From Showa-era kayōkyoku to pop: songs that sound cool when you can really sing them

Many of you probably want to sing cool, deep tracks at karaoke with style.

In particular, Showa-era kayōkyoku and New Music, as well as early-to-mid Heisei J-POP, are packed with timeless masterpieces that still sound fresh decades after their release—a real treasure trove of cool, mature songs.

It’s precisely because of that universal appeal that these songs continue to be sung by today’s younger generation.

In this article, I’ll introduce plenty of those songs that, if you can pull them off, will give you that sophisticated edge.

I’ve picked selections mainly from Japanese music of the ’70s through the ’90s, with some of the latest J-POP mixed in, so use this as a reference when choosing songs for karaoke!