Last summer, while on vacation in Tokyo, I joined a motley crew of Americans and Japanese compatriots on a journey into the crowded nightlife of Shibuya, the trendy 20-something district of Tokyo. Sometime after midnight, while camped at an Irish pub overlooking a side street washed in a neon glow, the inevitable happened. Our fearless leader, Jason, uttered the "k" word.

"Karaoke!" the cry rang out.

Here in the U.S., if you suggest heading out for an evening of karaoke with a group of friends, you might evoke a few cringes. Even guffaws.

In Japan, it's a different story. Karaoke is more than de rigueur. It's an accepted, ingrained social institution, not unlike meeting at Starbucks for a latte. In Tokyo, there is no sense that karaoke might be a diversion suited only for the hopelessly unhip. Within minutes, we were headed for the nearest karaoke parlor.

As I would quickly discover, karaoke isn't popular in Japan just because it originated there. It's popular because it happens to be extraordinarily fun. Sure, we Americans may feign a pretense of being too cool to sing along with a bouncing musical note on a TV screen, but give us an open road and a loud car radio and we'll belt out tunes with the best of them. Ditto for the shower. And the truth is, when we do get up the nerve to try our vocal pipes at karaoke, there's rarely a closet Streisand or Sinatra among us who doesn't have a rollicking good time.

So, when the karaoke suggestion was made, who was I to resist? We tracked down the nearest karaoke bar — they're as common in Shibuya as sushi dens and noodle joints — and took the elevator to the eighth floor, where we jammed into a crowded booth that looked like it came straight out of the movie Lost in Translation.

Never mind that not once in my attempts as a singer have I hit the right note. Trust me, that doesn't matter with karaoke. It's not about who might become the next American Idol. It's about pretending anyone can be.

Karaoke originated in the early 1970s in Japan. Legend has it that karaoke was borne at a snack bar in Kobe City when strolling guitarists who normally entertained onlookers didn't show up. As an impromptu substitution, the bar owner offered recorded tapes to accompany sing-along performances by his guests. The novel performance medium moved quickly into bars and restaurants in Japan as a regular form of entertainment, and a burgeoning market arose for special audio playback machines that would suppress or eliminate vocal tracks from popular songs.

Over time, technology has elevated the art. By the mid-1970s, home karaoke machines allowed aspiring singers to hone their chops in basements and living rooms. The core platform for karaoke also advanced from cassette tapes to laser disks, and later, from music CDs to video. The video element was a welcome addition that made it possible for performers to croon away while watching song lyrics scroll by on a large-screen monitor. (It also helps prevent those awkward moments in front of a crowd when suddenly you can't remember the chorus from "American Girl.")

In Japan, karaoke remains a hugely popular form of entertainment. Business people ritually pop into karaoke bars after work to belt out a few songs, and karaoke fits well with the Japanese societal ethos, where singing — particularly amateur crooning — is a sign of good will and even friendship. That's why it's imbued firmly into the culture.

Into the states
Karaoke is now becoming entrenched in the U.S., too. Karaoke migrated overseas shortly after its rise in Japan and began to gain popularity in the U.S. in the 1980s, especially in Asian restaurants. Today, the medium is going mainstream. Americans now spend more than $200 million on karaoke equipment and music in a year, according to Pocket Songs, a New York company that sells karaoke tunes over the Internet.

Karaoke has also made fresh technological advances. Video game distributor Konami offers karaoke games for game consoles including Sony's PlayStation2 and Microsoft's Xbox, and says they're among the most popular entries in the music-games genre.

But the latest wrinkle takes in-home karaoke to a whole new level: It's "karaoke on-demand," courtesy of cable television.

Some background: "On demand," sometimes called "video on demand," is a fast-growing digital cable service that lets customers select from a variety of TV shows and movies to watch whenever they want. It also gives customers the ability to pause, fast forward and rewind the programs they've selected, with just a tap or two on the remote control. With its select-what-you-want menu approach, karaoke is a perfect fit for the on-demand medium.

For $6.99 a month, Charter Communications offers Karaoke Monthly, a new on-demand service that gives customers access to more than 300 songs in eight genres, says Robert Ladd, director of marketing for Charter OnDemand. Hook it up from your TV set to your living room sound system and Friday evenings with the neighbors will never be the same again.

Introduced in December 2005, Karaoke Monthly has been a hit right out of the gate. In households that have Karaoke Monthly, the music service is selected more often than TV programs from HBO On Demand are selected in households where that service is available, says Ladd.

Why the appeal? For one thing, with Karaoke Monthly, you no longer need to buy a home karaoke machine and plug it in. The Charter OnDemand karaoke service works in the same way — you select a song, the lyrics appear on the screen and you wow the crowd with your vocal stylings — but there's no need to buy expensive equipment or amass a collection of karaoke CDs and tapes.

In many ways, it's a living room derivation that's faithful to the original karaoke experience. Like the one I had in a tiny soundproof booth in Tokyo at 2 a.m. on a Monday night last summer. Rain streaked down the windows, and I took turns with four Americans and four Japanese, blasting out karaoke staples like Bon Jovi's "Livin' on a Prayer," Guns N' Roses' "Sweet Child of Mine" and Simon and Garfunkel's "Mrs. Robinson."

I sang completely off-key. But it didn't matter. The crowd still applauded. And it was still great fun.