Nariaki Obukuro bristles when I suggest he makes J-pop. He prefers his music being described as J-pop-adjacent.
Yet here we are sitting in a spacious room at Sony Music Japan's office in Akasaka, and the singer-songwriter has worked extensively with J-pop queen, Hikaru Utada. Still, Obukuro can't commit to the idea he makes J-pop. Why? "It's awful," he says with a laugh.
"A lot of J-pop just focuses on things that are outside of you, looking beyond the individual," he says. "For me, (music is) way more about individuality. It's more personal, and it comes from inside."