If you had North West rapping in Japanese on FKA twigs’ new album on your 2025 bingo card, then check yourself into the Umbrella Academy because you’ve clearly got a gift. “Childlike Things” wasn’t bad, in fact it just landed on the Billboard Hot Dance/Pop Songs top ten, but it did spark widespread discussion about how appropriate it was to feature an 11-year old on an album about healing sexual trauma through raving. FKA twigs has since explained that the track was about her own childhood dreams of becoming an artist and so “it only felt right to have a young spirit on the song”. Regardless, what is certain is that there are countless other Japanese rappers you can check out right now if North West’s verse tickled your fancy.

Japan has the unlikely claim of holding one of the longest-running hip hop scenes in the world, behind only America itself. While the genre’s defining trait of extended drum loops was first unveiled at a party in New York’s Bronx neighbourhood in the summer of 1973, it was subsequent releases from Japan’s Yellow Magic Orchestra and Ryuichi Sakamato that pioneered the digital drum patterns and electro-style synthesisers that later became central to hip hop parties in the 80s. In fact, one of hip hop’s ‘four godfathers’, Afrika Bambaataa, even cited Yellow Magic Orchestra as a key influence behind his debut album Planet Rock.

Almost 50 years later, the country’s hip hop scene is stronger than ever – not least thanks to the spectacular return of Japanese rap legend KOHH, who resurfaced under his birth name Yuki Chiba with a feature on Megan Thee Stallion’s viral hit “Mamushi” last year. The full spectrum of rap sonics are covered, from the global dominance of grime and drill, to the distinct cadences of artists like OZWorld and Maddy Soma, who draw on traditional Buddhist sutras and indigenous rituals.

Below, we spotlight five Japanese rappers that are killing it right now.

YUKI CHIBA

Yuki Chiba’s return to rap last year is one for the history books. He first made waves back in the early 2010s under his previous pseudonym, KOHH (an abbreviation of ‘king of hip hop’), as a leading figure in a new wave of Japanese rappers welcoming gritty trap sonics into the country. He appeared on Keith Ape’s moment-defining “It G Ma” remix, as well as a Vice documentary on the dark underbelly of Japan’s danchi housing estates, but in 2021 he retired the moniker for good. Chiba then resurfaced under his real name in early 2024 with “チーム友達” (‘Team Tomodachi’ – ‘team friendship’), which mobilised the entire J-rap scene with remixes spanning the rest of the year – as well as offshoots in Korea, Indonesia and the Philippines.

This was soon followed up with an iconic feature on Megan Thee Stallion’s Japanese crossover track “Mamushi”, and then full-length LP Star. The Yuki Chiba lore runs deep, but, if you’re going to start anywhere, I’d recommend diving into the series of “Team Tomodachi” remixes to get an impression of just how significant his reemergence was.

LITTY

There’s something strangely captivating about the contrast between Tokyo rapper Litty’s unassuming appearance and her quick-footed melodic trap flows. Despite leading lights like Awich, Akane and Lana, Japan’s hip hop scene is still starkly lacking in female presence, and Litty seems to have a bit of an ‘everygirl’ appeal about her. Breaking through last year with “Pull Up”, her debut EP Just a Girl’s colourful melodies arrive lights neonlit tour through Tokyo’s Shibuya nightlife district, while Litty’s nonchalant delivery contains a certain mendokusē that just draws you in.

ITACHI

Born in Okinawa, raised in Tokyo, and having spent time as a DJ in London and Berlin, 23-year old rapper-producer itachi’s globetrotting escapades are written all over his latest EP #fromSCRATCH. There’s hints of lo-fi melodic drill in “note.” and “Day by Day”, the incredibly current plugg-rage crossover sound on “plugginmyroom”, and internetty hyperpop sonics on “Landed ‘22”. What makes it all stand out, however, is its packaging within the perspective of an outsider who, as he states himself, has constructed all of these diverse genres from scratch.

OZWORLD

There are a few factors that have led Japan’s southern tropical island paradise of Okinawa to have an oversized impact on the country’s rap scene. First, it spent much of its history as an independent kingdom. Secondly, and perhaps more nefariously, to this day it houses the largest (and much-protested) US military presence in Asia, leading to a steady influx of American rap music into the region. Neither of these factors, however, can fully capture the inimitable style of Okinawan rapper OZworld. His indigenous-influenced melodies formed a standout moment on Awich’s “RASEN in OKINAWA” freestyle (which also saw an unlikely crossover with American hip hop platform 4 Shooters Only), while his eclectic aesthetics set him firmly apart from the Japanese hip hop scene as a whole – covered head to toe in local tattoo designs and often seen swinging a cane as a hangover from a birth defect that left him without sensation in his entire lower body.

LANA

If Litty represents the ‘everygirl’ aesthetic, then 20-year-old Kanagawan rapper-singer Lana represents the aspirational popstar end of the spectrum. She has appeared on releases alongside her older brother and fellow rapper LEX since the age of 16, and has already started to carve out an unprecedented niche as an outspoken female hip hop artist in the country. Her dyed blonde hair and sexualised visuals can’t be underestimated as a force of social change in a country that still suffers from rife institutional sexism, wielding her Barbie-inspired aesthetics and aggressive rap delivery with lethal accuracy.