Speaker 1: Shaw m out Virginia anyway.
Speaker 2: Hello everybody, and welcome back to the Shirley You Can't
Be Serious podcasts. Ladies and gentlemen, we have a story
coming up for you that involves Billy Joel's manager impersonating
a doctor in order to sneak him out of a
mental hospital that he was in after a failed attempted
suicide in this episode, if you're not going to stick
around to hear that story, then I don't know what
to do with yet. Jason, how are you doing, man?
Speaker 3: I'm good man. I've got a story on Billy Joel's
Greatest twenty four Hours in the nineteen eighties that actually
arrived Lionel Richie's Greatest twenty four Hours.
Speaker 2: So we are here today doing our second part to
the two parts that we typically do. Last week we
did Lionel Richie Can't Slow Down. This week we are
comparing Billy Joel an innocent man, and because we happen
to know the number one fan in the galaxy for
Billy Joel, we invited our dear friend, mister John Reid
from the thirty something Movie podcast. Mister John Reid from
the Pocket Full of Kryptonite podcast mister John Reid, It's
good to see you, buddy.
Speaker 4: How you doing.
Speaker 5: Man, Apparently my reputation precedes me, and it's like a
mile long.
Speaker 3: That was the longest time, right, there's.
Speaker 5: I have looked for when you guys told me about
this one this night in particular, I've looked forward to
for the longest time. So yeah, I know, I know
I'm guilty of that oftentimes, but overall, I'm typically an
innocent man. It's getting to be careless talk, so I'm
just going to leave a tender moment alone.
Speaker 2: I'd said, eladies and gentlemen, we're off for the night.
Everybody tip your waitress.
Speaker 5: Oh my gosh, No, I'm looking forward to this, And
it's been a while since since I've been able to
talk with you.
Speaker 4: Guys.
Speaker 5: Are podcast full of Ryptonite still on a little bit
of a hiatus for just a little bit. A Superman
and Lois is coming back soon, so we'll have to
get that back in the rotation.
Speaker 4: But it's been a while. It's been a while.
Speaker 2: So I was looking up because I needed to send
you the Zoom invite today and we're trying to find
your email and I just searched our texts and look,
and I say to Jason, look, it's exactly three years
ago that I asked him for his email for the
first time. And we just always we pick things that
we know are your favorites. So three years ago we
got together and we did Superman, which of course eventually
spun into podcasts full of Kryptonite. And then we have
of course had you back on to Star Wars Holiday Special,
which was fantastic. And now here we are with mister
Billy Joel. I think the only thing we have left
to do with you is the rocketeer.
Speaker 5: Let's do it. We can do the rocketeer in Billy Joel.
At the same time, let's just talk about all.
Speaker 3: You ready to dive into the history of mister William
Joel here to sing us a song tonight.
Speaker 2: Yeah, let's let's do it. So we're gonna take you
back to eighty nine, eighteen eighty nine. Yeah, that's when
a mister Carl Amson Joel was born. Mister Joel was
born in Germany and in nineteen twenty eight he got
himself invested in a textile factory. Was one of the
key players in this textile factory. The only problem was
is that nineteen twenty eight was about five years before
it became the worst time in all of history to
be in Germany because the Nazis so poor Jewish mister
Joel was forced to sell his textile factory to an
Aryan stooge, if you will. He was then forced to
cut the price in half. Then the money was put
in a trust account which he couldn't get access to.
By this time, he has immigrated over to Switzerland with
his wife and his young son, Helmet, who would later
be called Howard. And they are there for a bit,
but ultimately decide they have to get to the United States,
so via France via England via Cuba. Eventually they end
up in the US and he starts another factory. By
nineteen fifty seven, he finally gets paid for his factory
in Germany. And I tell you all that to tell
you this. His young son, Helmut, whose name was Howard,
also in nineteen fifty seven. He was a family man.
He was married with two kids, a little girl named
Judith and a little boy that they called Billy. Both
of them were music prodigies. Howard was a piano prodigy.
Billy was a prodigy by four years old Billy was
take and piano lessons. And then right about the time
that Billy's grandfather gets all of his money, his dad,
Howard says, you know what, I liked Europe better, I'm
going back. Oh and nobody's coming with me. Yeah, And
so he leaves. He goes back to Europe, where he
gets married again, has a second boy named Alexander, who
is now a internationally famous composer. Billy Joel's half brother
is an internationally famous composer named Alexander Joel.
Speaker 4: But back to.
