A classic song about a forbidden love
Adultery dramas we often see in dramas, movies, and TV talk shows—the love that can never come true.
We’ve gathered songs about these “forbidden loves.” There are many beautifully portrayed dramas that make your heart race, but what if you yourself were to fall into a love that isn’t allowed…? Here, we’ll introduce plenty of songs that capture the bittersweet feelings of such forbidden love.
From songs told from a woman’s perspective to those from a man’s point of view, there are more tracks about forbidden love than you might think.
Perhaps that’s because many people are secretly suffering over a love that shouldn’t be….
- [Adultery Song] A forbidden song about an affair that sings of an impossible love
- [Cheating Song] A forbidden love that crossed the line — infidelity song
- A song of forbidden love. A love song about feelings that can't be stopped.
- [Unattainable Love] A love song about two people who feel the same way but can’t be together
- Unattainable Love: A Heartbreaking Love Song About Falling for a Married Person
- [Empathetic & Tear-Jerking] A love song about an unrequited romance
- [An Adulterous Love] A love song about a secret affair you can't tell anyone about
- A song of forbidden love. A heartrending, sorrowful love song.
- [Unrequited Love] Heart-wrenching Love Songs | A Roundup of Tear-Inducing Crush and Breakup Tracks
- Favorite Songs for Women in Their 50s: A Curated Selection of Sweet and Bittersweet Love Ballads!
- [Jealousy & Possessiveness Songs] A curated selection of popular tracks to listen to when possessiveness feels overwhelming!
- Songs about homosexuality and LGBT; love songs on this theme
- “I Want to See You”: A love song that makes you cry when you listen to it while you can’t meet
Masterpieces about forbidden love (21–30)
Other people's relationshipsYo Hitoto
It was the theme song for Fuji TV’s drama “Hirugao: Lovers at 3 p.
m.
on Weekdays.” The series had many shocking scenes and became quite a hot topic.
The original version of “Tanin no Kankei” was by Katsuko Kanai.
When it was first released, the distinctive choreography drew more attention than its seductive lyrics.
Even now, the lyrics—written with an affair as a premise—feel provocative.
If you have time, do check out the original version as well.
signalaiko
This is a song by aiko included on the single “Plamai” released in 2015.
It was used as the theme song for the film “My Senpai and Me.” It portrays the feelings of a woman who is in love and knows the feelings are mutual, yet remains somehow unstable.
Looking at the lyrics, it seems the two are not in a boyfriend–girlfriend relationship.
It might be a relationship they can’t tell anyone about.
Her single-minded love, the desire to stay by his side no matter what kind of relationship it is… is deeply heartrending.
A love I can tell no one abouterica
Even just the song title “A Love I Can’t Tell Anyone About” already feels heartbreaking, doesn’t it? Choosing the archaic ‘ienu’ instead of the more common ‘ienai’ for “can’t say” conveys a loneliness too heavy to bear.
Whether the person is married, the same sex, a school teacher—each situation differs, but in the end the struggle comes from the same mismatch.
It’s one of those songs that makes you think, “I can’t believe I didn’t know such a beautiful track existed.”
sunflowerSEKAI NO OWARI
The protagonist, who had been living in a dark world, ends up meeting “you,” someone dazzling like the sun—the beginning of a forbidden love as sung by SEKAI NO OWARI.
Listening to this song, you can feel that bittersweet thrill of knowing the person is off-limits, yet realizing thanks to them your world is starting to gain color.
Maybe it’s precisely because the melody is light and pop that it tightens your chest even more.
This track is included on the acclaimed album “Lip,” which topped the Oricon charts in February 2019.
It’s a song that gently stays with you in that helpless rush of feelings at the moment you fall in love, even when you know it won’t be returned.
A person I mustn’t fall in love withCHIHIRO
A perfectly polished, refreshing pop sound.
Even so, the melody isn’t light; it carries a certain weight, a sturdy, deep-rooted strength.
Does “someone you mustn’t fall in love with” mean someone who already has a partner, an affair, or someone underage? In any case, the lyrics feel brighter than the words themselves, as if they’re about falling for someone you shouldn’t.
There really are many kinds of songs about forbidden love.
even ifKen Hirai
It’s a song by Ken Hirai that conjures up the image of a man at a bar counter, tilting his glass and hiding his true feelings as he sits beside someone gazing at their lover’s ring.
You can almost feel the protagonist’s painful frustration as he wishes they’d miss the last train, yet swallows the words instead.
Released in December 2000, the track reached No.
3 on the Oricon weekly chart and is also included on the classic album “gaining through losing.” For those entangled in a forbidden love—knowing it won’t come true yet unable to stop their growing feelings—this song may quietly keep you company.
Crime and PunishmentRingo Sheena
A song by Sheena Ringo whose heartrending cry—wanting nothing more than to hear her own name—pierces the chest.
The figure who seeks only the certain “now,” even at the cost of abandoning the future, seems to portray the agony of a heart falling into a love it knows is forbidden.
This work was released as a single in January 2000 and was also included on the classic album Shōso Strip.
It apparently wasn’t originally slated to be a single, but there’s an anecdote that its release was decided due to strong demand from fans.
When you listen to it at times when your heart feels like it’s about to break between the pure desire to be with someone and the reality that such desire is a “sin,” you may feel as if the song affirms your pain along with everything else.