YMMV / Japan

• Ensemble Dark Horse: Mick Karn's distinctive fretless bass playing has made him a hero to four-string players the world over. He worked extensively with Midge Ure, Kate Bush, Phil Collins, and Pete Townshend in live shows after Japan's breakup, and many other artists throughout the '80s attempted to imitate his melodic, glissando-heavy sound on their own work.
• Fandom Rivalry:
  • While it dissipated with time, in the band's heyday, their fans frequently clashed with those of David Bowie due to accusations of them copying Bowie's style.
  • With Duran Duran, who are often the butt of jokes on Japan Facebook groups, due to being perceived as copying the band's sound and image for commercial gain but without the substance. This is mostly friendly, however, as a lot of people like both bands.
• Friendly Fandoms:
  • There's a large overlap between fans of Japan and fans of Yellow Magic Orchestra, due to Japan frontman David Sylvian and YMO member Ryuichi Sakamoto being frequent collaborators with one another, a connection that stretches all the way back to Japan's Gentlemen Take Polaroids.
  • Thanks to David Sylvian's collaborations with Robert Fripp in his solo work, a large number of Japan fans (and by extent fans of Sylvian's solo output) are also big on King Crimson. It helps that Richard Barbieri is a member of fellow Progressive Rock band Porcupine Tree, a band closely affiliated with King Crimson.
• Germans Love David Hasselhoff:
  • While they were (eventually) successful in their home country, the band was particularly popular among Japanese audiences. This is especially true for their first two albums. Those albums flew under the radar of US and UK audiences, but sold well in Japan. Their fitting name and stylized makeup are among the reasons for their success over there, with their looks in particular helping influence the Visual Kei movement.
  • While not commercially successful in the region, with Gentlemen Take Polaroids being their only album there to crack the Top 40 (and even then it only made No. 39), the band had a substantially large cult following in Canada. In fact, their following was strong enough there that the initial US release of Rain Tree Crow consisted of re-marked Canadian imports.
• Growing the Beard: The ambient instrumental "The Tenant" from their second album Obscure Alternatives is considered this by both group and fans. It is the first Japan song where the atmosphere and sound effects, as opposed to a lead riff (though it does have one), drove the song, and its influence can be heard in more celebrated works such as "Nightporter", "Ghosts", and David Sylvian's solo career.
• Harsher in Hindsight: One of Mick Karn's last recorded works is a cover of David Bowie's "Ashes to Ashes" for the tribute album We Were So Turned On released in September 2010. Karn would die of terminal cancer the following January 4. Bowie would follow Karn five years and a week later, also of cancer.
• Signature Song: "Ghosts", the band's biggest hit (reaching No. 5 on the UK Singles chart) and the one song included on any of David Sylvian's solo compilations, albeit with a re-recorded vocal track.
• Spiritual Successor: Reviewers treated Japan as a close approximation of what Roxy Music would sound like if they let Brian Eno take the reins of the band and continued the direction of their self-titled debut and For Your Pleasure.
• Suspiciously Similar Song: The intro of "Halloween" is unmistakably a copy of that of "Out of the Blue" by Roxy Music. Many of the group's fans wonder how on Earth they didn't get sued.
• Unintentional Period Piece: "...Rhodesia" is about the Rhodesian Bush War, fought between the racist white government and the Black majority population. Just one year after the song's release, however, the war ended, the white government was deposed, and the nation was renamed Zimbabwe. Despite this, the group continued to play it live. The lyrics, written from the perspective of the Rhodesian government, uses the n-word — it would be impossible for a white man to get away with using it in a song nowadays, and many modern fans cringe at it.
• Vindicated by History: The first two albums are a lot better received these days than they were whilst the group was around. In particular, "Suburban Love" and "The Tenant" are regarded as amongst the group's greatest songs.

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