Speaker 2: Nineteen fifty seven, when he leaves or Billy is he's
got piano lessons that his mom is scraping up to
give him. He's getting made fun of and bullied by
the local Long Island kids, and so he's got a
tough en up a little bit. And so what does
he take up. He takes up boxing.
Speaker 3: He went twenty two and four box.
Speaker 2: He went twenty two and four had he had twenty
six matches, lost four of them, the last two of
them were by knockout, and so after that he was done.
In that time, he also kept music, so he and
his friends start this high school band. After he has
fallen in love with the Beatles, and they call themselves
the Lost Souls. Huh, you got a story for me?
Speaker 3: I got a story for you. So in the third grade,
little William Joel, during their lunch hour, finds a piano
in the lunch room starts playing hound Dog by Elvis Presley. Okay,
and the fourth grade girls go crazy. Keep in mind
he's a third grader. He's like, my mind was gaving
up when the fourth grade girls were going crazy. I
realized I was onto something, yeah, he said. Then he
started to wiggle his hips and he got yanked off
the stage by the school faculty.
Speaker 2: Well the seed was planted at that point.
Speaker 4: It's too late.
Speaker 2: It's like when Prince watched James Brown. He knew this
was what he was destined.
Speaker 4: For in life.
Speaker 3: He said that the door locked behind him. He was
going to be a musician the rest of his life.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: So he was the.
Speaker 2: Type of kid who would go up to his room
at night and say good night mom, and then sneak
out the window and go hustle around, getting involved in
mischief and stuff. And he was also a kid who
was playing in bands.
Speaker 3: And he wasn't really a top notch student. He didn't
graduate from high school right until like nineteen ninety two
or three or something like that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, honorary ged or something like that.
Speaker 3: Right, Okay, mister English teacher may have to weigh in
on this one. But he had a final in English
that was mandatory for his graduation, and because he was
at a gig playing, he slept through that test, didn't
make it. Petitioned the school and they were like, nope, sorry,
you don't graduate, and he's like, well, screw you, guys.
I know I'm gonna be anyway. So what am I
doing fooling around with high school? His words exactly were,
I'm not going to Columbia University. I'm going to Columbia
Records baby.
Speaker 5: And then, from what I understand, a quarter of a
century later, he actually submitted his essays to the school
board and they accepted them and gave him his diploma,
like twenty five years after he left the school.
Speaker 3: The fact that they actually made him submit those essays,
I mean, with Billy Joe calls and said, hey, kind
of my ged I'd be like, yes.
Speaker 2: Never.
Speaker 5: In true public teacher fashion, they were like, I don't
care who you are, that that work is late. If
you want the credit you turn it in.
Speaker 3: Your essay on to Kill a Mockingbird was due twenty
five years ago.
Speaker 2: I'm going to have to mark you down one point
for every year. Latest thick bes Chi can get seventy five.
So mister Joel continues in the music biz. He auditions
for a guy named Erwin Maser Now Erwin ultimately becomes
his manager. At the time, he was just a younger
guy whose dad owned a cool club in a strip center.
Of all places, I did another cool clubs and strip centers,
but that's where Erwin's dad had one, and so he said, hey,
I think you would be the perfect guy to join
the group that I helped manage called the Hassles. The Hassles,
thank you very much. He was still just a piano
player for him, but he started singing more often, especially
when their lead singer left. But ultimately the Hassles ended
up being a hassle. They did two albums, they weren't
well received anywhere, and ultimately the group broke up and
Billy decided to go and form a duo band, a
two piece band with the drummer from the Assholes, and
that guy's name was John Small. What's interesting is that
it's a duo band with a drummer and a keyboard player.
And what's more interesting is they were gonna play heavy metal, right,
that was their plan. They named the band Attila, and
they decided we're going to be super loud, and they were,
in fact so loud they got kicked out of the
one gig that they had.
Speaker 3: The.
Speaker 1: One and Only California Flies.
Speaker 2: Billy is trying his best to find a place to live,
ultimately ends up staying with John Small and his wife, Elizabeth.
Elizabeth isn't super happy with John, her drummer husband, and
so she kind of confides in Billy and is like, hey,
you know here where things are going wrong. And as
typically happens when those types of relationships develop, it very
quickly turned into an affair. The one rule is in
the band, you don't sleep with other band members. Wise
it should be really easy when there's only one band member,
there's only one other guy, only one guy, and he's
the only guy who's married.
Speaker 3: Don't sleep with that girl, right, And he couldn't do it. Now.
