LOL I forgot to mention my liked Utada too. But Namie was my mom's fav too :D! I burned Namie's 'Queen of Hip-Pop' cd for her and she loved it lol!

Hah same here, at least when it comes to most of my friends (including my bff). And the very few of the friends who love anime only listen to anime-based songs.

I kinda infected my sister though. And my mom thinks Koda is pretty. :D

Oh thats soo cool ^^ My mom's favorite song from Namie is from that album, its I love you, and WoWa ^^

My dad thinks Koda is pretty, but it's because her boobs hang out every time he sees her. It's strange.

My brother and my parents both seem to like Ayu, although ELT is a bit of a strange music-choice for me to them.. and my brother is obsessed with remixes.

Most of my friends have a built in immunity to J-pop.

Do they assume it's all like Morning Musume? ;_;

Exactly... :headache

I never understood that thought since the majority of Asian music is a lot more diverse and more interesting that Western "stuff". :|

^ Me niether, but like you said, the instant image they get is Morning Musume, crazy colors, wacky music and all.

Well, there are several reasons why people mock japanese music.

-The most ignorant people who have absolutely no clue, associate the word "japanese music" with old traditional chinese music, and even whistle something they've listened in some traditional tune, from some cartton or movie that joked with it. The fairly ignorant people associate japanese music with enka.
-Some people associate japanese music with otakus -crazed nerd obsessive anime fanboys- who live entirely for cosplaying and swear they're truly Shinji Hikari from Evangelion, so they think: "ridiculous people => ridiculous music"
-some people prefer their local music, and can't understand why people will look for stuff they can't even understand
-The people who can actually go through all of those barriers face yet another one: associating japanese music entirely to ai otsuka and morning musume, a.k.a - Cute, nasal, annoying music for female children.

Imagine the entire American music industry being boiled down to 50 cent or something :dead2

It's odd to me why people judge so quickly, but oh well. I think you lose out on a lot if you limit yourself.. and that goes both ways, like the people here who only listen to J-pop.

well, america is lucky because american music has been known worldwide for a long while and people knows everything is not summarized into 50cents only. You can look through diffeerent generations and actually see its diversity.
However, japanese music is unknown to most, so I believe it's normal for the human behavior to not be so tolerant for things you hardly know much.

A great example is in this forum actually. Some people here can't understand why others reject japanese music, but they can't see the richness there is in american music, other than the rap breakout that is happening now.

Exactly. It's like the pot calling the kettle black.

I think it's the thought of listening to something they don't understand. Even if they do like the beat or melody or whatever. It's "eww omg she no speaky english GTFO my eeaars!" :tired ... ah well~ they don't know what they're missing!! *rocks out to ayu* XD

There' a down side of not understanding the lyrics of songs we listen to, but it's a chance for the music itself and the emotion in it to touch our hearts. =)

I have infected my mom :D

Now, she likes Ayu. She watches AT05 with me, and listens to Ayu in the car!

My firends are like die hard MCR fans, me and my friend were taking it in turns to put on music and later she says to someone else, "OMG it's horrible, it's like pop music." Well she listens to High School Musical as well so that's kind of well hypocrytical.