I Know Way Too Much About Billy Joel
Albeit deserved, the tarnishing of Billy Joel's legacy makes Stereogum sad. Growing up as a young Strong Island blogger in the '80s, I had no choice but to love the Piano Man, especially because my parents were making me take piano lessons. There was no way around it: at the time of your Bar Mitzvah, Nassau County begins issuing you one mandatory Billy Joel CD per month, starting with the sappy but underappreciated Cold Spring Harbor. What's more, Greatest Hits Vol. I And II is the official soundtrack of every Jewish summer camp.
In junior high, my friend Evan and I collected shitty soundcheck tapes (from Bleecker Street bootleggers), 7" records (for the b-sides), and rare CDs by Billy's early psych-metal bands Atilla and The Hassles (which I've since sold on eBay). We prided ourselves on liking only the obscure cuts.
My friend Marji says I know way too much about Billy Joel. But I'm gonna go the Chuck Klosterman route and embrace it.
Music fans stopped paying attention to Billy Joel at "We Didn't Start The Fire" (I remember one book named him the worst rock star of all time simply because "a list is not a song"). Blender's recent countdown of the 50 all-time worst songs included the rap-rock ballad at #41, citing special hatred of the line "China’s under martial law/ rock & roller cola wars!"). But here's a fun fact: the original line was "Poison apples in the stores, rock & roller cola wars." Then the whole Tiananmen Square thing replaced the alar scare headlines. Like I said, I know way too much about Billy Joel. Did I mention I did a fifth grade book report on an unauthorized Billy Joel biography? We were allowed to pick anything.
Skipping ahead to the soporofic River Of Dreams album (whose cover featured a laughable portrait painted by then-wife Christie Brinkley), we find Billy losing interest in pop music. He thought he could quietly slip out of the spotlight, marry a twenty-year old (he's actually older than his father-in-law) and earn enough money from touring with Elton John to buy a new fishing boat.
But despite the non-pop music success of a #1 classical album and Tony Award winning musical, Billy's been a laughing stock since a March '02 NY Times concert review (and later a Magazine piece) painted him as a lonely, has-been lush: "When Mr. Joel emerged for his set, there was sympathy as well as adulation: The audience had been warned that he had a cold. But Mr. Joel seemed to have ingested something quite a bit stronger than cough syrup."
Billy likes to drink. But in his defense, he always has. In the early '70s the former boxer checked himself into a mental institution after chugging furniture polish in a lame suicide attempt. Seriously.
And a year ago, BJ voluntarily entered rehab in an attempt to put all the bad press behind him. But then he went and crashed his car. THREE TIMES. Even I admit that's pretty funny.
Here's Horatio Sanz as the drunk driving Piano Man from this weekend's SNL:
"A bottle of red, a bottle of white ... I think I've got a bottle of Peppermint Schnapps in the backseat there, Lindsay Lohan."
In light of the latest accident, Lasagna Farm thought up some new song titles.
Meanwhile, two enterprising L.I. radio DJs have collected the grill of Joel's '67 Citroen from the site of the latest crash. You can bid on the car parts on eBay.
Poor Billy. Maybe it's time for a new album? Or at least a chauffeur.
One bright note: a scene in the current hit movie 13 Going On 30 features the song "Vienna," from the Grammy-winning Stranger album. It stands out like a sore thumb, but the music on that soundtrack is totally anachronistic anyway. It takes place in 1987 and the character is obsessed with Rick Springfield. Huh? Anyway, here's Joel's contribution:
Why Vienna? Check out track #47 on the Q&A section of his boxed set.
Billy Joel never considered himself a poet (last year he apologized to Entertainment Weekly's L2T section for "the worst song I ever wrote": the French-sung "C'Etait Toi."). He penned lyrics by default, and most of them were pretty lame. But as a musician, he was equally informed by a love of the Beatles and Beethoven -- the result is a catalog of hits that will never go away. "Just The Way You Are," "You're My Home," "New York State Of Mind," "She's Always A Woman" ... yeah, I'm sick of them too, but they're great songs regardless. He's been covered by everyone from Frank Sinatra to Braid. Even my fiancee has come around and admitted to liking two (!) songs: "All For Leyna" and "Downeaster Alexa."
OK, now that I've turned into an Internet punchline (see The Onion's "Area Man Hasn't Told Co-Workers About His Billy Joel Fan Page Yet"), I'll wrap this up.
