I have always heard his music on the radio and whatnot, but just very recently, my friend who plays piano has been learning Billy Joel songs because he's a big Billy Joel fan, and I'm acquiring quite a liking for his music. I haven't heard an awful lot aside from his singles and I don't have any of his albums yet, but I have to admit that the stuff I've heard is really, really, really good, and several of his songs border on brilliant.

He gets a lot of disrespect, though. I have a feeling that there'll be quite a few 'crap' votes on this one, although I cannot see how anyone can deny the genius of songs like "Piano Man" and "Scenes From An Italian Restaurant."

SchnappM wrote:I have always heard his music on the radio and whatnot, but just very recently, my friend who plays piano has been learning Billy Joel songs because he's a big Billy Joel fan, and I'm acquiring quite a liking for his music. I haven't heard an awful lot aside from his singles and I don't have any of his albums yet, but I have to admit that the stuff I've heard is really, really, really good, and several of his songs border on brilliant.

He gets a lot of disrespect, though. I have a feeling that there'll be quite a few 'crap' votes on this one, although I cannot see how anyone can deny the genius of songs like "Piano Man" and "Scenes From An Italian Restaurant."

Thats some top notch sarcasm. Well done. Espicially the "although I cannot see how anyone can deny the genius of songs like "Piano Man" and "Scenes From An Italian Restaurant." Whats next, the pop orgasm of "Uptown Girl", or the towering social commentary of "We didn't start the Fire"?

Ah, the good captain and his ship of wit...

Billy Joel is a great C/NC topic: he's done some good stuff and some god-awful stuff. I think his early solo records are pretty darn good, actually. For a time, he was writing some classic stuff.

Once he entered his Joe Kellerman phase and started looking like a serial killer, my interest waned.


Still, NOT CRAP

total crap

sometimes, when i feel like torturing my wife, i make her play 'what's your favorite billy joel song?' it basically consists of me singing as much of as many billy joel songs as i can remember.

i think he's about 1/2 as good as elton john. who's about 1/2 as good as neil young. but he's pretty good.

I heard "Zanzibar" on the radio a while back. What an epic!

Sure, there are plenty of Billy Joel songs that make me want to throw up (Piano Man and Scenes from and Italian Restaurant in particular), but there's some stuff I actually really like - Don't Ask Me Why, Movin' Out, For the Longest Time, Only the Good Die Young..the list goes on.

Here in New York Billy Joel is on the front page of the Post every time he has a car accident, which is pretty often.

not crap.

C

Seaside Lounge wrote:Here in New York Billy Joel is on the front page of the Post every time he has a car accident, which is pretty often.

I will give Billy Joel points for his medicated meltdown during that one NY show with Elton John, the one where he apparently kept shouting out the names of various WWII battles. (I recall reading about it in the NYT, and I'm sure that link's long gone.)

Also, when I heard about the first car accident, I wondered if he was working on a Jackson Pollock impersonation or something.

Otherwise, CRAP.

Billy Joel is the living embodiment of CRAP, but I would truly love to hear his first band, Attila, someday:

http://usuarios.lycos.es/stormfront/atila.htm

Angus Jung wrote:Billy Joel is the living embodiment of CRAP, but I would truly love to hear his first band, Attila, someday:

http://usuarios.lycos.es/stormfront/atila.htm

I want to hear this record, too!

"Rising from the ashes of Billy Joel's Long Island-based rock & roll band the Hassles, Attila was an embarrassingly discordant duo that also featured the Hassles' Jon Small. Described by Joel at the time as "psychedelic bullshit," their self-titled debut album came out in 1970. A critical and commercial disaster, it featured Joel on a heavily distorted B-3 organ, with an Attila the Hun theme that included Joel and Small's appearance on the cover dressed as Huns. The album's lack of success virtually guaranteed that there would not be another Attila project; the group's demise was also sealed when Joel began an affair with Small's wife, Elizabeth, whom he eventually married."

Billy Joel--and I will brook no argument--is CRAP.

However, I have played "It's Still Rock and Roll to Me" on a terrible jukebox once when I was completely stumped for anything to play. Someone had already punched in some stuff from The Cars' first record and the Sheryl Crowe song I wanted to hear.

Is that Crowe with an "e"?

At any rate, she's not so crap. Maybe I'll make a poll...

When I was in high school I got tickets to the Who’s final tour for me and a friend. I HAD to go, right?! I mean it was their FINAL TOUR!! I am so glad I did not pass up that opportunity… Imagine…missing their FINAL TOUR! HA! ..ugh…

Anyway, my friend returned the favor by taking me to a Billy Joel concert. It was the Nylon Curtain tour. Now at this point I had a subscription to Modern Drummer (you know the magazine that always had Jeff Picaro of Toto on the cover and an article about Alex VanHalen making his own drums…again…) so I was familiar with BJ’s drummer, Liberty DeVito. I thought it was worth it to go for that reason alone.

I will spare you the details of this night of horror and shame except for this detail that for me sums it all up. During one of the hits that Billy played on his own, his band gathered ‘round a prop table and PANTOMIMED playing cards and did it very theatrically. At a certain point in the song when it is all brought down to the emotional part, the card miming band members slowed there actions until they all froze like mannequins until the song was over…and there was a whole verse and chorus to go! Even then with my zit covered face and acid wash jeans, I knew that was wrong…very wrong.

I am sorry Mr. Joel. You get a crap for that. Not even the video for Uptown Girl could right that wrong.