Billy Joel: The Nylon Curtain - 1982


After two critically-acclaimed albums in The Stranger and 52nd Street, the somewhat patchy Glass Houses in 1980 began something of a fallow period for Billy Joel. This album, from 1982, was, in my opinion, his most inaccessible, introspective album. Over 35 years on, and I still can’t really get into it. 

That is also acknowledging that it contains two bona fide Joel classics in Allentown, about the declining US steel industry, and the monumental, evocative Goodnight Saigon, about the horrors of the Vietnam War. This track sits completely at variance with the rest of the album, however. I am really not sure what it is doing there. I find the other tracks very up and down, to be honest. 

Laura is a cynical, almost miserable John Lennon-esque tirade against a former lover; Pressure is a lot better, a synthesiser dominated (but in a good way) pounding, insistent number. She's Right On Time is a Beatles-ish (certainly the chorus) acceptable number, but it is nowhere near the standard of earlier material. Not at all. Nevertheless, I quite like it. 

A Room Of Our Own just seems a lazy rocker. Again, it sounds like filler from a mid 1970s Wings album, which people would forgive because it was Paul McCartney. The middle bit (about a tin of sardines) is such a Lennon plagiarism, both musically and lyrically it is untrue. Then there is the Run For Your Life similarity. In trying to sound like Lennon and McCartney, Billy just seems to have lost his mojo here. Some people seem quite happy with Joel's channelling his “inner Beatles”, however, it must be said. Why, he even sported a McCartney Let It Be style beard too but a song like Surprises just gets nowhere for me. Again, there are obvious tinges of The Beatles in it. 

I can’t really explain why this album just can't reach me. I am at a loss really. I own every Billy Joel album and can listen to them all every now and again and enjoy them. Not this one. I will continue to plough through it for the sake of this review even though you will have got where I'm coming from by now. 

Scandinavian Skies is Joel’s Revolution 9 (comparatively - considering his previous material). It is a pretentious, discordant mishmash of God knows what. Bizarre lyrics based loosely around a tour to Sweden. Lennon impersonations, Walrus orchestration, funny background noises, classical stylings. My oh my, it is truly awful. Unlistenable (at times). I realise, of course, that this is just my personal opinion. Some people love this and feel it is one of his most adventurous, ground-breaking compositions. Probably the best thing to do is download it and see what you think. Many would completely disagree with me. Funnily enough, I find sometimes it strangely compelling and find myself listening to it every now and again. Maybe that is its strength. Therein is the quandary within this album. Oh, and it had a strange, book-like cover too, as you can see above.

Sorry, back to the songs - even some pleasant saxophone cannot save the moribund Where's The Orchestra. Sorry, this album just doesn't do it for me. Some see it as Joel's Sgt Pepper. Joel himself says it is the best thing he ever did. Who am I to argue? Give it a chance, I guess. Every couple of years I do. I refuse to completely write it off. Maybe someday the penny will drop. Oh, and the remastered sound is truly fantastic. It is big, full and punchy and Pressure, in particular, sounds really impressive.


Popular posts from this blog

Faces: Faces At The BBC (Live)

Image
Until this release, there had been a distinct paucity of Faces live material, which something of a surprise as they were known for being an energetic, always exciting live outfit, if not a little shambolic. They were a bit like Mott The Hoople in that respect - hard drinkers, saucy fun lovers, solid, prolific giggers - and you got what you got. Thankfully, they always gave of their best, warts 'n' all.  Anyway, all that existed from The Faces live in concert before this release was the long out-of-print Overture And Beginners album, which was roundly acknowledged to be of particularly poor quality (even by the band themselves), and a few extra live cuts included on the remastered re-releases of their studio albums. This release therefore comes as an unexpected and most welcome treat. This collection of live material played on various BBC Radio shows in the early seventies. As with all BBC live cuts, the sound quality is definitely variable. Some of it is bloody awful, but most
View Full Post »