Billy Joel turns 55 this Sunday. When you're on the couch watching The Sopranos (sadly, Adriana and Christopher never did attend that BJ concert in Season 4), have a drink or eight in honor of the birthday boy.
Posted at 9:58 AM
Tags: Billy Joel | Chuck Klosterman
I didn't know Woody Harrelson was in a 70s psych metal band. Anything for a Woody shout out.
Don't feel bad about your love for Joel. All I can think about is skating at the Roll-a-bout in the very early 80s to "It's Still Rock and Roll to Me" and grooving my little 8 year old self to the beat. That's a good song.
And if it makes you feel any better, I will one up you and expose that I watch American Idol AND thought the Billy Joel night last season was one of the best nights they had.
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Man, that's some Billy Joel post.
I actually still enjoy a good deal of his early songs, and not in a snarky, ironic Gen X or Pitchfork look-how-cool-we-are-liking-Hall-&-Oates-and-getting-Ben-Gibbard-to-crack-foxy-about-them-for-us-kind-of-way. "Captain Jack" is great. As is that episode of Freaks & Geeks that features mainly BJ.
I prefer Ultravox's "Vienna."
A sure-fire comeback hit would be for him to update "We Didn't Start the Fire." Again, I'm serious here.
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I love that Freaks & Geeks episode. I gotta buy that DVD already.
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the Joel is always welcome. Rosalinda's Eyes is a particular guilty pleasure. And dudes like Ben Folds (and that goateed fucker that sings about superman) wish they could be him. And Me First and the Gimme Gimme's cover of "only the good die young" is priceless.
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Hip hop songs that have sampled Billy Joel. A bunch of dudes have used "New York State Of Mind" on mixtapes as well.
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http://the-breaks.com/perl/search.pl?term=billy+joel&type=0
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Ben Folds needs to cover "Scenes from an Italian Restaurant" already. I desperately need to hear that.
I also love "Downeaster Alexa" though I often would run into idiots who thought it was abaout his daughter.
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I have Rowlf the Dog from The Muppets doing "New York State of Mind." Best cover version ever.
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Mark: I haven't heard that cover, but I'll look for it.
Chris: Agreed on the Ben Folds thing. It seems like he only covers Elton John. Has he ever covered Joel?
Nick: That link is so fucking awesome! Thanks. I'm gonna have a blast on iTunes now...
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There's two huge differences between an artist like William Martin Joel and some schmuck like Eddie Money. The first difference is in the songwriting. Say what you will about some of the unforgivable lyrics or that Guido Mooley accent he tries to pull in one of the last choruses of "Big Shot", the songs Joel have composed in the last thirty years should some of our nation's most treasured classics. His ability at playing the piano shouldn't go unnoticed either.
The second reason is that people like Money actually TRIED to be rock stars. Joel has always been content to being kind of a dork and letting the music speak for itself. I think that even he knew that he looked silly drinking a Budweiser and wearing a tie in the "Still Rock and Roll to Me" video. I don't think that he's ever taken the rock star thing seriously, and just has fun being uncool about it.
My vote for the most underrated Billy Joel song would have to be "She's Right On Time" off of Nylon Curtain.
I think that I've said enough now.
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> My vote for the most underrated Billy Joel song > would have to be "She's Right On Time" off of
> Nylon Curtain.
Great song! Have you ever seen the video? One of the worst music videos ever made. It was a slapstick comedy, which made no sense with the music.
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How can anyone not give props out to a troll of a man like Billy Joel (albeit a charming, funny singing troll) who beds every boy's 80s fantasy, Christie Brinkley? His musical talent--even if it's just a few drops of musical talent--is like icing on the cake. Speaking of the man's music, the greatest Billy Joel song has got to be the obscure "California Flash" from his heavy-metal organ period. Nothing rocks harder than Billy on an organ. Just ask Christie.
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Great post Scott. Billy Joel kicks ass. He's one of the few artits of his age that still maintains an incredible vocal range depite his age and (or maybe because of) the drinking.
So many fantastic songs... Pressure, Allentown, The Stranger, Moving Out and lets not forget "No, no, no , no you had to be a BIG SHOT, didn'cha?" :)
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there's no question that some of billy's lesser known songs have some of the more incredible piano parts of any songs of the past 30 years. there's no shame in admitting that i still like a lot of his stuff. and steroG - if u sold that stuff on ebay shouldn't i get a cut?
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> if u sold that stuff on ebay shouldn't i get
> a cut?
