I'm not dead!

Just posting quickly to say I'm not dead - I've just been very busy with my graduation and moving around. But don't worry, there's still a ton of exciting music waiting to meet you soon - expect regular updates again tomorrow! :-) If you're really itching for some music, here's the Oricon charts for this week (always a fun watch):

Top 100 Japanese Artists

HMV's Top 100 Japanese Artists

I've been going over my music to decide what will make a good compilation for a special event. In thinking through all of the artists I've encountered in the past couple of months, I've remembered this interesting list that I found on a bunch of Wikipedia articles about artists (great source right?)

It's the HMV list of top 100 Japanese (pop) artists. Don't trust the pop label, because I was surprised at the wide range of rock artists who also made it on here. I thought it would be an interesting exercise to post the list on here and then see how much this blog eventually covers one day.

1. Southern All Stars - popish rock group I may cover some day.	51. Misia
2. YMO	52. Minako Yoshida
3. Yumi Matsutoya	53. Namie Amuro
4. Happy End	54. Taeko Onuki
5. Hibari Misora	55. Akina Nakamori
6. Tatsuro Yamashita	56. Tsuyoshi Nagabuchi
7. Momoe Yamaguchi	57. Alice
8. Yosui Inoue	58. L'Arc～en～Ciel - Hyde's group, may have to cover them someday
9. Eiichi Otaki	59. Shogo Hamada
10. Seiko Matsuda	60. Tatsuya Ishii
11. Ryuichi Sakamoto	61. Unicorn - planning on putting these guys up
12. Keisuke Kuwata	62. Chage & Aska
13. Motoharu Sano	63. Dragon Ash - these guys may go up
14. Eikichi Yazawa	64. Hi-standard
15. Flippers Guitar	65. Glay - pretty famous dude
16. RC Succession	66. Masayoshi Yamazaki
17. Kenji Sawada	67. Akiko Wada
18. Kyu Sakamoto	68. Moon Riders
19. Blue Hearts	69. Smap
20. Miyuki Nakajima	70. Tomoyasu Hotei
21. Tetsuya Komuro	71. Tokyo Ska Paradise Orchestra
22. Boowy	72. Lisa Ono
23. Yutaka Ozaki	73. Blankey Jet City
24. Hikaru Utada	74. quruli
25. Tamio Okuda	75. Roosters
26. Mariya Takeuchi	76. Kyosuke Himuro
27. Mr Children	77. Thee Michelle Gun Elephant
28. Kazumasa Oda	78. Denki Groove
29. Spitz	79. Kenji Ozawa
30. B'z	80. Yuzo Kayama
31. Pizzicato Five - totally putting them up!	81. Yellow Monkey
32. Off Course	82. Jacks
33. Murahachibu	83. Fishmans
34. Pink Lady	84. Noriyuki Makihara
35. Tulip	85. Ken Hirai
36. Ringo Shiina	86. Yonin Bayashi
37. Toshinobu Kubota	87. Rip Slyme
38. Char	88. Princess Princess
39. Godiego - these guys will go up!	89. Original Love
40. X Japan - may go up, wayy famous	90. Luna Sea - may go up
41. Yujiro Ishihara	91. Mute Beat
42. Ayumi Hamasaki	92. Alfee
43. Cornelius	93. Hiroshi Fujiwara
44. Haruomi Hosono	94. Sadistic Mika Band
45. Dreams Come True	95. Mondo Grosso
46. Takuro Yoshida	96. Judy And Mary
47. Anzenchitai	97. Zeebra
48. Checkers	98. Crazy Ken Band
49. Candies	99. Ua
50. Yasuyuki Okamura	100. Begin

Quick note about commenting

I have now made it so that anyone can comment on this blog (not just blogger members). Some people had been complaining to me about that. So feel free to post your feelings whenever, wherever!

How to find Japanese music

Several people have been asking me about how I get my music. So here are some late-night tips on how to get your hands on these awesome tunes!

• Youtube (or Google Video Search for a wider spread) - many Japanese bands have common English words as names and so are hard to find (like "Straightener" or "Half-Life"). Add "PV" to your search and you will find their music videos (PV is an almost exclusively Japanese term, meaning "promotional video").


• Discovering Indies - Again on youtube, I recommend a related videos chain - where you just keep clicking on music videos of related artists. You'll find some gems then! I find the sources of most of my videos tend to be Victor Music, UK Project official, and Avex Network.


• Download sites - There are several live journal communities, such as Just Download, or torrent sites like JPopsuki, but I don't use those much (my school network doesn't support torrents). What I do is just Google the band (and maybe album name) + megaupload, rapidshare, or mediafire. Even with the rarest and newest material, works like a charm. Though of course only download what you already have, delete it in 24 hours, etc yadda yadda. Luckily a lot of friends randomly send me music too to keep up my library.


• Japanese music charts - In Japan, the music chart is called Oricon, and every week they release a top-30 list that serves as a good starting point for studying Japanese music. Currently I can't find a good source, but the best shows to watch are "Music Station" and "CDTV" (Countdown TV).

Hope this helps you guys on your quests to find some awesome music! ;-)

Introduction

Hi everyone!

My name's Wilma and I'm a big music lover. I just came back from a year-long study abroad in Kyoto, and I'm planning on going back to Japan after graduating from college. I have become obsessed with the Japanese music scene - I check the Oricon charts weekly and download a new cd every week.

However, I can almost never find people who have a similar interest in Japanese indies music. Many Japanese university students fall into the same old, worn-out tastes: Mr. Children, Greeeen, etc etc. And then many Americans have a strange view of Japanese music, getting it mostly from anime or Johnny's Entertainment. Although good music sometimes comes out of those venues as well, I would like to introduce the world of Japanese rock music to you from a non-otaku taste. Welcome to the world of Japanese indies.

I am always excited to hear your opinions and recommendations on music as well. Please leave comments freely and let me know how to make this blog better!