• AllMyVinyl #40
• Band: Billy Joel
• Album Title: Streetlife Serenade
• Release Date: 11 Oct 1974
• Date purchased: 25 Dec 2021
• Location purchased: Gift
• Color of vinyl: black
• Number of discs: 1
• Links: [ Wikipedia | Discogs | Band Website | Complete album on Youtube ]

I’m writing this on 11 Oct 2024, exactly 50 years from the day it was released originally – 11 Oct 1974.  This is out of order for my alphabetical project, but when I saw this turned 50 today, I bumped it up a bit, as it’ll be awhile till I get to “S” – I wanted to write about it on the anniversary date.

This was the third overall Billy Joel album (although at the time most thought it was the second).  It’s an odd beast for me.  It’s probably the album that people know the least of his.  It’s not bad – Joel has no bad albums.  But even the bigger “hits” from this one are tracks that non Joel fans probably don’t know very well – if at all.  For me, the album isn’t as strong as my memory had it filed as.  I always liked the album when I listened in the past, but I think it boils down to the two biggest tracks on here I like (Root Beer Rag & The Entertainer).  Joel was the first “rock star” I ever really paid attention to as Philadelphia radio in the early mid 70’s played Joel **A LOT**.  Back then radio had some real merit and DJ’s would play the album tracks, so I knew the material.  I never owned it on vinyl back in the day – that didn’t happen until recent times.  I would have bought it on cassette tape somewhere along the line, but I don’t recall that, nor do I still have my copy of it.  What I do have is a 2021 vinyl print.  I was gifted both Billy Joel vinyl box sets as presents by various family members.  This album comes from the first one, and I got it on Christmas 2021.  The box contained reprints on black vinyl of his first several albums, a booklet, and a live album.  Since this came out the individual albums have been released individually, so the “buy these tunes” link on this page goes to the individual album.

A quick remark about the album cover.  I never put much thought into it – I always just assumed it was a street that he knew that had someone do a painting for.  In reality that’s not too far off.  I looked around while writing this page, and found an article on a website called “PopSpots” where they track down the history of things.  The article I read was about the cover art for this album.  It’s got some supreme detail as to finding the actual building the painting was based off of, a dive bar that’s on the ground floor of the building now, and the fact that the TV show Dexter filmed there – all with visual proof.  It’s not relevant to the music as such, but it’s a great read.  Go check it out – guy does some great research on the cover art to this album.

The music?  As I said earlier, it’s not what I remembered.  Not bad at all, but not his most memorable batch of songs.  Even Joel himself said this about the album…  “”Interesting musical ideas, but nothing to say lyrically.”   Here’s a few remarks on the songs.  Some more than others.  :)

Streetlife Serenader – A slower song, one I thought was always an odd choice to open the album with. Now Billy Joel, and especially Joel of this era wasn’t a fast, in your face kind of musical choice, but even by those standards, it’s a slower track. Not my favorite song, but not bad, either.

Los Angelenos – Liked the vibe of this song, has a simple rhythm section that runs through it that works for me. Also, I first heard this when I was super young, so the line of lyric that says “Making love to the natives..” and “getting exotic massages” got my attention. :) The underlying rhythm section I mentioned is my big draw. There’s some decent guitar work in the solo about 3/4 of the way through – but given I know it’s all session musicians, I’m not as a drawn to individual solos in this era of his music. I did listen to the album twice today, and on the second listen I found myself jamming to the chorus of the song that I didn’t do the first time.

The Great Surburban Showdown – This is a very slow song, kind of reminds me of something like Captain Jack from Piano Man, but not as good as that one. In fact, it’s probably the most forgettable song on the album.

Root Beer Rag – An instrumental which shows off Billy’s piano prowess. It’s always been my favorite song on the album. I never saw him do it live, but there was a video clip of him playing it in 2007 when he was in New Orleans. As much as Joel has played his own stuff live, I loved watching him actually having to focus on playing the piano, since it seems he didn’t play it much. I have an old friend of mine who used to play the keyboards in my church’s band, and she and I would talk about Joel all the time. Jessica, if you see this, I’m still waiting for that clip of you playing Root Beer Rag!

Roberta – A pretty straightforward song written about well, “Roberta”. It’s the kind of song we’ve seen a bunch of in his catalog – reminds me a bit of an earlier version of something along the lines of “Just The Way You Are”, although a little more “rock” than that one was. Has a nice chorus of operatic voices which isn’t usually done in a Joel song.

The Entertainer – Probably the most well known song off this album. Tells the story of a music star (himself?) and the tribulations of living that life, particularly the business side of it. It’s a great song, I love the lyric “.. so they cut it down to 3:05”. The song is actually 3:41, so it wasn’t cut down to 3:05. Ha. :)

Last of the Big Time Spenders – When I came time to write this article, my notes for this song were blank.  I could probably try and force something in here to say something, but maybe I’ll go with that instead as my commentary.

Weekend Song – Starts off with a guitar riff, something unusual in this era of Joel’s music – it’s also a bit faster than the usual track. I like this track, but can’t really elaborate too much. Guitar riff at the start hooked me in, and like a lot of songs it works for me, but I can’t put it into words why very well.

Souvenir – A ballad that I saw Joel brought back into the live set list the last few years. Love Joel’s vocal delivery on this track. It’s almost just him and the piano. A more quiet song because of that, but it’s the kind of track Joel was always good at writing.

The Mexican Connection – An instrumental to close out the album. Not quite sure how to describe it. It doesn’t particularly sounds like “Mexican” music to me. Something in his mind when he wrote it – a person he knew? Not sure there, but a nice piece of music to close the album out.

As I said, this one is one my memory remembers it differently than the reality of listening to it today was.  There was nothing at all I actively disliked, and nothing I wanted to skip.  But it has more “eh” songs on it than you usually get on a Joel album.  In reading about it, Joel said he felt pressured to followup Piano Man which came out the year before.  He said he had no songs (which is why there’s two instrumentals on here).  His first album came out and had to be recalled (will talk more about that later when I get to it), but at this point he was “song-ed” out, and managed to push this album out the door.  His next one is more cohesive and I think that stems from the fact that he stopped using session musicians.  For his first three albums it’s all session guys, he put together a standard band after this album and tour.  That helped in the albums that follow, I think.

Anyway, I’ve embedded my two favorite songs below.  They’re definitely worth checking out – both quite good.