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‘A new stereophonic sound spectacular’: Shibuya-kei as transnational soundscape

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 February 2013

Martin Roberts
Martin Roberts*
Affiliation:
School of Communications, Hallym University, Chuncheon, South Korea E-mail: [email protected]
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Abstract

This paper focuses on Shibuya-kei, a style of independent popular music that emerged in Japan in the late 1980s and which has been influential in the popularisation of J-pop worldwide. Although usually treated as a uniquely Japanese musical genre, Shibuya-kei was from its inception defined by an ostentatious internationalism, fusing jazz, easy listening and bossa nova with British, American and French retro-pop styles. Tracing the international itineraries of Shibuya-kei musicians and the role of Western musicians and labels in promoting it outside Japan, this paper characterises Shibuya-kei not as just another J-pop genre but as a transnational soundscape, a collaborative project produced by a network of musicians circulating between Japan and the UK, the US, France, Germany, Spain and Brazil. As such, the paper suggests, it requires us to rethink the place of the national in relation to popular music.

Type
Articles
Information
Popular Music , Volume 32 , Issue 1: East Asian popular music and its (dis)contents , January 2013 , pp. 111 - 123
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2013

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Discography

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Filmography

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