The Stranger [Remaster] (CD - 1977)

Personnel: Billy Joel (vocals, harmonica, piano, organ, keyboards); Hiram Bullock, Steve Burgh, Steve Khan, Hugh McCracken, David Brown (guitar); Richie Cannatta (fiddle, flute, soprano & tenor saxophones, organ, keyboards); Phil Woods (alto saxophone); Richard Tee (organ); Doug Stegmeyer (bass); Liberty DeVito (drums, percussion); Ralph MacDonald (percussion); Phoebe Snow, Lani Groves, Patti Austin (background vocals).

Recorded at A&R Recording, New York, New York.

This is an Enhanced CD, which contains both regular audio tracks and multimedia computer files.

Composer: Billy Joel.

Personnel: Billy Joel (vocals, harmonica, piano, keyboards, synthesizer); Gwen Guthrie, Lani Groves, Patti Austin, Phoebe Snow (vocals, background vocals); Steve Khan (guitar, acoustic guitar, electric guitar, 12-string guitar); Steve Burgh (guitar, acoustic guitar, electric guitar); Hugh McCracken (guitar, acoustic guitar); Hiram Bullock (guitar, electric guitar); Dave Brown (guitar); Hugh MacDonald (acoustic guitar); Richie Cannata (fiddle, flute, clarinet, saxophone, soprano saxophone, tenor saxophone, organ, keyboards, wind); Dominic Cortese (accordion); Phil Woods (saxophone, alto saxophone); Richard Tee (organ); Liberty DeVitto (drums, percussion); Ralph MacDonald (percussion).

Audio Remasterer: Ted Jensen.

Recording information: A&R Studios, New York, NY.

Photographer: Jim Houghton.

Billy Joel teamed with Phil Ramone, a famed engineer who had just scored his first producing hits with Art Garfunkel's Breakaway and Paul Simon's Still Crazy After All These Years for The Stranger, his follow-up to Turnstiles. Joel still favored big, sweeping melodies, but Ramone convinced him to streamline his arrangements and clean up the production. The results aren't necessarily revelatory, since he covered so much ground on Turnstiles, but the commercialism of The Stranger is a bit of a surprise. None of his ballads have been as sweet or slick as "Just the Way You Are"; he never had created a rocker as bouncy or infectious as "Only the Good Die Young"; and the glossy production of "She's Always a Woman" disguises its latent misogynist streak. Joel balanced such radio-ready material with a series of New York vignettes, seemingly inspired by Springsteen's working-class fables and clearly intended to be the artistic centerpieces of the album. They do provide The Stranger with the feel of a concept album, yet there is no true thematic connection between the pieces, and his lyrics are often vague or mean-spirited. His lyrical shortcomings are overshadowed by his musical strengths. Even if his melodies sound more Broadway than Beatles -- the epic suite "Scenes From an Italian Restaurant" feels like a show-stopping closer -- there's no denying that the melodies of each song on The Stranger are memorable, so much so that they strengthen the weaker portions of the album. Joel rarely wrote a set of songs better than those on The Stranger, nor did he often deliver an album as consistently listenable. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine

He's known to many as an inoffensive pop balladeer, but at the arguable peak of his career in the late '70s, Billy Joel released his darkest, most emotionally charged album. THE STRANGER abandons the grandstanding and broad melodic sweep of Joel's earlier records for a more intimate, introspective sound, effectively communicating Joel's ruminations on the perils of life and love. "Movin' Out" is something of an existentialist anthem, chronicling the way people's dreams are often irreparably crushed. The ominous-sounding title tune examines the many guises with which lovers disguise themselves in their attempts to entrap and deceive each other. "Only the Good Die Young" is hedonism at it's most iconoclastic. Even "She's Always a Woman," ostensibly a romantic piano ballad, is full of thorny, less-than-complimentary observations about its subject. Joel's emotional honesty would never be this clear-eyed and unabashed again. minimize