No. You got to keep the "House Of Blue Light" cassingle.
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i love BJ, but I cannot -- cannot -- find it in my heart to forgive him for "tell her about it."
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persio is very appreciative of all the representation on stereogum - she just wanted to make sure you knew she knew
(who'd ve though we'd share that old conversation w/ 80 billion people??)
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what about elvis presley boulevard?
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scott-
being from LI as well (also from nassau county, even more the north shore) nothing hits closer to home than Mr. Joel. Hell "scenes from an italian resturant" was about a resturant in my town. But i think that billy is left as something of a musical mystery to those who have not grown up on LI in the 80's. For us its more a sense of commradery, something we grew up with that is as much a part of our landscape growing up as the island itself. so i say keep Represent strong island Mr. Joel, even if you cotinue smashing everything on it up in horribly humiliating auto wrecks. well thats my take on it anyway..
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Billy Joel is definitely a fave. As much as I like his older stuff, I really think River of Dreams holds it's own. It was one of the first tapes I ever bought, but beyond personal nostalgia there are a few great songs on there. No Man's Land, Great Wall of China - those songs kick ass. I love the angry shit. I'm also impressed by the fact that Famous Last Words was always considered to be his goodbye to that type of music and, so far, he's actually stuck to it. Usually musicians say that stuff and go back on it within a few years.
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Billy has become a cartoon lately, would help credibility if he would do a new album. I remember first seeing him in 1975 at Wake Forest University, he was a replacement for Judy Collins at homecoming. His performance blew the audience away, he did 5 encores, he was young and thinner, Turnstiles had just come out, everyone I knew went out and bought turnstiles, piano man, streetlife serenade and waited patiently for his next album. I have seen him 20 times since then, mostly years ago, but also with Elton.
Saw Ben Folds at the Egg in Albany, he reminded me how Billy was in 1975, would like to see him cover any Billy songs, but for some reason he seems to hate Billy Joel. Regardless I like Ben Folds music and do compare him to Billy. Anyone heard of Jamie Cullum, watch for his release May 11, what I have heard sounds good.
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Rockland County in the house. I have "Turnstiles" on vinyl, baby. Honesty is really not such a lonely word, tho.
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Surely people aren't trying to imply that BJ is not a credible artist?! OF COURSE A LIST IS A SONG!!! Even if the list isn't a song, it's a freaking good list!!!! Also, is it wrong to find a now 55-y-old attractive as he was when he was 25, even though he is now older than your father?
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I first saw Billy in Brisbane, Australia in 1980 and have seen him several times since. To this day one of the best entertainers I have witnessed.
He was one of the best singer/song writers to come out of the 70's and 80's. So he's crashed his car a few times, had a battle with the bottle and married someone less than half his age. Atleast he doesn't hang babies out of windows.
From Cold Spring Harbor to The River of Dreams I think is an important body of work. I notice that a couple of American Idol contestants site him as a favourite and they are in their early 20's so I think he's still got it.
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I think what everyone has to remember about Billy Joel is that no matter how famous or rich he's become, he's just a regular blue-collar kind of guy. You can really see this in the song/video "Uptown Girl" and "The Downeaster "Alexa.""
I mean the guy started out life in street gangs and as an amateur boxer, who subsequently dropped out of high school to persue a musical career. My two favorite songs of his are "She's always a woman" and "She's got a way" followed up by "Piano Man" and "The Downeaster "Alexa."" These songs really speak to the blue-collar man. Even so, he is a perfectionist who takes criticism hard.
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I just randomly found this page while doing a google image search for Billy, so don't mind me...
I'm twenty years old, and I absolutely love Billy Joel. I have nearly all his records -- yes, vinyl -- that I've been collecting for the past several years, and I listen to them regularly while I'm home from college (some of them are apparrently worth a pretty penny).
Why be ashamed of loving Billy? He's awesome!
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Can anyone tell me where I can watch the video to Billy Joel's Uptown Girl?? Any info would be helpful! vwgirl82@comcast.net
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All for Leyna is the best BJ song on the best BJ ablum, Glass Houses. It's really a bit of a concept album isn't it?
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Kristy,
For the love of god:
http://www.google.com/search?q=uptown+girl+video
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all i gotta say 'bout the beej:
tune up the fucking jaaam "zanzibar" from 52nd street (1978)
....
(dancing with my se=elf)
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do you know the name of the hip hop song that smaples bjs, im movin out...?? johnnymagana@yahoo.com.. thanks..!!
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