Album Reviews

The late New York Times rock critic Robert Palmer once wrote a Billy Joel review that was so scathing, so mean, so nasty and couched in personal terms, that even I, a fellow Billy Joel detractor (perhaps even a "hater" back then), cringed with embarrassment.

What would cause a critic to unload like that? Just listen to this record!

It's funny: while searching The Times website for that Palmer review (couldn't find it), I found a headline: "Billy Joel has hip surgery." I'm thinking, "not even surgery could make him hip." 

Look, there's no denying Billy Joel's talents as a pianist and some of his songwriting accomplishments. Anyone who can write even one standard like "I Love You Just the Way You Are"— a song still played at every third wedding since it was written— has made his mark on the world.  

So then what makes Billy Joel so annoying to some of us?

Just listen to this record from 1976—Joel's reaction to returning to New York after spending time in California. It starts off well, with a tribute to Ronnie and Phil Spector.

"Say Goodbye to Hollywood"  is a great, purposefully derivative song. The charts quote from the Spector game plan and in a way that's respectful and fun. Joel's quavering voice pays its respect to Ronnie and the tune gets the album off to a great start.

But then comes a bit of drool so foul you want to pull the disc from the player and stomp on it.

"Summer, Highland Falls" is a pretentiously titled, downright repulsive parody of Jackson Browne.

It cops Browne's sensitivity, sees it and raises it to laughable heights. It doesn't pay tribute to Browne at all. It pays tribute to Joel's arrogance, self-importance, ponderousness and worst of all, sense that the suburban yentas who he (correctly) thinks will buy into this phony hypersensitivity have never heard of Jackson Browne, because anyone who has will positively barf upon first listen and if you know Jackson Browne and didn't barf, I ask you why not?

And even worse, by presenting such a parody of Browne, it does him damage, too. On the other hand if that was Joel's intent, he did a damn good job of mocking Southern California sensitivity. But I don't think that was the intent.

Just when you've had time to begin to recover from that bit of musical excrement, Joel does his Paul Simon-best on the reggae-light of "All You Wanna Do Is Dance." It's not easy to take a reggae beat and squeeze from it every last drop of sensuality, but this tune manages. I did like the "Oo La La La"s that sound sampled from The Beatles' "You Won't See Me," though.

Next up comes one of Joel's great tunes. Sure "New York State of Mind" sounds like a piano man piano bar special but that's the idea, and who better to write it than an ex piano bar performer?

It's genuinely felt and for anyone from New York it resonates with such purity you can almost forgive all of what you've just endured to get to it. However, you really must hear the version Mel Tormé manages on his live double LP "Live at Marty's." 

The master tape has disappeared, so no digital other than one transferred from the original vinyl (not well) and available as an MP3 download if you must. The record sounds stunning—like you're in the club, and Mel's version will floor you! Look for a copy. They are around. Be prepared to drop that jaw (as they say in the audiophile cliché).

This one is just okay. Joel was too young to really pull it off, but give him a huge amount of credit for writing it!

Next up comes the weird, melancholic "James," which sounds like a cross between Paul McCartney and James Taylor.  It's certainly judgmental as hell but that soprano sax solo is a treat and Joel's Wurlitzer electric piano (or Fender Rhodes?) part is deftly played and the overall arrangement perfectly fits the mood.

So just when you're maybe coming around, Joel unloads the totally fucking annoying "Prelude/Angry Young Man."

Look if you're not a bit of an angry young man when you're young, something's wrong with you. The prelude part shows off Joel's prodigious piano chops in an instrumental piece that sounds like something familiar but you can't place it, mixed in with the worst prog rock you ever heard and a bit of The Jackson 5's "I Want You Back." 

When that settles down, Joel sings this ode to suburban, middle class self-satisfaction and condemnation of anyone trying to make some change and kick some ass. It's got the energy of a 25 year old coupled with the sentiment of a lacquer-haired, graying Republican woman. I see Phyliss Schlafly really digging the hell out of it. 

Joel's take is that if you're an angry young man, you'll die an angry old man. So don't be angry. Just bend over and take it. He even sings about the kid "refusing to bend" as if that's a bad thing. That's the sentiment that can really piss one off when you're in your 20s listening to this stuff. Today? It doesn't make you angry, just sad.

The music Joel puts together for this song is really interesting. It mixes "Kodachrome" with Procol Harum, some Elton John and some Broadway bravado in a song sung by a 27 year old who's already thrown in the towel and bent.

This song is the anti-rock and roll song and its probably the one that sent Robert Palmer over the top, but I could be wrong. The corny synth break, part Procol Harum/Bach and part what? Genesis? requires an Ozium spray to clear the room. Did then, does now.

"I've Loved These Days" is another ponderous melodrama, this one about materialistic excesses. My favorite line is "We're going wrong, we're gaining weight." If that's not a clue that this is parody, I don't know what is, but I don't think it is. The song sounds right off Procol Harum's album Grand Hotel only not as good.

"Miami 2017" (Seen the lights go out on Broadway) is the song Billy Joel sang at the 911 tribute concert and at that point, in between my tears and slobbering, I told myself "all is forgiven. I love you Billy Joel." 

Now I admire and respect Billy Joel (even if still find most of his music schlocky), but I still don't like this album. However, I have to admit I played this SACD way too many times for my own good in preparation for writing this. "Why am I playing this again?" I kept telling myself. Sort of for the same reason you smell your finger after rubbing your ass when it itches. 

Mobile Fidelity has done a spectacular job with the sound here. Of course this was a good sounding record to begin, producing it at the late Ben Rizzi's Ultra-Sonic Studios, in Hempstead,  Longuyland. Joel had originally recorded the tracks at James Guercio's Caribou Ranch (that later burned down) using Elton John's sidemen but he ended up not liking that and appropriately, took it home.

Listening to this record made me realize just how much The Eagles must have listened—and I don't mean just because Don Henley wrote a song called "All She Wants to Do is Dance." There's more to it than that, but don't ask me to explain here.

So if you love this record and Billy, don't let me stop you.

You'll dig the Mo-Fi SACD sound. I haven't heard the LP yet and given what I've written here I doubt Mo-Fi will send me a copy.

That's okay. I'd rather play Grand Hotel anyway.