[Sunday Culture] "Stay With Me~" The Story of Japanese City Pop Noticed by NewJeans

Born in response to the 1970s folk song trend
Reflecting images of Japanese cities during rapid growth
Forgotten after the bubble burst, revived through SNS
Gaining attention overseas

"Stay with me, Mayonaka no Doa o Tataki~ (Stay with me, ?夜中のドアをたたき)"

Recently, there has been a city pop boom on social networking services (SNS). Songs that evoke nostalgia for the Showa era, such as Miki Matsubara's "Stay with Me," which tells a heartbreaking love story about knocking on the door in the middle of the night asking not to leave, and Mariya Takeuchi's "Plastic Love," are playing everywhere. During my school days, I think I listened more to contemporary J-pop like X Japan, KinKi Kids, Arashi, and M-Flo rather than city pop, but suddenly the previous generation’s city pop has become hugely popular. Various analyses are ongoing within Japan about the revival of city pop, which gives a dreamy melody and a wistful feeling.

Today, we introduce how Japanese city pop started and why it is experiencing a revival.

Album jacket of Matsubara Miki's 'Stay With Me'. (Photo by Matsubara Miki SNS)

Emerging in the 1970s... Starting as a Non-mainstream Genre

City pop is a music genre that began in the 1970s and flourished through the 1980s. Legendary singers such as Mariya Takeuchi, who sang "Plastic Love," Seiko Matsuda, and Akina Nakamori also emerged during this period. Originally, the popular music in Japan during the 1970s was folk songs. At that time, student movements were active, and songs expressing anti-war and peace sentiments were loved by young people. Amid this, artists who wanted to try music different from the folk songs began to appear. Instead of folk songs, they were influenced by American pop music and devised urban and sophisticated sounds, which led to the birth of city pop. It is a unique genre created by combining Western genres such as funk, disco, and rhythm and blues with Japan’s distinctive musical sensibility.

The emergence of city pop coincided with Japan’s bubble economy boom. It encompasses the dazzling city images such as the never-extinguishing lights of discotheques decorating Tokyo’s nights and the streets filled with people, as well as the contrasting emptiness after people leave. This creates the unique sensibility characteristic of city pop.

However, later on, idol groups appeared in Japan, and popular music flourished. City pop, which had been forgotten for a while, suddenly began to rise again from the late 2010s. And notably, this resurgence happened not in Japan but overseas.

Spread via YouTube Algorithm... City Pop Noticed Overseas

Those who handled computers in the 2000s might recall that music editing by cutting and pasting segments using software like GoldWave was popular. In this way, a new music genre called "vaporwave" emerged on the internet after the 2000s. Vaporwave started as nostalgia for the 1980s heyday and a reaction to the mass consumer society of that time. Brands like Sony and Toyota, which expanded globally during Japan’s economic golden age, exemplify this well. Vaporwave artists would take 1980s city pop segments that were frequently played on YouTube and repeat them to create similar yet new songs.

Among these, Mariya Takeuchi’s "Plastic Love" and videos featuring the classic Japanese animation "Sailor Moon" as background gained significant attention. With the rapid growth of SNS, this subculture spread worldwide.

Nostalgia of the Past Moves the MZ Generation

In particular, city pop has become very popular among the MZ generation (Millennials + Generation Z). This is because city pop has a sensibility quite different from today’s music and evokes curiosity and nostalgia for a past era that is unreachable. Recently, the resurgence of Y2K from the early 2000s is similar, as things that evoke the glory and nostalgia of the past experienced during their childhood have gained attention among the MZ generation.

Music critic Yuji Shibasaki analyzed in an interview with NHK that "Japanese culture in the 1980s is often called a hollow period compared to the 1970s, but now it has been newly interpreted through city pop and regained popularity."

Above all, it is fascinating that city pop, which was not previously noticed, has been spotlighted overseas rather than in Japan and then re-exported back to Japan. This gives great comfort in knowing that even something not currently recognized can touch someone’s heart anywhere and anytime.