• AllMyVinyl #38
• Band: Billy Joel
• Album Title: The Bridge
• Release Date: 25 Jul 1986
• Date purchased: 25 Dec 2023
• Location purchased: Gift
• Color of vinyl: picture disc
• Number of discs: 1
• Links: [ Wikipedia | Discogs | Band Website | Complete album on Youtube ]

In 85 Billy Joel put out a Greatest Hits package which was groundbreaking as it was one of the first to include new tracks with it.  It was also a stupidly high level best seller, a thing that continues to this day.  It was kind of a break for him, as he had been going full on from the early 70’s till then – album/tour, album/tour.  The GH package was a rest a little for him, and then in 1986 he came out with his next album, this one – “The Bridge”.

I was 20 at the time, and in the prime of concert going in the mid 80’s, so of course I bought this album the day it came out.  Not on vinyl, as I was fully over to cassettes at this point, and my move to CD’s happened the next year.  Bought this on cassette back in the day, and never owned it on vinyl until I got it as part of the “Billy Joel Vinyl Collection Vol 2” from my family for Christmas 2023.  That’s what I’m playing today.  That box was just a “shell” of sorts for reproductions of all his studio albums, so this is just that album on a single disc black vinyl, no special anything, which is fine – as I’m usually about the tunes first anyway.

The album starts with the song “Running on Ice”, which has something I never picked up on until very recently.  I watched a video talking to Liberty DeVitto about his drumming style and what he does.  It’s a great video, you should check it out if you like his drumming.  Anyway, I never noticed the drum fills Liberty does here.  There’s more drum feel here.  Especially after watching that video I mentioned above, I can see him doing these things in the studio.  It was a nice enhancement for me listening to this song.  Great opener to the album.

The second song goes right into “let’s take the mood down a bit”.  This track is “This is the Time”.  This is a song that I recall having not a ton of effect or emotional draw.  Now that’s not to say I never liked the song.  I did.  However, some years later the meaning of this song was completely changed for me.  That’s because my brothers and sisters back home did something.  My stepfather was turning 60 and they put together this video of memories of childhood with him.  The video had this song playing through most of it, so all intended meaning by Joel went out the window, cuz it reminds me of my late stepfather.  I can’t not hear this song without thinking of family falling off ladders, or going on about needing to mow the lawn, or visiting Marcus Hook, NJ.  Bit personal, but this is my thoughts. :)

A Matter of Trust – The big (lead) single from the album.  It’s a good song, but it’s just “there” to me, I don’t have a lot deep to say about it. There was a music video for it which at the time I was reminded of when Santana came out with the video for Smooth a few years later – they both involve a street party in what looks like a New York neighborhood.

Modern Woman has a different sound – he uses synths for musical accent.  It was 1986, and they were the rage, so he experimented with them a bit here too.  I quite like the use, but it does make for a distinctive sound to the song.  Not much else from Joel sounds like this.

Baby Grand – now we get to something that sounds like earlier Joel – in the pre Stranger era.  This is a sound which reminds me of that era, but with more modern production values.  But the big joy here is the duet with Ray Charles.  It’s a highlight of Joel’s entire career in my opinion.  Their voices work together very well.  I always wished I could see this live with Joel & Charles.  I *DID* see it live, but Joel sang the entire song. Which was still good, but not as great without Charles singing with him.

Big Man on Mulberry Street – I love this song, but Billy’s voice is in a much higher register than it usually is. That’s a different sound. Most of the time I never paid it much attention, but today – on the day I’m doing this album for the project it sounds higher than I usually enjoy.  This has a horn section that doesn’t usually appear on Joel songs.  That’s a nice change.  In some regards, I thought this was a spiritual successor to “Scenes from an Italian Restaurant”, despite not being a true sequel to that.

Temptation – A song I don’t listen to a ton, definitely an album track. Other than playing the album in full, I can’t tell you the last time I listened to this solo.  Not bad, just kind of “there” for me.

Code of Silence – This one has a different vibe than most of the album. I think that’s because it’s unique in the Joel catalog. It’s the only song he’s ever had a co write credit for Lyrics – this one was co written with Cyndi Lauper – who also sings on the track. Nice harmonica sound running through this one.

Getting Closer – lyrically it sounds like he’s writing about the business side of what he goes through. Oddly, I didn’t pick up on that until later. Given what he was about to go through in his real life with managers and people stealing his money, it’s kind of prophetic as I don’t think the big problems had broken yet. Does have Steve Winwood on organ, which is another guest appearance that doesn’t usually happen.

Overall, it’s another good Joel album.  Perhaps not his most solid album front to back, but there’s nothing that I want to skip when I listen to it, even tracks I don’t listen to a lot (Temptation, Code of Silence).

I did see the tour – 13 Oct 1986 in Philadelphia’s now demolished “Spectrum” arena.  It was the first tour I saw “in the round”.  His stage was a circle.  Given it was 1986, I don’t recall it spinning – concerts like that now would rotate the stage so they can be seen by everyone, but my memory of it says that he would run around to different pianos on the stage.  It was also the last time I saw Joel’s primary band all together, as the album after this is where they started to break apart.  I never saw Billy Joel live again until 2019, long after I had moved to Texas.  I also saw a good percentage of Joel’s band from this year in 2022 – they played together in a band called “The Lords of 52nd Street” where I got to meet Liberty DeVito and Russell Javors afterwards – a very pleasant memory.

There’s no Billy Joel album I can say I don’t like, so it was fun to revisit this one today which I remember well from the 80’s when it was new.