brandy vs John Barleycorn

brandy and John Barleycorn both are nouns.

Word	Noun	Adjective	Verb	Adverb
brandy	Yes	No	No	No
John Barleycorn	Yes	No	No	No

As nouns, John Barleycorn is a hypernym of brandy; that is, John Barleycorn is a word with a broader meaning than brandy:

brandy: distilled from wine or fermented fruit juice
John Barleycorn: an alcoholic beverage that is distilled rather than fermented

Other hypernyms of brandy include booze, hard drink, hard liquor, liquor, spirits, strong drink.

brandy (noun)	John Barleycorn (noun)
distilled from wine or fermented fruit juice	an alcoholic beverage that is distilled rather than fermented