretation of "future funk" is versus mine. I will start by acknowledging that Yung Bae is the only artist of the first four you mention early on that I am familiar with, and also point out that in context with Asian sounding names, it fits perfectly. But I know that his name is "Yung Bae", clearly an American reference to the hip hop trends of the modern era.
I saw Yung Bae open for Griz in 2019 (actually around the date this video was uploaded, Griz & Yung Bae @ St. Augustine Amphitheatre), I think, which ties both to my interpretation of future funk and this video. I didn't personally click with Bae's set when I saw him, it wasn't bad, I just couldn't connect it to anything I knew, which makes this video infinitely more fascinating.
I don't know what relation you have to the modern live electronic scene, but I was the right age at the right time when Skrillex came to prominence, and as a metal kid at the time it was the perfect introduction to a world I had completely ignored. Pretty Lights is the foundation upon which my entire musical identity is based now, and my interpretation of future funk springs from that. Early Griz, Gramatik, Big Gigantic, and a million smaller glitch hop artists are what I consider future funk (Marvel Years is a good example).
It is very interesting to see what the origins that this particular branch of the modern, sax/guitar incorporating DJ stems from. I can recommend artists like Flamingosis, Guggenz, and a few others as a western alternative to Yung Bae, but his influences are extremely apparent after watching this and I might look deeper into his music.
definitely one of the best analysis I've ever seen on the subject. Congratulations! But I find it bewildering that Saint Pepsi wasn't even mentioned
I watched this 4 months ago and thought "hmm that zeta show looks kinda neat" and now I've watched every UC gundam series and have a shelf full gunpla kits what have you done to me Michael?!
Your content is so GOOD that I'm willing to wait forever to get just another taste. Thank you for everything.
Someone should create a discord for people like us 🙏
As soon as I heard City Pop and discovered the name that encompassed the genre I had to consume more... After consuming more and getting hit with the familiar yet foreign nostalgia I had to figure out why it felt the way it did, I knew that someone had to have made a video essay on the topic and then I found this... Absolutely well done sir 👌🏾🙏🏾
15:15 that's the pose of a man financially hit in the wallet. the hole is still burning his wallet to this day.
Thank you for this ive Always been so in Love with the future funk genre and this video speaks to my heart 😊
Finally someone who put it in words when I couldn’t. Thank you for making this video friend.
Familiar but totally alien... Every word you have said in the whole video explains my attraction and addiction to city funk. I don't know what else to say accept you have described my life since Feb this year when I found city pop. I haven't stopped listening since. Thanks so much for helping me know I'm not the only one out there.
Sublime video.
Absolutely sublime.
Wow, i really loved this. Thank you so much for your hard work. This is one mini-documentary I didn't know i needed to see until I listened to your opening words. Hooked me. Well done, looking forward to your next works!
I was a young teenager when i stayed at Niigata in mid 90s for a little while and my uncle would play these familiar tunes when driving and recently i was yearning for relaxing music until i fell into this city pop rabbit hole. My heart has found its rightful place, or i have it in my heart all along.
Artzie Music single handedly popularize city pop and future funk. It all came down to that channel that was managed by an ill fated young couple (they broke up and had custody battle over the account). They were basically the only ones to make the future funk anime videos. The original city pop songs were uploaded after the future funk songs were popular since 2015 on the Artzie channel. The earliest recorded rendition of Plastic Love was literally like 2014 on Artzie.
I wasn't expecting that solo at the end, but I'm here for it lmaooooo
Thank you so much for this video. At 50 and from the Gen X generation, I didn't understand why I had this sense of nostalgia when watching some anime in particular; I always thought the music sounded 'retro', and just thought along the lines of Japan's karaoke scene maybe. Only recently, have I found the language to describe it, as you have; it's City Pop.
This is such a great video! Future Funk and City Pop got me to explore other areas of music, and become a massive music fan, but I always have a special place in my heart for these songs.
Shonen Knife lead me into this rabbit hole. Japanese rock is one of the factors that brought American ears to City Pop.
That macross album is legendary!!! Has totally changed my musical directory the last few weeks
I fucking love you. Tatsuro Yamshita forever
I’m 42, I grew up with toys and a few records from Japan brought home by my late father. It brings back a lot of memories to the country I’ve never been to... Until 2015.
So what you are saying is that I was into City Pop before you were born! :)
All of those anime tracks were my 80s and 90 and I have come full circle. LOL
You just made me remember the MP2 and .AU files we used to download in the 90s of japanese radio tracks and OSTs. LOL
Well researched! I feel you could have included more actual Future Funk in it, for people who might not have been familiar with the genre.