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Beginning
as a quintessential confessional singer/songwriter, Billy
Joel has gone on to render consistently well-crafted pop.
Classically trained, he combines rock attitude with
musicianly professionalism. Whether taking the form of
rock & roll, new wave, hard-edged dance fare, Sixties
nostalgia, or political statement, his songs are marked by
a melodicism derived ultimately from Tin Pan Alley and
Paul McCartney. His forte is the romantic ballad
epitomized by his signature tune, "Just the Way You
Are."
Raised in
a middle-class Hicksville, Long Island, family, Joel ran
with a leather-jacketed street gang as a teenager. He also
boxed for three years, breaking his nose in the process.
In the late Sixties he joined the Long Island band the
Hassles, which released two meager-selling records on
United Artists. He then formed a hard-rock duo, Attila,
with Hassles drummer Jonathan Small; Small’s wife,
Elizabeth, would later wed Joel. Attila’s only album
also failed. Taking up commercial songwriting, Joel signed
with Family Productions in 1971. His solo debut, Cold
Spring Harbor, demonstrated both his fondness for his
native Long Island and the somber side of his
singing/songwriting approach, but because the tapes were
inadvertently sped up slightly in production, Joel’s
voice sounded nasal and unnatural.
Legal and
managerial woes precluded an immediate follow up, and for
six months Joel performed in West Coast piano bars under
the name "Bill Martin." These experiences
informed his breakthrough, Piano Man, yielding hits
in the Top Thirty title track, the Top 100 "Travelin’
Prayer" and "Worse Comes to Worst." His
third solo album, another respectable seller, featured
"The Entertainer" (#34, 1974). Turnstiles came
next, and although "New York State of Mind"
eventually became a standard, Joel’s career appeared to
be in a holding pattern. Then came The Stranger, and
a string of hit singles: 1977’s "Just the Way You
Are" (#3) and 1978’s "Movin’ Out
(Anthony’s Song)" (#17), "She’s Always a
Woman" (#17), and "Only the Good Die Young"
(#24). "Just the Way You Are," written for his
first wife and manager, Elizabeth, won two Grammy Awards
in 1978.
More hits
followed -- from 1978’s 52nd Street, "My
Life" (#3, 1978), "Big Shot" (#14, 1979),
and "Honesty" (#24, 1979); from 1980’s Glass
Houses, "It’s Still Rock and Roll to Me"
(#1, 1980) and "You May Be Right" (#7, 1980) --
and in 1979, Joel appeared at the Havana Jam Concert in
Cuba. In 1981 he released Songs in the Attic, a
live collection of pre-Stranger material; later
that year "Say Goodbye to Hollywood" (also
recorded in the Seventies by Ronnie Spector) became a hit.
Despite the hits, Joel remained in his most vociferous
critics’ eyes "a lightweight"; Joel responded
publicly by tea- ring up critical reviews onstage during
his concerts. Critically and musically, the tide seemed to
turn for Joel with the socially conscious The Nylon
Curtain, which showcased his musical skill and pop
traditionalist’s gift for song structure. That, along
with his perseverance and industry, began winning critical
converts (in 1992, Joel was inducted into the Songwriters
Hall of Fame). Featuring "Pressure" (#20, 1982),
"Allentown" (#17, 1982), a Reagan-era
unemployment lament, and "Goodnight Saigon"
(#56,1983), about Vietnam vets, The Nylon Curtain went
to #7. The multiplatinum An Innocent Man, a
stylistic homage to Sixties AM-radio pop, offered
"Tell Her About It" (#1, 1983), "An
Innocent Man" (#10,1983), "The Longest
Time" (#14,1984), "Keeping the Faith" (#18,
1985), and the #3 single, "Uptown Girl" (1983),
a Four Seasons-esque Valentine for Christie Brinkley, the
model whom Joel would marry in 1985 (the couple divorced
in 1994). After a seven-night run at Madison Square Garden
in 1984, he released Greatest Hits: Volume I &
Volume II, his seventh consecutive Top Ten album.
The
Bridge (1986)
found him duetting, on "Baby Grand," with Ray
Charles, for whom Joel’s and Brinkley’s daughter,
Alexa Ray, was named. The next year Joel toured the Soviet
Union; the live Kohuept documented the concerts. In
1989 Storm Front and its first single, "We
Didn’t Start the Fire," charted simultaneously at
#1; its centerpiece ballad, "Shameless," became
a hit for Garth Brooks two years later, and its supporting
tour saw Yankee Stadium hosting its first rock concert. By
this time, Joel had reorganized his band, found new
management, and, for longtime producer Phil Ramone,
substituted Foreigner guitarist Mick Jones.
With
1993’s River of Dreams, which entered the chart
at #1, Joel’s lyrical content, oftentimes topical and
acerbic, revealed a more philosophical outlook. With a
cover painting by Brinkley, and employing producer Danny
Kortchmar (known for his work with James Taylor and Don
Henley), River featured Leslie West (ex-Mountain)
on guitar. The album’s title track reached #3 and
"All About Soul," with guest vocals by Color Me
Badd, peaked at #29.
Joel’s
career has been marked by tumultuous business moves -- his
1972 relinquishing of publishing rights to Family
Productions, his legal battles with his first wife and
former manager, and a $90-million lawsuit Joel filed
against ex-manager and former brother-in-law Frank Weber
in 1989 alleging fraud and misappropriation of funds (in
1990 he was awarded $2 million and, in a twist, by 1994
Joel was paying Weber $550,000 and forgiving $600,000
Weber still owed). In September 1992 Joel filed another
$90-million lawsuit, this time against former lawyer Allen
Grubman, charging fraud, malpractice, and breach of
contract (in October 1993 Joel and Grubman announced that
litigation had ceased; no news of a financial settlement
followed). And not stopping, Joel also sued his onetime
tour manager, Rick London (his first wife’s
brother-in-law); Joel then dropped the suit in early 1995.
Deeply suspicious of the music business, Joel has fought
for lower concert ticket prices and attacked ticket
scalping; he has contributed extensively to philanthropic
causes.
Unlike
that of many pop legends, Joel’s work has been perceived
as progressing over the years, moving steadily from the
purely personal, some would argue sophomoric, concerns of
his earliest work to embrace a wider range of styles and
subjects. As bard of everyday suburban dream and
disappointment, he has achieved a singular voice and
status.
Born
May 9, 1949, Hicksville, New York
1972 -- Cold
Spring Harbor (Family/Philips) 1973 -- Piano Man
(Columbia)
1974 -- Streetlife Serenade
1976 -- Turnstiles
1977 -- The Stranger
1978 -- 52nd Street
1980 -- Glass Houses 1981 -- Songs in the Attic
1982 -- The Nylon Curtain 1983 -- An Innocent
Man
1985 -- Greatest Hits: Volume I & Volume II
1986 -- The Bridge
1987 -- Kohuept (In Concert)
1989 -- Storm Front
1993 -- River of Dreams
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