I've always been a believer that you should listen to what you enjoy, not what other people think you should. And certainly you should not NOT listen to something, for fear of being branded "populist" or whatever. I actively avoid the charts, but hey, I've been known to spin a Madonna or Kylie record from time to time, and I recently reviewed The Script's album. Some of it IS okay; it's just the general music that masquerades as r&b these days (because they can't find any other handy category to shoehorn it into --- I'd say crap generic, but that's just me) that annoys me, along with the "stars" that come out of the likes of the X Factor.
Being on the radio or in the charts doesn't necessarily make your music worthless; it's what you do before/after that which I think makes or breaks a musician, band or artiste. If you fold after one big hit single (and I mean really fold, not just go on to make many more albums but be viewed by the general public as a failure and a "one-hit-wonder") then that says more about your music than any amount of record sales.
Listen to what you want to: jazz, classical, funk, rock, metal, punk, samoan nose flute melodies... as the old Kit Kat ad used to say: just enjoy it!
And sod those who don't or won't understand.
That's what I do, anyway...
