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Definition: City pop is a loosely defined form of Japanese pop music that emerged in the late 1970s and peaked in popularity during the 1980s. It was originally termed as an offshoot of Japan's Western-influenced "new music", but came to include a range of styles — including funk, disco, R&B, AOR, soft rock, and boogie — that were associated with Japan's nascent economic boom and leisure class. It was identified with new technologies such as the Walkman, cars with built-in cassette decks and FM stereos, and various electronic musical instruments.

In Japan, the term referred to music that projected an "urban" feel and whose target demographic was urbanites. Many city pop artists did not embrace Japanese influences, and instead largely drew from American funk, soft rock and boogie. Some songs feature tropical flourishes or elements taken from disco, jazz fusion, Okinawan, Latin and Caribbean music.

City pop lost its mainstream appeal by the 1990s and was derided by later Japanese generations. In the early 2010s, partly through the influence of music-sharing blogs and Japanese reissues, city pop gained an international online following and became important to the sample-based microgenres known as vaporwave and future funk.

Criteria: influence, critical & peer acclaim, popularity

1. Stay With Me - Miki Matsubara (1979)
2. Plastic Love - Mariya Takeuchi (1985)
3. Ride on Time - Tatsuro Yamashita (1980)
4. Downtown - Sugar Babe (1975)
5. Tokai - Taeko Ohnuki (1977)
6. Sparkle - Tatsuro Yamashita (1982)
7. Machi no Dorufin - Kingo Hamada (1982)
8. Midnight Pretenders - Tomoko Aran (1983)
9. Flyday Chinatown - Yasuha (1981)
10. I Can’t Stop the Loneliness - Anri (1983)
11. Fantasy - Meiko Nakahara (1982)
12. September - Mariya Takeuchi (1979)
13. Telephone Number - Junko Ohashi (1981)
14. Remember Summer Days - Anri (1983)
15. If You... - Toshiki Kadomatsu (1982)
16. Mayonaka no Joke - Takako Mamiya (1982)
17. Mizuiro no Ame - Junko Yagami (1978)
18. Ame no Wednesday - Eiichi Ohtaki (1981)
19. Christmas Eve - Tatsuro Yamashita (1983)
20. Airport Lady - Toshiki Kadomatsu (1984)
21. Tasogare no Bay City - Junko Yagami (1983)
22. Last Summer Whisper - Anri (1983)
23. Sky Restaurant - Hi-Fi Set (1977)
24. 4:00 AM - Taeko Ohnuki (1978)
25. Dream in the Street - Noriyo Ikeda (1980)
26. Tasogare - Mai Yamane (1980)
27. Oh No Oh Yes - Mariya Takeuchi (1987)
28. Just a Joke - Yurie Kokubu (1983)
29. Aqua City - Omega Tribe (1986)
30. Sunset Road - Reiko Takahashi (1987)
31. Watashitachi wo Shinjiteite - Cindy (1990)
32. Midnight Cruisin' - Kingo Hamada (1982)
33. Summer Breeze - Piper (1983)
34. Kimi wa Tennenshoku - Eiichi Ohtaki (1981)
35. Summer Connection - Taeko Ohnuki (1977)
36. Subterranean Futari Bocci - Nanako Sato (1977)
37. Ruby no Yubiwa - Akira Terao (1981)
38. Midnight Driver - Minako Yoshida (1980)
39. Kiska - Haruomi Hosono, Shigeru Suzuki & Tatsuro Yamashita (1978)
40. Smoky - Char (1976)
41. Casiopea - Casiopea (1979)
42. Must Be Lucky - Cindy (1990)
43. Kaze wo Atsumete - Happy End (1971)
44. U, Fu, Fu, Fu - EPO (1983)
45. Natsu no Tobira - Seiko Matsuda (1981)
46. Fly-By-Day - Toshiki Kadomatsu (1981)
47. I Say Who - Tomoko Soryo (1977)
48. L.A. Night - Yasuko Agawa (1984)
49. Sports Men - Haruomi Hosono (1982)
50. Bamboo Vendor - Masayoshi Takanaka (1979)

Greatest City Pop Artists

1. Tatsuro Yamashita
2. Mariya Takeuchi
3. Miki Matsubara
4. Taeko Ohnuki
5. Sugar Babe
6. Anri
7. Kingo Hamada
8. Toshiki Kadomatsu
9. Junko Ohashi
10. Eiichi Ohtaki

Tim on his way to make every list ever.

Tim making sure DDD beats RYM as the ultimate music guide