The interesting thing was they were separated for a time
and Billy Joel thought, well they're separated, it's cool. We're
kind of a trifecta. We were on a break and
so his band member followed them home from a gig
one time and saw them together. When he came in,
Billy had no inkling that what he was doing was
not cool or not all right, and he said, the
guy slugged him out of nowhere. He's like, I've been
punched before, but I'd never been punched that hard when
I completely was not looking for it. Yeah, and then
the guilt rained down on him.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and that stopped him right there. He never had
another relationship with Elizabeth again. No that's not true. No, okay, yeah, no, sorry, Yeah,
the relationship continued and he continue to feel guilty, and
he said, I'm going to I have to tell him
that this is still going on. And she said, if
you tell him, I will leave both of you. And
that pretty well ended things, not only for John and Elizabeth,
but it also ended things for John and Billy. So
nineteen seventy, Attila releases its only album, First and Last,
and nobody liked it anyway. So nineteen seventy also is
when Billy runs away with Elizabeth. They would later get married.
She would later become his manager, but what's most impressive
is we're going to talk about a video later on
that one of the directors for Billy Joel's video is
John Small. That's the guy who doesn't hold a grudge.
Speaker 3: I forget to forget. Wow. Now, during this time, Billy
was actually suicidal. He had lost Elizabeth, he had lost
his best friend, he had lost his band, he didn't
have a gig.
Speaker 2: He was living in a laundromat. I can see how
that might be a downer.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: So what he did was he was given some anxiety pills,
and so he decided, well, I got these pills. I
guess I'll just take all of them. Yeah, And he
woke up in the Burgency room.
Speaker 2: They had pumped his stomach.
Speaker 3: He had survived his half hearted suicide attempt.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Erwin, he was living with Irwin Mazer at the time.
Erwin said, he woke up one morning, he walks into
the kitchen and on the kitchen table he sees that
Billy has written a song. They're like, oh, hey, there's
a song Billy wrote. It's called Tomorrow's Today. That's interesting.
He reads it and then you know, a few hours later,
he gets the call from the hospital and he's like, oh, this.
Speaker 3: Is a suicide note. Oh okay, my bad.
Speaker 2: One thing that I didn't mention about Irwin Massour is
that for a time he was a dental school attendant,
but he dropped out of dental school. But when he
goes to visit Billy at the hospital, Billy's like, they're crazy.
You got to get me out of here. And so
several failed attempts at legally getting him out of the hospital.
Later he decided, I'm gonna throw on my old dental
school attendant lab coat and he walks in and sneaks
Billy Joel out of the mental hospital. Wow, that's creative.
Speaker 3: You know what he did to get into the mental hospital.
Speaker 2: He committed suicide. He tried to commit suicide. He well,
his second attempt.
Speaker 3: Was he drank a bottle of old English.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, furniture cleaner.
Speaker 5: What did you did you hear what he said about
the second attempt when he drank the bottle of furniture polish,
He was like, I actually pulled up the quote because
I remember reading this one time and I wanted to
get it right. Well, the furniture polish will probably taste
better than the bleach. So I'll drink the furniture polish.
And then he said all I ended up doing was
farting furniture polish for a couple of days.
Speaker 2: And yeah, that's hilarious. Okay, so two suicide attempts.
Speaker 5: Oddly enough, that didn't polish him off. Ohuning I went
there real quick. I was I was going to back
up for a second to the Attila album. I was
in a used bookstore years and years and years ago,
and I ended up coming across a cassette tape and
I pulled this tape out because it said Attila with
Billy Joel, and I was like, wait, what, hold on,
hold the phone. If you're a comic book fan, you
might enjoy part of the Attila album because the very
first song is titled wonder Woman. Canonically, I don't think
it has anything to do with wonder Woman, but that
is the name of the song.
Speaker 4: So if you want to just.
Speaker 5: Check it out to hear what Billy Joel's seventies progressive
rock heavy metal sounds like, go for it. It's a
weird little album.
Speaker 3: But I wonder if wonder Woman is an uptown girl
or he's trying to serve me these softballs and I'm
like swinging a mess.
Speaker 4: That's a secret that's a secret code for Elizabeth Small.
Speaker 2: So less than a month, less than a month after
he has tried to kill himself the second time because
of his failed music career, Irwin is at his brother's office,
and Irwin's brother happens to be the art director for
Paramount Records, and he's playing in one of Billy's songs
and some long haired dude sticks his head through the
door and says, who is that what you got there?
And that dude's name was Michael Lang And if you
don't recognize that name, he's the guy who did Woodstock. Wow,
so not insignificant. Yeah, And he's like, oh you like it?
