Legendary Hall & Oates Star John Oates: Newer Artists Are All Copying Madonna & “Modern Pop Music Would NOT Exist Without” Her

Legendary musician John Oates is no stranger to receiving praise aplenty for his impact on modern Pop music via his group Hall & Oates, but the 77-year-old was recently the one handing out royal compliments to none other than Queen of Pop Madonna.

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During a visit to ‘The Zach Sang Show,’ Oates opened up about how much the music industry has changed since Hall & Oates’ debut album ‘Whole Oats’ hit shelves in 1972.

Among the most prevalent change was the power of the music video, a rise to prominence among promotional vehicles he credits to Madonna.

He even openly admitted he was wrong when he famously went head-to-head with the then-rising Pop diva at the 1984 New Music Seminar where she ultimately shut down his opinion (at the time) that videos weren’t a necessity for music artists.

“You can say what you want to say about Madonna, but without her there would be no modern Rock concerts. Because the modern artists are doing exactly what Madonna did way back when,” he shared with Sang. “Having dancers behind her, no Rock band had dancers behind them doing choreography and dancing almost like a Las Vegas approach. But, now it’s common that that’s what modern Pop looks like.”

The sentiment is one clearly shared by a number of Pop stars who followed Madge’s revolutionary footsteps as many of the century’s top-selling divas from Beyonce and Taylor Swift to Jennifer Lopez, P!nk, Rihanna, and more cite her groundbreaking music videos and equally game-changing stage shows as inspiration.

Click PLAY on the clip above to hear John’s full statement.

[photo source: Zach Sang Show]