Shibuya-Kei
Shibuya-kei is a 1990s Japanese pop style from Tokyo that stitches together 1960s pop, bossa nova, French pop, lounge and dance beats in a playful, collage-like way.
It is named after Tokyo's Shibuya district, whose record shops stocked the rare imported records these musicians loved and sampled. The music is light, stylish and full of references, with retro arrangements, soft vocals and cut-and-paste production. It began as an indie scene in the late 1980s and early 1990s and peaked in the mid to late 1990s. Its knowing, retro taste separates it from mainstream J-pop of the same years.
Artists it is known for: Pizzicato Five, Flipper's Guitar, Cornelius, Kahimi Karie.
- Family
- J-Pop & Anime
- On Spotify
- A current genre
- What it is
- A genre
- From
- Tokyo, late 1980s to early 1990s
- Also called
- Shibuya sound
- Trackify listeners who play it
- 2%
About 1,700 of 83,000 Trackify listeners with public profiles have shibuya-kei among their top artists of the last four weeks. Rounded; updated 13 November 2026.
Shibuya-Kei artists
Lamp
Ichiko Aoba
Tommy february6
Lily Chou-Chou
Fishmans
Taeko Onuki
Perfume
Serani Poji
溶けない名前
Kitty CraftThe shibuya-kei artists most Trackify listeners have in their top fifty. Each opens on Spotify.
Sources
The definition is written for this site from open sources, and was checked against them on 13 November 2026.