Browse 74 metal and hard rock albums connected to the Japan scene in the 2010s, with detailed artist and album pages.
Nucleus, released worldwide on 29 March 2019, gathers Anthem songs re-recorded with English lyrics throughout. It followed the band becoming the first Japanese act signed to the German label Nuclear Blast, and it is the record with which they began addressing an audience outside Japan.
BABYMETAL’s third album expands its universe through worldwide musical colors, major guests and a broad light-and-dark design.
The album by BAND-MAIKO, the alter-ego project that swaps the maid conceit for a maiko one: seven songs layering Kyoto dialect and Japanese-instrument colour over the band’s usual hard rock.
A two-song single issued the same day as "glory", pairing the title track with "Smile".
A full-length that expands BAND-MAID’s expressive range, balancing wider melodies with hard-driving performances.
A two-song single issued the same day as "Bubble", pairing the title track with "hide-and-seek".
The major-label debut on avex, made by a line-up that had just gained guitarist AYUMI and drummer NATSUMI.
Into the Purgatory is Galneryus’s twelfth studio album and a strong restatement of the band’s core after its fifteenth anniversary.
An early release that documents the origin of BAND-MAID’s maid concept and rock-band direction.
A two-song single: the title track, written as an anime theme, backed with "Screaming".
A decisive hard-rock statement whose title mirrors BAND-MAID’s ambition to reach audiences beyond Japan.
Reach for the Sky turns Blindman’s live-bred unity as a newer lineup into a precise tenth studio album.
Seven songs opening on an instrumental title track, made in the years when the band's reputation in Europe was hardening.
Dir En Grey's tenth album, released on 26 September 2018, recorded at Studio Sunshine.
An early six-track EP that captures teenage urgency, envy, time pressure, ghosts and a return to zero through raw metalcore and fresh melody.
Rise to Glory -8118- is the twenty-seventh Loudness album, released simultaneously worldwide on 26 January 2018 — through Ward Records in Japan and earMUSIC in the US and Europe. It was their first American release since On the Prowl in 1991.
A four-song, 21-minute mini-album built on the idea of fighting the fate one is handed, including a pair of songs drawn from Rachmaninoff.
Clockwork Immortality expands the speed-metal and power-metal strengths Lovebites showed on their debut into a larger scale.
Onmyo-za's twelfth album, from June 2018, the harder half of a pair released on the same day.
An EP put into national distribution on 28 March 2018. The band's own release list describes it as the EP where reading the score of "CADAVER" backwards gives you "REVADAC" — the two title tracks are one piece of music read in both directions. The third track is a live recording from 14 September 2017.
The second full album, in national distribution from 19 September 2018. Thirteen tracks: the two songs of the March EP CADAVER / REVADAC, plus re-recordings of the 2015 single "Wings" and of "Kyobo no Koibito" from the 2014 debut affected. Music videos were made for "Knight of Sword" and "Kizasi", the latter released in both a flat and a VR version.
Unlimited Diffusion expands Aldious’ ornate twin guitars, speed and clear vocal character into a more colorful melodic-metal setting.
Engraved is Anthem's sixteenth studio album, released on 21 June 2017. It is the second record made by the line-up that brought back Yukio Morikawa and added Isamu Tamaru, and it followed the thirtieth-anniversary tour that marked three decades since their 1985 debut.
A double A-side single pairing "Daydreaming" and "Choose me" with "Play"; both title songs received official music videos.
A key album that clarifies BAND-MAID’s hard-rock direction while connecting musicianship with catchy songwriting.
A four-track EP led by the advance single "IGNITE," cut during the band's touring years abroad.
A five-track mini-album that compresses Fuki’s commanding vocals and the Gacharic Spin players’ virtuosity into a heavier, sharper modern loud-rock attack.
Ultimate Sacrifice concentrates Galneryus’ fast guitar, flowing keyboards and expansive vocals into high-tension power metal in which drama and melody, not technicality, stay at the centre.
Awakening from Abyss introduces Lovebites with a remarkably complete union of speed, precise twin guitars, soaring vocals and large melodic payoff.
The 2017 debut mini-album, cut with a Finnish engineering team and pressed as a strictly limited 3,000-copy run.
Outrage's twelfth album, out on 11 October 2017 and mixed by Peter Tagtgren of Pain and Hypocrisy. It came in the band's thirtieth anniversary year.
BABYMETAL’s second album turns global momentum into power metal, metalcore and progressive scale, confirming the group’s strength.
A release that pushes BAND-MAID’s rock-band strength forward and builds the foundation for the breakthroughs that followed.
Four tracks — the title song, "Unfair game", "matchless GUM" and an instrumental — released ahead of the album Just Bring It.
To the Light shapes Blindman’s lyrical melody, expansive vocals and precise guitar work into traditional hard rock with care.
The first full album, four years in — and the source of four of the six songs re-cut for 2025's Reborn 2013-2016.
Urban Night naturally joins Cyntia’s urban pop instinct to the sharp guitar edge of heavy metal.