7. Shiina Ringo ( )
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bWNAFcEygP8 Shiina Ringo is one of Japans most popular female musicians. Her success in Japan hasnt really crossed over into the West. The few in the West who know of her music really like it. They include famous musicians like Lenny Kravitz, who especially admires her music videos, Courtney Love and Mika. Major news outlets like CNN and the Guardian have described her as one of the most underappreciated, in the West, artists from the Asian continent. My theory is that Western audiences expect something weird from Japan. Thats why many people may be aware of Kyari Pamyu Pamyu (singer of the YouTube hit Pon Pon Pon) and her really bizarre music videos but not Shiina Ringo. Shes a really talented and somewhat eccentric musician but not necessarily a weird one. In Japan in the early 2000s, she was fashion icon and many young girls become Ringo gals and copied her clothing. For readers who know some Japanese, youll know that ringo means apple. Either that or you recognise it from Ringo Starr. Her real name is Shiina Yumiko. She started using Ringo as her stage name in 1996. In an interview, she said that the name evolved from the combination of her childhood nickname, owing to her tendency to blush when embarrassed, and the Beetles drummer. The inspiration for taking a mundane, everyday object as her stage name came from her appreciation of manga artist Yoshida Sensha. Sensha means tank in Japanese.