And he goes no, not really, not my style, but
I know a guy who I think would love it.
And that is how Billy Joel meets the famous, if
not infamous ARTI Rip. So Michael Lang sends the music
to ARTI Rip. ARTI Rip calls up Irwin Maisur and says,
I love Billy Joel. Let's make a deal, and Billy
signs the as shoot as all of our newbie artists do.
Signs the record deal quick because he wants to be
a signed artist right, probably without reading a word of
the contract. So with the signing of the deal, he
gets back together with Elizabeth. They were on again, off again,
and now they're on again and they're ready to produce
mister Billy Joel's first an incredibly famous album, Cold Spring Harbor.
Speaker 6: She's gone away about her.
Speaker 5: I don't know.
Speaker 4: What it is, but I know that I can.
Speaker 2: Live with other.
Speaker 3: Cold Spring Harbor nineteen seventy one crickets.
Speaker 5: If he'd liked me to talk about Cold Spring Harbor,
I could talk about Cold Spring Harbor and maybe one
of the problems that came out with the Cold Spring
Hart when they recorded it and they were I'm sorry
that came out way too fast.
Speaker 2: I know, it's like you're a chipmunk or something that
was weird.
Speaker 5: They went through and they recorded the whole thing, and
I think it is because of a mastering error. His
voice sounded way too high, you know, and Billy Joel
he can sound he can hit the high notes, and
there are times when when his voice can come out
fairly high. But it ruined the whole album, like it
ruined the sound of it. And he again, it was
kind of feeling like, oh great, my first album and
it's already a flop. It's got some great songs on it,
but yeah, the mastering of it got all messed up.
Speaker 2: And truly the responsible party for that was Alardy Ripe,
and he basically just said, the record's already been pressed.
There's nothing we can do about it. It is what
it is, literally, and so here he is. He's got
this terrible album. What's he going to do now?
Speaker 3: He went to a listening party. He was at a
listing party and he was listening. He's like, holy crap,
I sound like a chipmunk, and then somebody else started laughing.
So he took the record off, he threw it out
the window and it just busted everywhere. Yeah, he was humiliated.
Speaker 2: He was humiliated. So he's not going to make his
name through this first record. So his next alternative and
pretty much only alternative at this point, is to make
his name on the road. And since Arty was the
one who had screwed up his first album, Irwin Maser
was able to convince him, hey, you need to finance
a tour, and so ARTI Rip puts up two hundred
and fifty three hundred and fifty thousand dollars, which was
a fair chunk of change in that time, and Billy
starts touring the country, starts touring in Europe, is making
a name as a live show and doing pretty good.
And then he has a very very important moment where
he appears on the WMMR radio station in Philadelphia and
he plays a song that he has written while on
the road, and that song is called Captain.
Speaker 1: Jack Saturday Night, yostill hanging around, tired of living in
all on.
Speaker 5: Hostile You like one of the funny things. I mean,
fast forward several years. Billy Joel I think, has said
that's one of his least favorite songs over the years,
he got so tired of playing it because one thing,
and we'll talk about that as we're talking about all
these different songs, is he's much more of a music person.
Speaker 4: You know. The lyrics to him always come second.
Speaker 5: He's much more about the music, and I think it's
always more interesting interesting to him when he can do
something that is almost classical and more complex. And he
has said in subsequent interviews he's like, oh yeah, Captain Jack.
He even said this was his quote. At this point.
I've demoted him to Private Jack because it's just such
a boring song. There was an interview where he starts
to play it and he's just like, you can just
tell he's bored even just playing it during that interview
and he's like, oh, thank god a chord change, and
then he moves into the next He is not a
fan of that song now, I think because it is
so simple, and I think some of those I think
that's some of the some of the like build up
over the years as to why he got disillusioned with
his own career and his own success. Was he felt like, oh, man, like,
the songs that get me real popular are the ones
that like, I don't even really care for. Like, I know,
I got to put the lyrics in there because that's
what sells albums. But eh, all right, I.
Speaker 3: Found this story funny. He was out on the road
to support that first album and they noticed there's a
small group of women that showed up to all the shows.
Turns out they were hookers, Oh, hired by our man,
Ardie Rip to schmooz the DJs and to you know,
support the band, to support the band, keep them up,
you know, and whichever way they can.
