It was Marty O'Donnell (Ex Bungie composer) who opened the doors to classical music for me. All through high school, I struggled with the uniformity of the CDs friends brought to listen to in car rides (live in Hawaii, long distance between everything). I questioned them all the time "Why do you like Rap so much? Do you even know what they're talking about? Do you associate with it? But the answer was always everybody loves it, it's cool. It became a joke when I would pop in one of my CDs, from classical to Manson to Nujabes to hiphop to foreign, whatever it was, they always hated it all :( Nowadays, I listen to as much music as I can, and I take note when something moves me, whether it's the melody, the lyrics, the beat... I love listening to EVERYTHING, as long as I like it. ;) Music should be taught in schools again, it's such a big part of human expression, a language that connects us even without words. And as far as popularity, it's obvious talent is not enough or not always necessary to be a big hit. Uniformity is bad in my book, it puts us in little bubbles. The internet does a lot of that if you're not careful, customizes your searches, your likes, so you never look beyond your bubbles.