Elton John: The artist Billy Joel considered the “supreme melodist”
Billy Joel has always been as good as the melodies he works with. No one gets to be one of the most celebrated musicians in the world by accident, and given that Joel spent most of his career following in the footsteps of people like Bach and Beethoven, it’s only natural that his music would flow out of him over time. The Beatles and The Rolling Stones may have started his hunger for rock and roll, but in terms of being a badass behind a keyboard, Elton John was the one Joel was stunned by when he first heard him.
If you really think about it, there weren’t as many people in Joel’s position who could claim to be rock stars behind a piano. Someone like Paul McCartney could certainly play the piano on Beatles records, but outside of Little Richard, there was no one really willing to give people a show when playing a keyboard.
Then again, John wasn’t like most other songwriters in more ways than one. Outside of never writing one lyric to any of his classic hits, John figured that he would get the crowd’s attention differently. Mick Jagger may have been the model for a frontman, but if he was confined to sitting down, why not take a page out of Liberace’s playbook and make the most extravagant outfit ever conceived by man?
The dress code may have been slightly over-the-top, but Joel was more interested in the songs behind him. No one puts all that window dressing in front of songs that are just passable, and John was more than willing to kick some ass whenever he went into the studio, putting together classical-style ballads like ‘Your Song’ or managing to make rock sound exciting on ‘Saturday Night’s Alright’.
For all of John’s antics, Joel had a slightly different direction in mind. No one would buy that a random guy from Long Island was the next Jim Morrison, so his everyman stage demeanour may have been the perfect foil, coming off as just another dude from New York half the time.
While Joel always had a refined palette for great songs, he thought John stood alone when it came to writing melodies, telling Rolling Stone, “Any melodic songwriter owes a debt to Elton John, the supreme melodist. I don’t know shit about new bands, but anybody who plays the keyboard and likes melody must give a nod to Elton”.
One of the things that has kept John relevant is that he has given those new artists the spotlight now and again. Whereas Joel might have only just warmed up to the idea of working with other artists with ‘Turn the Lights Back On’, John was always proud to work with anyone he thought had staying power, whether that was working with Eminem at The Grammys or nowadays when he’s working with everyone from Dua Lipa to Gorillaz. John has his own style to fall back on, but part of being able to make a great melody is to pay attention to what everyone else has been doing.