Speaker 2: If that's moving up, then I'm moving out. So he
plays Captain Jack on the radio station. It becomes their
number one requested song, and as it turns out, a
very important individual is listening, and here's this song, and
that gentleman's name is Clive Davis. And if you don't
know that name, you need to check out No Surprise
by Aerosmith, where they said and then old Clyde Davis said,
I'm surely gonna make you a star, because that's what
Clive Davis did. Clive Davis was the head of Columbia Records,
and he made a whole lot of stars Aerosmith, Bob Dylan,
Bruce Springsteen, just to name a few. And so he
calls up and says, hey, I want Billy on my label.
Well the problem is, of course he's on Arty's label, still, right,
And so Artie says, okay, tell you what, how about
I'll let you have him. I just get twenty five
percent of all of his album sales and all of
his compositions for the next ten albums ten albums, sounds fair,
ten albums, ten albums. By the way, ladies, Jim, and
we're here to talk about album number nine. So you
just know that Artie RiPP got twenty five percent of
this baby too, gosh dang, So mister Joel was none
too happy about that. He ends up firing Irwin Mazer
over the deal because he thinks he's the one who's
set him up for this. They remain friends, but he
just doesn't think he's a good manager, and ultimately he decides, Hey,
you know what, I'm not only going to marry Elizabeth,
I'm going to make her my manager.
Speaker 6: Yep.
Speaker 5: Have you guys heard that they are talking about making
a biopic of Billy Joel?
Speaker 4: No?
Speaker 3: Oh nice, that would be awesome.
Speaker 5: So they well maybe so they announced in I want
to say it was back in March of twenty twenty
two that they were going to be making the biopic
of his life, the only and it's going to be
directed by or at least the last thing I heard
was it's gonna be directed by Adam RiPP, who is
the son of Artie Rip. And the big hurdle that
they've got is Billy Joel is not interested in having
them make a movie of his early life, so he
is not allowing them to use any of his music
or his likeness. So they're how they're possibly going to
make a biopick. What I've heard is they the biopick
would would focus on the time of his life and
career leading up to like I guess the end of
the movie would be him releasing Captain Jack, him performing
Captain Jack, and that being the first step to his stardom.
It's it would deal with the time that he spent
with the Hassles and and Attila and all that, and
and Irwin Maser and but yeah, apparently they can't use
his likeness or his music, so I'm not quite sure
how you uh. I mean, weird Awl's weird would have
been even more weird if you couldn't have him look
like weird Al or play weird al music.
Speaker 2: So this is about a guy named Schmilly Schold a
band named ginghis Khan in the Hustler.
Speaker 4: Yeah, so I think you're going to pull that off.
Speaker 2: But well, so he now has to pay back some
of the money and is trying to dodge the creditors
that are coming back after him. So what he ends
up doing is playing lowly piano bar gigs in La
under the name Billy Martin. During that time, he meets
a guy named Davy who's still in the Navy, and
a guy named Paul who's a real estate novelist.
Speaker 5: And probably that one guy probably will be for life.
Speaker 3: Yes, nineteen seventy three, he writes and records Piano Man.
Speaker 1: It's nine o'clock gone a Saturday.
Speaker 3: I regular crowd shuffles in. Man.
Speaker 2: That's a good way to come back in after a terrible,
terribly bad, failed attempt at a first album. What a
great way to reintroduce yourself.
Speaker 5: To the world.
Speaker 4: Have you guys ever heard any of the demo versions
of his songs?
Speaker 2: I don't think so.
Speaker 5: They had this entire you can find them on YouTube,
but they had this entire I think it was released
as an album. It was called My Lives and it's
a it's an album of like remixes and demo versions.
And I was just listening to this the other day
because some of these I had not heard before. And
the Piano Man demo is really it's like it's like
the whole alternate universe kind of thing. It's the Mandela effect,
Like it's it sounds like Piano Man, but the lyrics
from the get go are different and so and it's
like you're listening to Billy Joel sing a song that
you're like, no, no, hold on, that's not right. I'm going
to actually bring that back when we talk about some
of the songs on the album that we're here to
talk about, because there's a demo that I actually liked
better than the song that was released. But yeah, that
that album is kind of fun. But to hear that
demo of Piano Man, it's very and it sounds very
different too. It's it's almost very echo we like it's
it's got an echo effect. It's been added to it.
I'm like, that just sounds it's weird.
Speaker 6: Said Son calling you play me a memory. I'm not
really sure how it goes.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 3: In our Patreon episode this month, we're dropping a Patreon
episode on take on.
Speaker 2: Me by Aha.
Speaker 3: That song went through multiple, like three or four different
variations before it hit.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: First one, you have that keyboard riff, but the words
are totally different. Yeah, go to our Patreon page, by
the way, check those episodes out.
Speaker 4: It's awesome.
Speaker 3: So after The Piano Man is released in nineteen seventy three,
it reaches number twenty five in the Hot one hundred.
By the way, we'll roll through these pretty quick. But
nineteen seventy four, he releases an album called Street Live
Serenade with the song you might know called the Entertainer.
Speaker 6: I am the Entertainer and I know just square Eyes
stand an a serenader and another long haired band.
Speaker 1: Today I Am You're Champion a male one young you know.
Speaker 5: Again his his struggle with the recording industry, and it's
it's got the line in the song, I'm gonna mess
it up here in a second, but it's like, if
you're gonna have a hit, you gotta make it fit.
So they cut it down to three zero five, and
kind of like his commentary on I gotta I mean
the stuff if it's gonna get on the radio and
I'm gonna be a hit, I gotta do this stuff.
Speaker 4: But that's not it's not what I want to do.
Speaker 5: So you can kind of see the little hints here
and there of it's just like some of the other
creatives that you know, we know and love and talk about,
like you know, George Lucas getting you know, fed up
with the whole studio system and wanting to be free
to create his artwork. And but yeah, I love the
I love the song. The entertainer is just such a
such a fun little microcosm.
Speaker 4: I think of Billy Joel's, especially his early career.
Speaker 3: Okay, in nineteen seventy six, he releases Turnstiles, and the
song that I know most from that is called New
York State of Mind.
Speaker 5: Turnstiles is a great too, like that one You've got
Say Goodbye to Hollywood Summer Highland Falls, that's a great
I love the piano in that one. That's He's referred
to that one as his bipolar song. New York State
of Mind is amazing. James is a fun song. I
mean that one's kind of that's a little underrated James.
And then the song that follows it is The Angry
young Man, And I feel like those two could kind
of go together, Like James, based on the lyrics of
the song, he could develop into an angry young man.
But then the one that I've always loved this song
is it ends with Miami twenty seventeen. It's one of
those kind of like I always love a good alternate
history story, alternate universe kind of a story, and just
and especially when it got to be twenty seventeen and
they kind of made a big deal about this song
again and they started playing it. I'm like, I've always
thought that song is so cool, and it's actually one
of his few songs where he kind of he comes
right out and comments on something political because it had
to do with the city of New York going bankrupt
in the early seventies, and I think it was President Ford.
It was the famous headline in the newspaper. Ford says,
drop dead to New York City, and Billy Joel is like, well, God,
what would it be like if New York City goes
bankrupt and we have to like sell things off and
shut things down. And so that whole song grew out
of that whole battle between New York and President Ford.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Cool. Well, nineteen seventy seven is where I kind of
entered the picture here. I remember this album as a
young kid. The Stranger is released in nineteen seventy seven.
Speaker 1: Don't Go Change to Try Please Me You never let
me down before.
Speaker 3: Don't That has songs like just the way you are
only the good die young moving out and She's always
a woman to me.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's an important thing that happens the album before this.
Turnstile is where Billy he was initially given a Columbia
producer and given the band the backing band for Elton John,
which seemed like a good fit, but it wasn't working
for him and he was like, no, I don't want
to do that, and he ends up going back to
Long Island and getting buddies that are musicians, like guys
come play on the album. They're the ones that of
course become his band forever after that. And then whenever
that's done, the stranger comes along and he's like, Okay,
I'm kind of done with producing and performing. We needed
a producer and that's where we introduced mister Phil Ramone,
who is also the producer of An Innocent Man.
Speaker 5: This is one of those albums, and I could say
this just about any one of his albums, but this
one in particular, I think it's it's gotten better reception
as time has gone on. I think people have gone
back and it got positive reviews when it came out,
but I think since then a lot of people look
back on this one and they're like, this is probably
his most so lyrical album. I think a lot of
people would would argue it may be his best and
there's just so many songs. I mean, if you look
at the songs on that album, moving Out the Stranger,
just the way you are scenes from an Italian restaurant, Vienna,
only the good Die Young, She's always a woman. I
mean you get to the last two songs in the
album before I go, oh yeah, I know those songs too,
Like all the other songs are absolutely like throw those
all on the Greatest Hits albums, and I think they
are on all the greatest hits albums.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, yeah, it's like a greatest Hits album in itself.
Speaker 4: Yeah, Okay.
Speaker 3: In nineteen seventy eight, he releases fifty second Street. For me,
the biggest song on the album is My Life.
