A classic song about a forbidden love
Adultery dramas we often see in dramas, movies, and TV talk shows—the love that can never come true.
We’ve gathered songs about these “forbidden loves.” There are many beautifully portrayed dramas that make your heart race, but what if you yourself were to fall into a love that isn’t allowed…? Here, we’ll introduce plenty of songs that capture the bittersweet feelings of such forbidden love.
From songs told from a woman’s perspective to those from a man’s point of view, there are more tracks about forbidden love than you might think.
Perhaps that’s because many people are secretly suffering over a love that shouldn’t be….
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- [Empathetic & Tear-Jerking] A love song about an unrequited romance
- [An Adulterous Love] A love song about a secret affair you can't tell anyone about
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- [Unrequited Love] Heart-wrenching Love Songs | A Roundup of Tear-Inducing Crush and Breakup Tracks
- Favorite Songs for Women in Their 50s: A Curated Selection of Sweet and Bittersweet Love Ballads!
- [Jealousy & Possessiveness Songs] A curated selection of popular tracks to listen to when possessiveness feels overwhelming!
- A roundup of love songs themed around homosexuality and LGBTQ+
- “I Want to See You”: A love song that makes you cry when you listen to it while you can’t meet
Masterpieces about forbidden love (31–40)
Absolute relationshipakai kouen
This is the song ‘Zettaiteki na Kankei’ (‘Absolute Relationship’), which was used as the theme for the drama Lost Days.
It was written specifically for this drama.
Its brevity—just 100 seconds—also became a talking point.
While it can be seen less as a love song and more as a track themed around “secrets,” I think it’s perfect for people involved in a romance they can’t tell anyone about.
The sound has a catchy vibe yet carries a certain tension, and the lyrics depict a world where you act so that no one finds out.
Perhaps there’s something in it that resonates with the relationship between the two of you.
sunflowerSEKAI NO OWARI
The protagonist, who had been living in a dark world, ends up meeting “you,” someone dazzling like the sun—the beginning of a forbidden love as sung by SEKAI NO OWARI.
Listening to this song, you can feel that bittersweet thrill of knowing the person is off-limits, yet realizing thanks to them your world is starting to gain color.
Maybe it’s precisely because the melody is light and pop that it tightens your chest even more.
This track is included on the acclaimed album “Lip,” which topped the Oricon charts in February 2019.
It’s a song that gently stays with you in that helpless rush of feelings at the moment you fall in love, even when you know it won’t be returned.
Run through the nightsupittsu
A Spitz song that portrays an elopement born from a forbidden love.
Knowing theirs is a relationship no one will bless, it depicts a poignant night as the couple runs off into a world for just the two of them.
Aware that they’re connected not by a destined red thread, but by something far more fragile, they still try to believe in that bond alone—an attitude that leaves you with a sense of helpless sorrow.
The track was included on the classic album Mikazuki Rock, released in September 2002, and was later used as an insert song in an anime.
It’s a work that confronts you with the purity and peril of a love you’d uphold even while turning your back on the world, prompting deep reflection.
even ifHirai Ken
It’s a song by Ken Hirai that conjures up the image of a man at a bar counter, tilting his glass and hiding his true feelings as he sits beside someone gazing at their lover’s ring.
You can almost feel the protagonist’s painful frustration as he wishes they’d miss the last train, yet swallows the words instead.
Released in December 2000, the track reached No.
3 on the Oricon weekly chart and is also included on the classic album “gaining through losing.” For those entangled in a forbidden love—knowing it won’t come true yet unable to stop their growing feelings—this song may quietly keep you company.
Dear…Nishino Kana
This is a song by Kana Nishino that conveys the pain of bittersweet affection and unrequited love.
The melancholic piano sound evokes the feeling of softly murmuring one’s sorrow, and the expansive development of the music strikingly expresses emotions overflowing.
The lyrics, which capture the inner movements of the heart when burdened with feelings that won’t reach their destination or love that cannot be fulfilled, further emphasize the poignancy.
By also depicting the ideal of “what if these feelings had reached you,” the song renders the suffering even more vividly.
Masterpieces about forbidden love (41–50)
Through countless nightsCHEMISTRY
It’s a CHEMISTRY track that puts an aching poignancy front and center, depicting someone who keeps singing feelings that will never reach their destination.
The distinctive, floating sound seems to express a sense of emotional instability.
With its simple arrangement—wavering organ tones and vocals—the message embedded in the singing and lyrics feels all the more emphasized.
It powerfully conveys the pain of thinking about a beloved person who has gone away, and of piling up unreachable wishes within oneself.
WRONGyukaDD
This song captures the inner conflict of a woman who can’t bring herself to hate him, even though she knows his heart is drifting away.
The title “WRONG” means “mistake.” Many people experiencing a love that likely won’t come true will painfully understand the feeling of wanting to believe that their feelings for him are a mistake, trying to convince themselves of it.
You can really feel the heartache of the moment she realizes his true feelings.
This song was also chosen as the theme for the drama “When a Marriage Breaks.”
