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Billy Joel: An Innocent Man (1983)

In his book 60 Songs that Explain the '90s, Rob Harvilla wrote the following:

"I may never put on the 1994 Nine Inch Nails album The Downward Spiral ever again, because this is music I no longer need to play out loud to hear. I can recite this record for you the same way I can recite my Social Security number."

Now I realize there's not a lot of common ground between the music of Nine Inch Nails and that of Billy Joel, but the way Harvilla describes his relationship with The Downward Spiral is an exact match for my own relationship with An Innocent Man.

My mom bought the cassette when it came out, and that thing lived in the tape deck of her Chevy Cavalier for at least two years, covering my sixth and seventh years. Every musical moment of this record, from the opening drum roll of "Easy Money" to the adlibbed outro of "Keeping the Faith," is imprinted in my brain. I can sing along from beginning to end for all 40 minutes, likely to the chagrin of anyone who happens to be within earshot.

Just to illustrate how ingrained the album is in my head, overwriting all else: In the 2001 Coen Brothers film The Man Who Wasn't There there's a scene was scored by Beethoven's Sonata No. 8. Watching it in the theater I felt this wave of intense familiarity. It took me the rest of the movie to realize how I knew that melody. As we walked out of the theater, I said to a friend afterward that it was weird they used a orchestral version of a Billy Joel song. She said, "No dummy, that's Beethoven."

Arriving only 11 months after the release of The Nylon Curtain, An Innocent Man was the result of Billy feeling like a teenager again. He was newly divorced, dating supermodels, and enjoying the freedom and reinvigoration of a fresh start. His state of mind extended to his songwriting, and he took inspiration from the R & B and soul music from his adolescence, artists like James Brown, Sam Cooke, Frankie Valli, and Jerry Lee Lewis. He wrote all 10 songs in a six-week period, and went into the studio with a versatile band with thousands of hours of chemistry behind them. 

The result was a blockbuster in every sense. An Innocent Man peaked at #4 on the Billboard album chart, sold 7 million copies, and produced five top 20 hits, three of those in the top 10, and one of them Billy's second #1 single ("Tell Her About It").

One could write an interesting investigation into the musical origins and homages on An Innocent Man, but that's not something I'm interested in doing myself. I don't want to pull the thread that makes the album hold together so well for me. I also don't think it particularly matters. When I wrote about this album on my list of Favorite Songs, I attributed Billy's act of pastiche to his waning interest in songwriting. I now realize - thanks to a better view of the big picture - that isn't fair or accurate. Billy still had plenty of good songs in him post-1983, and his acts of homage here (and to The Beatles on The Nylon Curtain) were a result of inspiration, not desperation.

So, I won't write about every single song, but I will share some random tidbits:

  • To me, this album is the best showcase for Billy's vocal prowess - from the hungry growl on "Easy Money" and "Christie Lee" to the falsetto of "An Innocent Man" and "Leave a Tender Moment Alone" to the a capella of "The Longest Time" to his perfect reproduction of the Frankie Valli whine on "Uptown Girl."
  • "Leave a Tender Moment Alone" features breathtaking harmonica by Belgian jazz legend Toots Theilemans, who played with all of the greats of the swing era.
  • "An Innocent Man" is one of my favorite Billy Joel songs ever. It's an emotional journey every time.
  • "Careless Talk" is a perfect example of Billy's ability to take personal experience - in this case the scrutiny of fame - and make it feel universal, a skill he either lost or ignored on some of his subsequent songs ("Getting Closer" and "Great Wall of China"). 
  • "Uptown Girl" and "Christie Lee" are the clearest evidence of Billy's relationship with soon-to-be second wife Christie Brinkley, though the latter began as a song about Elle Macpherson, whom he dated first.
  • Final song "Keeping the Faith" serves as both a summary and a thesis statement for the album. "If it seems like I've been lost in 'Let's remember,'" he begins, referring to the backwards-looking musical homages of the previous 9 songs, "If you think I'm feeling older and missing my younger days / Then you should've known me much better / 'Cause my past was something that never / Got in my way." But then he contradicts himself by admitting that he wouldn't have become as successful as he did if not for being able to remember his youth so vividly, especially the music he loved. After a few verses of reminiscing, he sings, "Now I told you the reason for the whole revival" and waltzes off to have a beer and listen to his 45s.
  • "Keeping the Faith" also has one of my favorite lines in a song ever: "The good old days weren't always good and tomorrow ain't as bad as it seems."

Like Rob Harvilla with The Downward Spiral, I may not need to ever play An Innocent Man out loud to hear it. But I sure will want to, if only to get lost in "let's remember."

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