After the Meiji Restoration introduced Western musical instruction, a bureaucrat named Izawa Shuji compiled songs like "Auld Lang Syne" and commissioned songs using a pentatonic melody. Western music, especially military marches, soon became popular in Japan. Two major forms of music that developed during this period were shoka, which was composed to bring western music to schools, and gunka, which are military marches with some Japanese elements.

As Japan moved towards representative democracy in the late 19th century, leaders hired singers to sell copies of songs that aired their messages, since the leaders themselves were usually prohibited from speaking in public. This developed into a form of ballad called enka, which became quite popular in the 20th century, though its popularity has waned since the 1970s and enjoys little favour with contemporary youth. Famous enka singers include Misora Hibari and Ikuzo Yoshi. Also at the end of the 19th century, an Osakan form of streetcorner singing became popular; this was called ryūkōka. This included the first two Japanese stars, Yoshida Naramura and Tochuken Kumoemon.

Electronic pop music in Japan became a successful commodity with the Technopop craze of the late 70s and 80s, beginning with Yellow Magic Orchestra and solo albums of Ryuichi Sakamoto and Haruomi Hosono in 1978 before hitting popularity in 79/80. Influenced by disco, impressionistic and 20th century classical composition, jazz/fusion pop, new wave and technopop artists such as Kraftwerk and Telex, these artists were commercial yet uncompromising; Ryuichi Sakamoto claims that "to me, making pop music is not a compromise because I enjoy doing it". The artists that fall under the banner of technopop in Japan are as loose as those that do so in the West, thus new wave bands such as P-Model and The Plastics fall under the category alongside the symphonic techno arrangements of Yellow Magic Orchestra. The popularity of this music meant that many popular artists of the 70s that previously were known for acoustic music turned to techno production, such as Taeko Onuki and Akiko Yano, and idol producers began employing electronic arrangements for new singers in the 80s. Today, newer artists such as Polysics pay explicit homage to this era of Japanese popular (and in some cases underground or difficult to obtain) music.

The late 90's brought the arrival of many new artists and groups, including Utada Hikaru,Every Little Thing,Ayumi Hamasaki, and Morning Musume. Utada Hikaru's debut album, "First Love", went on to be the highest-selling album in Japan with 10 million copies sold, and Morning Musume remains one of the most well-known girl groups in the Japanese pop music industry, becoming Japan's best-selling female group with their 33rd single, Kanashimi Twilight.