(Contemporary) Japanese karaoke hits

April 1, 2011 2:41 AM

Karaoke in Japanese. Am looking for tracks with a karaoke version on YouTube for an event. This old post has some great ideas, but sadly half of them have been removed from YouTube. What Japanese language songs do you sing at karaoke at the moment?! The more contemporary the better
posted by 0bvious to Media & Arts (6 answers total)

I used to sing Chemistry songs, since they were slow, and the vocabulary was easy.
Pieces Of A Dream
You Go Your Way
Point Of No Return
No longer very contemporary, but they hold up well enough for me.
posted by bashos_frog at 4:38 AM on April 1, 2011

sorry - karaoke versions:
Pieces Of A Dream
You Go Your Way
Point Of No Return
posted by bashos_frog at 4:45 AM on April 1, 2011

Not really contemporary either, but Linda Lina by the Blue Hearts has always been my standby.
posted by Oktober at 6:40 AM on April 1, 2011

I'm also going to give you a non-contemporary one, but U O Muite Aruko (aka Sukiyaki) is a classic.
posted by jeffmshaw at 6:58 AM on April 1, 2011

Here are the karaoke rankings from Oricon, JOYSOUND, Uta-Net, and UTAGA. There are listings for the week and for the year.

Just search for the artist name + カラオケ at YouTube for a bunch of working videos (or omit the artist name and browse by hits, etc.). GReeeeN and Kobukuro are popular now and fun to sing, especially with groups.

I also like Spitz (Cherry, Sora mo Toberu Hazu) and Angela Aki.
posted by mshrike at 10:51 AM on April 1, 2011

Someone in the post you link to mentions "Linda Linda" and that is still a great suggestion, if not exactly contemporary. Personal fave, "Seishun Amigo" which you can dance to if you're ambitious.
posted by betweenthebars at 11:04 AM on April 1, 2011