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SUPPORT ME ON PATREON\n\nWATCH MUSIC is not a GENRE VIDEOS and MORE\n\nEverything in this country \u2013 and possibly the whole world \u2013 needs to be a competition. Think of growing number of TV shows that pit people\u2019s talents against each other. The Voice, America\u2019s Got Talent, etc. etc. Or hell, think of any entertainment awards show. The conventional wisdom is that conflict makes for a good story. And if you create conflict where none exists, then you\u2019ve REALLY won the game.\n\nI did a podcast already on bogus music rivalries, so I won\u2019t go into it too much here, except to say that just about 100% of the time we are forced to compare apples with oranges. We follow the lead of false conflict creators and actively look for similarities and comparisons so we can decide which one is better, even though most commonalities are surface at best.\n\nTake this week\u2019s case: the so-called contest between Billy Joel & Elton John, two singer/songwriter/piano players who happened to become famous around the same time. If you know enough about both of them, the first thing that comes to mind is how different they are. Background, overall sound, vocals, songwriting template, creation process, career trajectory, personal life & even piano playing \u2013 they only crossed over every so often. Most of the time, ALL of those elements were glaringly different.\n\nWe all know our judgments are highly subjective, and that they both excelled at what they did. But we need to pick a favorite and justify that pick by saying that person is better. So we twist ourselves up to turn coincidence into sameness, and then tear apart one of them to make our pick look even better.\n\nI grew up with both, love & respect both, played covers from both, did recent chronolographies for both, read bios & reviews of both, and have three takeaways:\n\n1. Billy Joel is to the Beatles as Elton John is to the Stones. There are parallels for almost every quality listed two paragraphs above \u2013 songwriting, trajectory, etc.\n\n2. My favorite will always be Billy Joel. It also happens that my favorite from #1 is the Beatles. I don\u2019t think that\u2019s a coincidence. I contend that if you are more a Beatles than Stones fan, you are more likely to favor Billy Joel.\n\n3. There are almost no critics who favor Billy Joel.\n\nIt\u2019s mind boggling how great the disparity in praise, accolades, good reviews & overall respect is between these guys. They both deserve it all. They\u2019re both geniuses & legends. So why is it that, for example, Rolling Stone has been way more solicitous to Elton than to Billy? Why do more of Elton\u2019s songs end up on best-of lists? Is it that Billy Joel has always been more direct and open-faced with his intentions, and Elton John had a more winding path \u2013 i.e. Billy is no bullshit pop/rock and Elton is artsy rock/pop? There are too many caveats to both for that to be true, yet I suspect that\u2019s a big part of it.\n\nAs a singer/songwriter, I very much lean toward Billy Joel\u2019s style. Yet as a piano player I\u2019m MUCH more similar to what Elton does. As a producer, I\u2019ve incorporated elements of both. There\u2019s no question that Billy Joel has influenced me much more than Elton John, right down to even some of his word pronunciations and the directness of his lyrics \u2013 often about relationship issues. Here are two I\u2019ve been dying to feature, an \u201cintro\u201d song that transitions into one of my early hit singles, the title track of my album, What It Is:\n\nNICK \u2013 \u201c10 Shun\u201d\n\nNICK \u2013 \u201cWhat It Is\u201d\n\nWho is your favorite? Why do you think critics tend to favor Elton John, and do you agree or disagree? Discuss dammit!\n\n\n--- \n\nThis episode is sponsored by \n\xb7 Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app\n\nSupport this podcast: https://anchor.fm/musicisnotagenre/support\nLearn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices