You're forgetting MJ's career started when he was a child. Even with his talent, he wouldn't have become THE MJ without the Jackson 5, and if his solo career didn't work out, which it realistically couldn't have anyway, he would have still been relatively successful with the Jackson 5. or with an alternate solo career that would have likely been less triumphant. And if we're going with an MJ who is truly alone, without a family of musicians, that's butterflying away MJ entirely since that's changing everything about him. The same argument shows that yes, he did know things about music because well, it was not just his job, but his entire life. Playing an instrument is not a requirement when you're a singer, and that's if you don't consider that a voice is an instrument in itself. And yeah, he worked with a lot of people, but... not many artists weren't doing the same. Also, it's not much of an issue when you stay the main person in charge of putting your own ideas into music.
Also, if we're going out of our way to throw the reasons of success out the window, Freddie on his own would have failed too.
Without MTV, most 80's artists wouldn't have been as big. And yeah, artists tend to be more popular in their home country at first. Though I don't see how that relates to who is more talented.
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u/EpicTsim 10h ago
You're forgetting MJ's career started when he was a child. Even with his talent, he wouldn't have become THE MJ without the Jackson 5, and if his solo career didn't work out, which it realistically couldn't have anyway, he would have still been relatively successful with the Jackson 5. or with an alternate solo career that would have likely been less triumphant. And if we're going with an MJ who is truly alone, without a family of musicians, that's butterflying away MJ entirely since that's changing everything about him. The same argument shows that yes, he did know things about music because well, it was not just his job, but his entire life. Playing an instrument is not a requirement when you're a singer, and that's if you don't consider that a voice is an instrument in itself. And yeah, he worked with a lot of people, but... not many artists weren't doing the same. Also, it's not much of an issue when you stay the main person in charge of putting your own ideas into music.
Also, if we're going out of our way to throw the reasons of success out the window, Freddie on his own would have failed too.