Dr. Feelgood: Down By The Jetty - 1975

Image
  It is amazing to think that this seminal breakneck r'n'b (in its essential rock sense) album was released at the beginning of 1975 when glam rock had only just fizzled out and prog rock was all around. Punk had not even been conceived of, or indeed any backlash against established rock genres.  Pub rock had been around in the form of Brinsley Schwarz and Graham Parker was beginning to get himself heard, as would be the soon to be formed Eddie & The Hot Rods, but it was Dr. Feelgood who really seemed to take off with the public.  As a Mott The Hoople/Bowie/Roxy Music loving teenager, I remember being initially sceptical when these disturbingly (and comparatively) short-haired, down-dressed oiks from Canvey Island, Essex came on the scene with their mid-sixties r'n'b, fast paced, short, sharp shock music. For a short while, I didn't buy into it. Then, all of a sudden, I did. The energy, excitement and back to basics attitude suddenly clicked in my brain and prov
View Full Post »

Eric Clapton & Friends: The Breeze - An Appreciation Of J. J. Cale - 2014

Image
From the early seventies, beginning with his hit cover of After Midnight, Eric Clapton was hugely influenced by Oklahoma blueser and Americana trailblazer J. J. Cale. Indeed, there were times when Eric sounded more like J. J. than J. J. himself, if you get my drift. Cale's laid-back, sleepy sound acted as a virtual blueprint for Clapton's entire solo career. Tracks that sounded like Cale turned up without fail on pretty much every Clapton album. Eventually, the pair of them teamed up on the excellent Road To Escondido album too. Here, after Cale's passing, Clapton decided to pay tribute to him with this album of covers of the man's work. As he liked to do, he gathered several buddies to help him out - Tom Petty, Mark Knopfler, John Mayer, Willie Nelson, Derek Trucks - all artists steeped in the Americana tradition. The result is an unsurprisingly effortless and highly listenable workout of an album that positively drips with quality . These guys know their onions and pr
View Full Post »

U2: Songs Of Innocence - 2014

Image
"We got some of  the songs halfway up the hill, three-quarters of the way up the hill. A lot of times, we just couldn't get them up to the top of the hill" - Bono Coming five years after their previous album ,  No Line On The Horizon , this album seriously ran the risk of being just "another U2 album". You almost got the impression that they felt they had to put something out to keep up their "best band in the world" reputation, but had sort of lost their mojo in creating it.  This album had a slight sense of trying too hard to come up something about it, but its is not without its good points, however.  The Miracle (Of Joey Ramone)  is a big, muscular industrial chugger and nothing like The Ramones, of whom it is supposed to be a tribute to. It is quite dense with a few crashing guitar parts, but it is certainly no breakneck punker.  Every Breaking Wave  is an insistent, bassily beautiful slow burner, with a fine, tender, clear vocal from Bono. They a
View Full Post »

The Who: Who Are You - 1978

Image
This was  The Who' s last album with  Keith Moon , before his unfortunate death three weeks after the album's release.  By mid-1978, The Who were struggling to remain contemporaneously relevant in the midst of punk, new wave and disco.  This album does nothing to change that, being an amalgam of synth riffs and prog rock stylings in places with  Roger Daltrey' s dramatic, operatic but from the streets voice starting to sound out of time among the snarl of punk and cynical sneer of new wave.  Their previous three albums,  Who's Next ,  Quadrophenia  and (lesserly)  The Who By Numbers  had been excellent, hard-hitting rock albums. Unfortunately, despite the individuals within the band's obvious musical proficiency, this is neither a great nor relevant album. It is still The Who, however, and there are good points to it, which I will highlight, but put in a cultural context, it was sadly a little irrelevant.  New Song  bursts into action with a synth riff like the sort
View Full Post »

Eric Clapton & J. J. Cale: The Road To Escondido - 2006

Image
In 2006, Eric Clapton finally cut an album with one of his long-time muses, the comparatively unsuccessful and lesser-known J. J. Cale. Now, given that Clapton had released several Cale covers (notably After Midnight and Cocaine) and that he spent most of his post-1970 career sounding like Cale, it is not surprising to find that this is an album very much in that laid-back effortless, sleepy blues mode. Clapton had this to say about the album -  “This was the realisation of what may have been my last ambition — to work with the man who’s music has inspired me for as long as I can remember, there are not enough words for me to describe what he represents to me, musically and personally, and anyway I wouldn’t want to embarrass him by going overboard,  for he is a truly humble man. I think it’s enough to say that we had fun, made a great record, and I for one already want to make another." Eric teamed up with Albert Lee, Derek Trucks, John Mayer and Billy Preston (in one of his last
View Full Post »

