Displaying items by tag: J-Pop Summit Festival 2012

Last year's Jpop Summit was a bittersweet experience for me. On the one hand, it was great to see Jpop enjoying a festival of its own, but on the other, I was disappointed to see such a heavy focus on Vocaloid and Hatsune Miku. Granted, the Vocaloid phenomenon is undeniably a part of Japanese pop music, but I was hoping for insight into the Jpop scene not viewed through the lens of anime and video games. As I walked down the street towards Japantown for this year's festival, I kept my expectations neutral but hoped for a greater focus on Japanese musicians. As I got closer, I heard a cover for "Call Me Maybe" by Carly Rae, and I cringed. Once I reached the plaza, I saw that there were three white girls playing covers of American pop music, and I struggled to understand the relation between this act and Jpop. As the day went on, I found a pleasantly surprising answer.