Confusion: Billy Joel And The 4 Seasons

[tutsiwarrior]

here's something to ponder...has anyone noticed the similarity between Billy Joel's 'Uptown Girl' and the musical style of The 4 Seasons?

I was at a pub quiz in Jakarta and a question came up about Billy Joel and part of his 'oeuvre' and amongst the quiz team (all of us engineers on a project together) we were arguing and an associate said something about Uptown Girl and Billy Joel...I said that's the 4 Seasons and I faced him down...he was was a fraud professionally, a fake controls engineer and he knew that I knew (he put up a whiteboard in his office and scrawled the math expression of a PID controller and I said 'proportional, integral, derivative?' and he looked elsewhere...) but he was right about the tune and we lost the quiz by a hair...

he must have thought 'arrogant yank bastid...doesn't even know about the artists in his own country' but I don't abide frauds on basic principles and didn't apologize...

so, whaddyathink?...about the music?...

[tutsiwarrior]

then on the same project there was another I&C man a year later and he suspected that I was skeptical of his professional abilities so that he posed various exercises to himself and proceeded to perform calculations including integrals that he left about the office for me to see but he had solid belgian academic credentials and I never questioned his legitimacy...he was usually incorrect as the processes that he wanted to model and scrutinise with the unnecessary calculations required differential equations and laplace transformation software (something that stayed with me from university: that with the necessary resources one can model any process in the world with applied mathematics and then we become god-like) and as we were warranty engineers and not required to do design work whytf was he wasting everyone's time?...

there were some personal problems as he had married an indonesian woman of dubious character (who very uncharacteristically for an asian got into my face once and shouted: 'ye think I'm a whore, don't ye!') and as I lived next door I could hear the arguments... but his little girl was born on the same day as my son and she was sharp as a tack...and it was from observing my son and her together when he and my then wife came to visit that I began to be concerned and a couple of years later the asperger's syndrome autism was confirmed...

the belgian guy also claimed that he was a pianist who had Rachmaninoff as part of his repertoire (don't they all?) which I seriously doubted...but I never told him that...

Edited April 9, 2013 by tutsiwarrior

[rgs2001uk]

so, whaddyathink?...about the music?..

Personally I thinks it sucks big time, couldnt even listen to it.

On the same subject, how did this

become this,

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2s4slliAtQU

[tutsiwarrior]

c'mon, man...it's easy to criticise musical styles but it's all entertainment...an' dem white boys helped us realise where it all came from...

plus that Christie Brinkley is quite a babe, wot?

[xen]

Tutsi,

I would agree with your prognosis that Billy Joel used other musical styles for his output and in particular up town girl and the four seasons.. I never have,and never will admire any of Billy Joels work as most of it is on advertising jingle level using German polkas and rip offs of do-wop groups and tin pan alley styles amongst others influences . He was a shrewd and brilliant business man who could have equally survived in the world of advertising jingles selling dog food or tampons.

I am sure to offend but my observation of Billy Joel fans are of people who do not listen to music than on a superficial level.

[tutsiwarrior]

well...you know...I don't particularly admire Billy Joel's music as I agree that most of it is on the level of an advertising jingle...however I did like the 4 Seasons in the early 60s and Uptown Girl sounds a lot like them...but let's not get syllogistic around here...

does Uptown Girl sound like the 4 Seasons or not? I'm sure that most of us listen to music in elevators (lifts) as we are a captive audience...

plus the Uptown video is amusing as the chauffeur looks to see if the help are stealin' his hubcaps when they wipe down the glass work...

Edited April 10, 2013 by tutsiwarrior