Van Morrison: Live At The Grand Opera House Belfast - 1984

Image
Many reviews I have read of this Van Morrison live album share the same opinions - firstly, that Van's performance is slurred and perfunctory, secondly, the sound is muffled and poor quality and thirdly, that the song selection is underwhelming. I disagree heartily with all of that.  Van is returning to Ireland after many years in the USA and is playing his hometown. Sure, he is uncommunicative, but isn't he always? He, as usual, lets the music speak for him. The musicianship is top notch, mining a Celtic soul seam with strident female backing singers to the fore. Personally, I have never had a problem with the sound - it is warm, bassy and subtle, particularly on the remastered version. Nothing wrong with it. Play it through and good system and it sounds great. The song choices reflect the period of the concert - a lot from the excellent Beautiful Vision album (six tracks, in fact) and a couple from Inarticulate Speech Of The Heart too, including the excellent Rave On John Don
View Full Post »

Eric Clapton: Eric Clapton - 1970

Image
Some  four years before one of his most successful solo albums, Eric Clapton released his debut. He had been on tour with folky bluesers Delaney & Bonnie and he used much of the same band to accompany him. The result was a pleasing offering with hints of blues, rock 'n' roll, gospel, country rock and a bit of pop sensibility. It is also quite brassy and, as I said, gospelly in many places, which I love. The best-known tracks are ones that would come to exemplify Clapton's seventies sound in the embryonic AOR of  Let It Rain,  with its great bassline, and J.J. Cale's lively rock-funk of  After Midnight .  After opening with a saxophone-driven jam in Slunky, other impressive Delaney Bramlett collaborations are the chunky brassy groove of  Bad Boy , the upbeat gospel of Lonesome And A Long Way From Home, the kick-ass bassy rock of  Bottle Of Red Wine (check out that solo)  and  Lovin' You, Lovin' Me .  Clapton also joins forces with Leon Russell on the excellen
View Full Post »

Trojan Presents: The Spirit Of '69

Image
These three compilations releases from Trojan Records cover the 1968-1970 period of "skinhead"/"boss" reggae typified by its stomping beat and fairground organ backing, enhanced often by a punchy brass sound. The music, incongruously, became the music of choice of the white, working class British skinhead sub-culture. The skinheads liked the music of the black teenagers in their area, despite not liking the kids themselves, something that was always very odd. The stomping nature of the music also was ideally suited to the big, clumping Doc Martens boots of the skinheads. Basically, the tempo never slows on this material, offering a steady "skank" rhythm to dance that jerky dance that Madness appropriated in the late seventies/early eighties. It is fast, uptempo reggae that ensures you can't keep still and it invariably lifts your spirits by its sheer vibrancy. As with all the reggae recorded during this era, the sound quality can be questionable on
View Full Post »

Mud: A's, B's & Rarities

Image
There are some excellent compilations in this RAK series -  CCS ,  Suzi Quatro  and  Hot Chocolate . The sound quality is excellent on all of them and they are a chronological document of singles, 'b' sides and a few rarities near the end.  Of all of them, this is probably the least credible, mainly because of the quality of the 'b' sides.  Mud 's self-penned efforts cannot hold a candle to those of CCS, Hot Chocolate or even Suzi Quatro. In fact, they are pretty awful, I have to say. Glam rock groups were notorious for self-penned, poor quality 'b' sides. Sweet were another offender.   That said, Mud's singles from the  Nicky Chinn-Mike Chapman  songwriting team were excellent, from the slightly strange, Kinks-influenced early hit singles -  Moonshine Sally ,  Crazy   and the excellent, little-mentioned  Hypnosis , which saw the group dressed up in dandyish 1920s gear before their classic glam rock period, when they adopted the teddy boy look and the bi
View Full Post »