I think your opinion is based on the life you lead. To condemn all of Billy Joel's music is wrong. The music is written for the people who listen to it. I live in a town that was once thriving from all the local steel mills and now it is dying, Allentown is written for us. Maybe because your east coast and you assume since Joel is east coast that he only writes for those that are on the east coast, well being midwestern and hearing these songs, they really speak to me. I am a 24 year old woman from Indiana and I was brought up on Joel, Springsteen and Melloncamp. These men speak to the experience which I live. Maybe you should get off your hipster high horse and learn what it is like to experience cultures in our country outside your own. Maybe your music is pretentious to me but I do not go out and deface that music that makes you feel whole. Think before you write, all your article does is insult those that live the life in those songs.