Vinyl Travelogue: Exploring Record Shops In Japan
Discover the best record shops in Tokyo, Kyoto, and Osaka with this crate digging travelogue through Japan.
This spring, I spent two weeks in Japan (my first time in the country) with my wife. We traveled through Tokyo, Hakone, Kyoto, and Osaka, taking in the food, the architecture, and the way the cities are always humming while still feeling calm and orderly. Tucked between the temples, alley bars, and ramen shops, I also found time to visit over a dozen record shops. And let me tell you: Japan is a record collector's dreamland.
This wasn't a dedicated digging trip, but the vinyl kept calling. I came armed with a loosely researched list of Japan record shops, but mostly let the cities guide me, checking Google Maps on the go, looking for hidden basements and top floor shops with blinking neon signs. The record culture in Japan is vast, specific, and beautifully obsessive. Here's what I found.
Tokyo: Deep Dives in Record Shops in Shibuya and Beyond
We stayed in Shinjuku-ku, but most of my digging in Tokyo happened in and around the neighborhood of Shibuya. The first major hit: Discland Jaro. It's a tight, 20-square-meter, jazz-focused basement shop so packed with vinyl you have to pivot your body to move through the bins. I walked out with three Mal Waldron albums and a smile that stayed on the rest of the day. The owner was kind enough to recommend some local live jazz spots, too.
Just a few blocks away, I found myself in Disk Union's Jazz/Rare Groove Hall. If you're looking for depth, it's here. Windowless, fluorescent-lit, and fully stocked. One of the best surprises of the trip happened here: a pristine reissue of Clube Da Esquina, a definite grail record by Milton Nascimento & Lô Borges. I'd never seen it in the wild before, and it felt like fate. That, along with a copy of Sean Wolcott's Voce D'Ombra, made this one of the most fruitful stops.
I also checked out HMV Shibuya, which spans several floors and genres, and another Disk Union in the Chiyoda neighborhood focused on jazz. (Interesting side note about this last store: albums here were often organized by instrument, which made for a good test of my musician knowledge while searching for certain artists.)
Anyone looking for record shops in Tokyo, I'd definitely recommend checking this list out. Props to whoever put this thing together, it was an indispensable part of my digging journey in Tokyo.
Kyoto: Hidden Gems in Record Shops with Soul
If Tokyo is abundance, Kyoto is precision. Here I stumbled into what might have been the dig of the trip: Super Milk. I walked out with rare jazz originals like Albert Ayler's Love Cry and reissues at prices that made me double check the tags. Unassuming from the outside, it's a true hidden gem that's definitely worth digging through. They also have $1 used record bins out front with interesting looking titles that might be worth taking a gamble on.
Just down the street, Vivrant Disc gave me my first copy of Weldon Irvine's Cosmic Vortex (Justice Divine). At Jet Set, I admired their collection of underground hip-hop and dance records, even if I didn’t take anything home. Prototype Records offered great jazz reissues and one of the friendliest shop owners I met. Kyoto's record shops felt smaller and more curated, more like personal libraries than stores.
Osaka: Soul, Fusion, and Rare Grooves-focused Record Shops
By the time we reached Osaka, I had a system: pull up nearby record shops, peek at the Google reviews to get a sense of the genres they carry, and dive in. Groovenut had an excellent hip-hop, soul, and rare groove selection. But Record Shop Rare Groove stole the show. Small, beautiful, and dialed in. I grabbed Weather Report – Mr. Gone, Jimmy Smith – Black Smith, and Passport – Infinity Machine (a slept-on German fusion burner). That shop sits in a building filled with small vinyl boutiques, each one focused on a particular flavor. Great one-stop shop is you want to hit a lot of record shops at once.
Vox Music also had some stunning jazz, rock, and soul bins. Disk Union Osaka Umeda had me crouched for an hour, combing through used jazz, soul and rare groove pressings. I came up grinning with a big stack of great finds.
What I Took Home
Some personal grails made the suitcase: a US original pressing of Albert Ayler's Love Cry, Bill Evans – Portrait in Jazz, and yes, that reissue of Clube Da Esquina. Most of what I picked up is now available in the Outer Frequencies shop, minus a few Mal Waldron and Thelonious Monk records I couldn’t let go of (some things are for the crates at home).
What struck me most was the condition these records were in. Albums from the 1970s and '80s looked and sounded near mint. The attention and care Japanese collectors give their vinyl is unmatched. Many of these felt like time capsules, almost too clean to be real.
What Japan Taught Me About Records
Digging in Japan confirmed something I’ve always felt about record collecting: it’s not just about the vinyl. It’s about curation, context, preservation. With so many shops, each one has to define a distinct identity. That’s something I’ve tried to reflect in Outer Frequencies too - a collection shaped not just by genre, but by vibe, story, and intent. I want the shop to feel like these stores felt: intentional, specific, alive.
More than anything, it was inspiring to be in a place where physical music still holds cultural weight. Where walking into a tiny third-floor shop and flipping through vinyl for an hour is seen as a normal way to spend your afternoon. Japan reminded me that this thing we love is alive and well. And that there are still so many records waiting to be found.
Have you dug for records in Japan? Got a favorite shop I missed? Drop me a line. I’m already plotting the next trip.
- Dylan