Speaker 2: Because of Buds Buddy, Because because of Budding budsm Buddy.
It's a great song, man, it is a great song idea.
It's kind of iconic for me. I think that was
the song that really I was like, this guy sings
this song.
Speaker 7: And I made that connection I grew up. We haven't
really talked about this. I really had a lot of
Billy Joel growing up. My dad was a big fan.
My dad loved the Beatles. Billy Joel loved the Beatles.
They were both born in forty nine. There's definitely an
influence there. And so there was tons of Billy Joel
in my childhood. John, same thing for you, right absolutely.
Speaker 5: In fact, now that we've gotten to this album, I
would say, growing up in my childhood, same thing. My
dad loved the Beatles, loved Billy Joel. So we were
constantly listening to Billy Joel in the car at home.
And if I had to pick the Billy Joel albums
that were on regular rotation for me growing up, we
actually had I think my uncle had made a cassette copy.
He had gotten the video of Live at Long Island
the concert, and then he had made a copy of
that concert on cassette. So for a a lot of
my childhood, that was the cassette that was just constantly
being played. I still have it somewhere and it still works.
I'm just afraid to play it because I don't want
it to break. But that was on all the time, constantly.
But the two albums in particular, and if I had
to vote and say, what are my two favorite Billy
Joel albums, it's fifty second Street and It's Innocent Man.
So and I know I know some folks, you know,
they look at this album and there's like, yeah, I
mean you got big shot, you got my life. And
then beyond that, there's some other ones on there. I
look at this album and I go, oh, You've got Honesty.
I love the song Honesty. I love the song Rosa
Linda's Eyes is probably one of my favorite songs of
his half a Mile Away fifty second Street. And it's
funny because I always feel like this album is very jazzy,
and I'm not always a huge fan of jazz. Sorry
to Patrick Cannagallo, one of my co hosts on the
thirty something Movie podcast, who loves jazz, I'm not as
much of a jazz guy, but this one is so
very much so, and in particular the song I love
the song Rosalinda's Eyes. And do you guys know the
story behind that one? So it's actually a song his
mom's name was Rosalind And basically the song is about
a I think it's about a Cuban singer who is
singing in a Puerto Rican band and he's kind of
struggling and and it's you know, the song is about
him kind of falling for this woman in this club
and her name is Rosa Linda and Billy Joel has
said that he treats this at this song as the
love letter he feels like his father always should have
written to his mother, and it was also his kind
of his thank you to his mother, like thank you
for getting me all the lessons you gave me, thank
you for supporting me, thank you for being there even
when you know my father left. Thank you for always
being the one that really pushed me to get to
where I am today. And I love that that this
was the love letter that his father should have written
for his mother.
Speaker 4: So he's going to do it for her.
Speaker 3: That's awesome.
Speaker 5: Feat Love love that album fifty second Street. I love
that album.
Speaker 3: Okay, in nineteen eighty we have glass houses and this
was a huge album for me as well. Right you've
got It's still rock and roll to me. You may
be right.
Speaker 2: Where are you guys? In this one best album cover
of all Billy Joel album covers. I can remember this one.
I told you when we did our Lionel Richie episode
that seeing him sitting on that chair in our stack
of albums was something I remember clearly. This album is
another cover that I remember clearly, him staring at a
giant window about to chunk a rock into it. I
love it.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and it fits so much with just the opening
of the very first song. You've got the shattering glass
and you May be Right and it just you're you're
off and running at that point.
Speaker 3: Really cool. Yeah, it's a it's a neat thing that
they do there.
Speaker 5: Yeah, And this is one of those you know, I
love this album. I mean I love all of his albums,
but this is one of those where obviously kind of
side one of the album. If you if you break
it in half and you do the side one, side
two of the original release Side one definitely much much
stronger than side two, but still some other really great songs.
Having taken French in middle school and high school, I
do love set atois You were the One, but I
mean the whole first side You May be Right sometimes
a fantasy. Don't ask me why still rock and roll
to me? All for Lena. I mean, those are those
are awesome.
Speaker 3: Calid, don't don't.
Speaker 4: It's old John still older than me.
Speaker 2: You may be Right. As one of those year worms
that routinely comes up in my mind player, I think
it might be from the album and the Chipmunks Chipmunk
Punk the album though, just kidding, well not really, That's
probably where I started with it. But it's definitely Billy
Joel that is playing in my head. Chipmunk Punk again
making an appearance.
Speaker 6: All right.
