We’re back again to greet the upcoming year by looking back at this year’s top Japanese acts! We have two lists prepared for you this time around, one consisting of the top 10 visual kei acts and another list with the top 10 Japanese acts we covered on our website!

The rank order is according to the artists’ top sale release on CDJapan in 2016, meaning that we’re only looking at the most popular release from each artist and not the total volume sold during the year. Unlike last year’s top list we reduce the number to only 10 acts in each list, and artists can now only enter one of the lists!

Starting from the bottom!

Goran kudasai!

Top 10 visual kei acts:

10.		Kaya Perfana Buy at CDJapan
9.		Matenrou Opera Chikyu Buy at CDJapan
8.		Versailles The Greatest Hits 2007-2016 Buy at CDJapan
7.		MEJIBRAY The End Buy at CDJapan
6.		Hizaki Rosario Buy at CDJapan
5.		GACKT Last Moon Buy at CDJapan
4.		DIR EN GREY Utafumi Buy at CDJapan
3.		NOCTURNAL BLOODLUST ZēTēS Buy at CDJapan
2.		KAMIJO LA VIE EN ROSE Buy at CDJapan
1.		the GazettE UNDYING Buy at CDJapan or JPU Records

Continuing with the second part where only non-visual kei acts are included!

Top 10 Japanese acts:

10.		ASIAN KUNG-FU GENERATION Re:Re: Buy at CDJapan
9.		RADWIMPS Kimi No Na Wa Buy at CDJapan
8.		LADYBABY Renge Chance! Buy at CDJapan
7.		FLOW Kaze no UTA / BURN Buy at CDJapan
6.		Aimer ninelie Buy at CDJapan
5.		EGOIST Kabaneri of the Iron Fortress Buy at CDJapan
4.		SCANDAL YELLOW Buy at CDJapan or JPU Records
3.		REOL Sigma Buy at CDJapan
2.		BABYMETAL Metal Resistance Buy at CDJapan
1.		BAND-MAID Brand New MAID Buy at CDJapan or JPU Records

It looks like the GazettE is still dominating the visual kei top list this year again, while Kamijo diligently remains as the silver medalist. However, Nocturnal Bloodlust made a significant leap from being in the fifth position last year, to the third position this year.

For the Japanese act list we see a tendency of female artists dominating it, surprisingly with REOL—a fairly new major debuted doujin artist—making it into the top three!

So that was it, hope you all had fun checking out our compiled top list of 2016. Tell us your thoughts or maybe even share your very own top list in the comment section below!

See more top lists:

Source:
Complete list of CDJapan’s Japanese artist ranking
Complete list of CDJapan’s visual kei artist ranking