Tin Drum
by Japan
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Japan bestography
Tin Drum is ranked as the best album by Japan.
(N.B. Bestographies include all albums by an artist (and their variations), but do not include albums ranked outside the top 100,000).
Listen to Tin Drum on YouTube
Tin Drum track list
The tracks on this album have an average rating of 79 out of 100 (all tracks have been rated).
Tin Drum rankings
Calculated from aggregate positions across 60,000 charts (2 million album rankings). Click to see how the rankings are calculated (Last updated: 3 hours ago)
| Year | Source | Chart | Rank | Rank Score |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026 |  Musicbuff123 | Top 50 Music Albums of the 1980s | 39/50 | 5 |
| 2026 | Skerns | Top 85 Music Albums of 1981 | 7/85 | 5 |
| 2026 |  zags7000 | Top 100 Music Albums of 1981 | 95/100 | 0 |
| 2026 |  slatsheit | Top 50 Music Albums of 1981 | 11/50 | 4 |
| 2026 | stevengnz | Top 97 Music Albums of 1981 | 81/97 | 1 |
| 2026 |  Helios | Top 80 Music Albums of 1981 | 70/80 | 1 |
| 2026 |  neilgee | Top 100 Music Albums of the 1980s | 1/100 | 20 |
| 2026 |  ERadio | Top 80 Music Albums of 1981 | 46/80 | 2 |
| 2026 | LosWochos | Top 99 Music Albums of 1981 | 34/99 | 3 |
| 2026 | neilgee | Top 100 Music Albums of 1981 | 1/100 | 5 |
| Total Charts: The total number of charts that this album has appeared in. | 165 | |||
| Total Rank Score: The total rank score. | 828 | |||
Tin Drum collection
Showing latest 20 members who have this album in their collection | Show all 75 members
Tin Drum ratings
Average Rating = (n ÷ (n + m)) × av + (m ÷ (n + m)) × AVwhere:
av = trimmed mean average rating an item has currently received.
n = number of ratings an item has currently received.
m = minimum number of ratings required for an item to appear in a 'top-rated' chart (currently 10).
AV = the site mean average rating.
Showing latest 3 ratings for this album. | Show all 178 ratings for this album.
| Rating | Date updated | Member | Album ratings | Avg. album rating |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ! | 09/30/2026 06:48 |  serpico | 914 | 85/100 |
| ! | 09/17/2026 10:23 |  ssteve | 2,627 | 76/100 |
| ! | 08/09/2026 15:42 |  Tamthebam | 23,329 | 69/100 |
Rating metrics:
Outliers can be removed when calculating a mean average to dampen the effects of ratings outside the normal distribution. This figure is provided as the trimmed mean. A high standard deviation can be legitimate, but can sometimes indicate 'gaming' is occurring. Consider a simplified example* of an item receiving ratings of 100, 50, & 0. The mean average rating would be 50. However, ratings of 55, 50 & 45 could also result in the same average. The second average might be more trusted because there is more consensus around a particular rating (a lower deviation).
(*In practice, some albums can have several thousand ratings)
This album is rated in the top 2% of all albums on BestEverAlbums.com. This album has a Bayesian average rating of 77.8/100, a mean average of 77.2/100, and a trimmed mean (excluding outliers) of 78.1/100. The standard deviation for this album is 14.5.
Tin Drum favourites
Showing latest 10 members who have added this album as a favourite | Show all 24 members
Tin Drum forum mentions
neilgee 09/11/2026 19:30 in What album are you listening to? (cont.) neilgee 07/10/2023 10:52 in What album are you listening to right now?
dihansse 01/29/2023 17:57 in My discoveries per yearView all forum mentions
Tin Drum comments
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timtooky 03/29/2014 11:05 | #107968 | TOP COMMENT
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many of the early 80s trendy synth-wave bands sound arty and vain to me. and so it is with japan. the songs are interesting and strange - but also cool and repellent.
I thibk this is one of the best albums from 1981 and from the 80s. This was the culminate point of them carreer. There's no album sounding like this. They had a sound witch combine New Romantic and Synth-Pop with oriental music. David Sylvian's voice and compositions are amazing, Mike Karn was the best bassist of its time and Richard Barbieri made them sound futurist.
The album also produced the hits "Visions Of China", "Ghosts", "The Art Of Parties" and "Catonese Boy"; and on its time was considered one of the best bands. Duran Duran was highly influencieted in them first record by Japan (even they took Japan's looks).
Definetly a masterpiece witch everyone should listen to.
Musicbuff123 01/26/2026 21:24 | #312822 | TOP COMMENT
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Tin Drum is a just below average album. Ghosts though is a cracking track, I loved way back then as a burgeoning teenager, unfortunately the only one on the album, well maybe Cantonese Boy is a catchy tune. Not to say that it's theme of Eastern rhythms & sounds mixed with Electonica vibes of the time warrant mention, but not too loudly. This theme helped to set it apart from most other groups / music of the time but it needed a bit more depth, there's only so much a haunting voice can do for weak lyrics and wishy washy sounds. (Edited)
Jboy56 02/08/2024 14:39 | #301800 | TOP COMMENT
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in 1981 this was top of the mark new romantic stuff. But today the sounds seem distant and this album sounds dated. But nevertheless a solid album (Edited)
Sadly the last of Japan's studio albums. At least they went out with a bang because this is great.
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