Speaker 3: Nineteen eighty one, we have the album Songs in the Attic.
This is a collection of live tracks. Are you fan
of this one? John?
Speaker 5: You know what, I haven't listened to this one as much.
Typically when I go, if I want to go for
live versions of the song, I will tend to gravitate
towards that live at Long Island album. So I've listened
to this one a bit, but I am so used
to it because it was on such regular rotation growing up.
I tend to gravitate over to that one. But still
a really fun collection from a bunch of his early albums.
Speaker 2: The song off of this album that I love is
that you don't hear elsewhere is She's Got Away. It
was one that was actually on Cold Spring Harbor, but
you know what happened with that album, and so the
way that I know it is the live version.
Speaker 3: Cool.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's good one.
Speaker 5: My wife and I are probably one of our favorite
songs of his is You're My Home off of Piano Man,
and I actually just introduced her the other day to
a cover of it because she also, you know, Helen
Ready that did the song in the in the Disney
movie Pete's Dragon. I was thinking, I think it was
Candles on the Water was the song. She actually does
a cover version of You're My Home, and so I
played that for my wife the other day. I said,
you want to mix two things you really enjoy, Billy
Joel and Helen Ready.
Speaker 4: Well, we'll get Ready there you go.
Speaker 3: I believe that's the first time that Pete's Dragon has
ever been brought up on our show.
Speaker 2: That's a travesty right there.
Speaker 4: Hopefully it won't be the last.
Speaker 2: All right.
Speaker 3: In nineteen eighty two, he releases the album The Nylon,
and this includes songs like Pressure and Alentown, good Night, Sigon.
Speaker 5: For me the weirdest one and as a kid, I
don't know, maybe just because he said it was weird
on the live album, I was like, I love the
song Scandinavians guys like it is such a weird song.
It's not my favorite one off the album, but you
know that one. I love that one too, But yeah, Alanown, Pressure,
good Night's Saigon Pressure in particular, it was always funny
to me, like, as a kid, I love these songs
and I would We used to have one of those
tape decks that you know, had a microphone attached to it,
and so I think my parents probably switched off the
microphone just so they didn't have to listen to the
kids sing all the time. But we would take that
thing and try to do our own little lip sync
karaoke kind of a deal. And so I'm sure it
was hilarious to watch, like this seven year old kid
singing the song Pressure, because what kind of pressure have
I had in my life up to this point?
Speaker 2: One of the lyrics and that song you're not allowed
to sing it's seven year old?
Speaker 5: Well, you know, I think it was because in the
at least in the live version, I'm trying to remember
about the other one, he does mention Sesame Street in
the song, So I think as a seven year old,
I was like, no, it's a Billy Joel song that
mentioned Sesame Street.
Speaker 4: I'm all like to do, what does it mean?
Speaker 3: All right? Three other really eventful things happen in nineteen
eighty two. On April fifteenth, nineteen eighty two, Billy Joel's
involved in a terrible motorcycle accident.
Speaker 2: Yeah, in the midst of recording, like they're not even
finished with the album, and it messes up his hand.
It busts up his hands, which is a pretty bad
deal if you were the piano man.
Speaker 3: If you're the piano man, that's a big deal.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: And also in nineteen eighty two, he served divorce papers
from his wife while he's in the hospital recovering from
a busted up hand. When you're a piano player, so
you lay hands on you when you're stuck in a
hospital bit, Oh my gosh. And then also in nineteen
eighty two, his good buddy Paul Simon invites him on
a vacation to Saint Bart's Man, that faithful trip. We'll
talk about just a little bit.
Speaker 2: Are we there yet? Are we there yet? Are we
there yet?
Speaker 3: I think we are.
Speaker 2: There, guys. It is time for us to discuss an
innocent man. Track by track. See, we gave a whole
bridge of information. Oh you said abridged. I'm sorry, I
messed all of that up. I did a whole bridge
of history right there. What you wanted was an abridged history.
Speaker 3: You know you mean the bridge right.
Speaker 2: Oh, there you go.
Speaker 5: Bring it back, the bridge which helps us get over
the river of dreams.
Speaker 3: There you go.
Speaker 2: Okay, you had to be a big shot, did ye
had to open up your mouth?
Speaker 4: Yes?
Speaker 2: All right, guys, So we will come back next week
and talk about an innocent man. Track by track, John
will be back with us.
Speaker 5: I will wait the longest time. Whatever you need.
Speaker 3: We will see you guys next week or in a
few days, whatever it is.
Speaker 6: So