Piano Man by Billy Joel

All iconic artists have a signature song.  Elton John has “Your Song,” Springsteen has “Born To Run,” and Billy Joel has “Piano Man.”

One of the things that many American, and some artists whoa re not American have done with a their music is to define the American experience. Billy Joel does this in a similar way that Springsteen does with working-class characters and deep nostalgia from times that came before while also acknowledging the flaws of the past, like Joel sings in “Keeping The Faith,” “the good old days weren’t always good and tomorrow ain’t as bad as it seems.”



Joel’s music has always had a harsher edge and a more cynical almost punk rock aesthetic. “It’s Still Rock And Roll To Me,” sounds bitter and “She’s Always A Woman,” has a strange almost sarcastic feeling to it (which I wrote about in this earlier post).

It shouldn’t come as a surprise that Joel’s signature song has a similar feel. “Piano Man,” is a song about dreams unfulfilled. It’s about people dealing with regret and trying to escape their the reality of their lives. When described this way, “Piano Man,” seems like a bleak and joyless song, but when you listen to it, you realize that it is something very different.

I’ve never been to a bar that had a piano man like Joel playing at it, but he paints such a vivid picture of the bar that you feel like you are part of that world. There’s depth in all of the descriptions of his characters that help you imagine deeper stories like in a good fantasy story.

The whole song swirls and rallies around the song itself. The chorus is the chorus of the people in the song and as we sing along to this song we become one more person sitting in that bar, with all of our own worries and fears, simply wanting to be lost in a song.

In many ways this is what Joel has done his entire career.  When I watched him perform in Wrigley Field last summer, I could feel how much he wanted his music to be a participatory event and how much that he wanted to take the audience away.

Joel is much more of a realist and his bitterness and anger reflects the “angry young man” in all of us in ways that pop music from previous generations did not. He worked through the pessimism of the 1970s and the cynicism of the 1980s with a song in his heart.

We demand the piano man to sing for us, because we need him to forget about life a while. He put into song the desire we all have for escape and provides that escape at the same time. “Piano Man” is the definition of great pop song. It’s specific enough to relate to our own lives but ambiguous enough to appeal to mass audiences. It melds styles of music together in subtle and unexpected ways and as good as it feels to listen to, it reaches a higher level of meaning when you let go and sing along.

Hey Jude by The Beatles

Imagine you are going to visit a 5 year old whoes parents are getting a divorce. Now imagine that the child’s father is one of the most famous people in the world that has been absent for most of this child’s life and cheated on his wife.

This is what Paul McCartney faced in as he went to visit Julian Lennon, John Lennon’s son with his first wife Cynthia. In 1968, John met Yoko Ono and had an affair with her that resulted in a divorce leaving young Julian at the center of it all. Paul sat down to write down his thoughts to Julian and what these comforting words became was one of Beatles most enduring classics “Hey Jude.”



This song shattered pop music’s song forms as one of the longest songs ever to be a number 1 hit but what makes this song uniquely meaningful is what this song is at its heart: a song of comfort and reassurance.

Amidst love songs, protest music and psychedelic rock, Paul is singing to comfort us all balancing an ambiguous subject with emotional clarity, the Beatles created a universal song of comfort and reassurance that has stood the test of time.

The song begins giving advice about how to approach a girl.

Hey Jude, don’t be afraid,
You were made to go out and get her.
The minute you her under your skin,
Then you begin to make it better.

In the refrains where Paul digs deeper the situation with Julian helping him understand that the divorce is not his fault, “don’t carry the world your shoulder.” Then there is the most touching line in the song in the last refrain when Paul reassures Julian that he is worth something and that all he needs is within himself.

So let it out and let it in, hey Jude, begin,
You’re waiting for is one to perform with.
And don’t you know that it’s just you, hey Jude, you’ll do,
The movement you need is on your shoulder.

Paul wraps up all of these thoughts and feelings in an extended ending sections, a sing-a-long of sorts with a chorus of na’s repeated for the last half of this seven minute song. What is going on here? It’s repetitive, lyrically non-sense and up until this point in pop music was something that was never heard before.  Even though this sections seems illogical something about it works.

The ending of “Hey Jude” provides space to reflect on the song. It frames all of the emotions and give focuses us on one of the main points of the song, making one’s life better.  It is not the words that we speak that we comfort each other in times of need.  The words are merely an expression of being there with someone in a time of need that makes them meaningful.

Hearing a chorus of people singing inviting us as an audience to sing along creates the ultimate feeling of comfort as a chorus of voice beyond is saying that things will be okay. It is not just one person’s belief that things will improve, it’s our shared humanity, our shared hope that this ending expresses which is what gets us through the darkest moments in our lives.

Follow Through by Gavin DeGraw

One of the most magical moments is hearing a song for the first time. It is an experience that can never be replicated but every once in a while that feeling of discovery is captured in a song and we can come close to reliving that moment.

I was looking for one of my favorite Genesis songs “Follow You, Follow Me” on iTunes library and accidentally selected “Follow Through.” I was immediately transported to the sitting in my dorm room and hearing this song for the first time years ago in college.



“Follow Through” opens with a beautiful description of discovering a new love. With conversational lyrics reminiscent of Elton John and soulful singing reminding us of a young Billy Joel, “Follow Through,” takes these two influences into a gently unfolding celebration of love combined with a life-assuring plea to follow through.

The idea of asking for commitment this early in a relationship may seems a little extreme, “our love have just begun to blossom and everything is great, by the way I need you to commit to me.” However, the way that he asks her to for her heart is heartwarming and expresses a sense of vulnerability.

It’s almost as if our protagonist has had his heart broken before, “build through this destruction” and he is just coming out of his shell with the courage to love again. As he asks for commitment he expresses a simple but heartwarming sentiment, “all I really want is you, you to stick around.”

What makes this song so effective is that DeGraw is capturing a specific moment in a relationship. It’s this small window of time right at the beginning when all you see is possibilities. The realities of life have yet to set in and there is magic in the future. It’s not real life-long love, maybe it’s more infatuation, but that doesn’t mean that this emotions, this feeling are any less meaningful or unforgettable.

This moment is fleeting and for those of us who are lucky enough, this moment of discovery develops into a deeper feeling a love. While I wouldn’t trade the way I feel about Diana, my wife, after being with her for 8 years for anything sometimes it’s nice to be reminded of that time at the beginning of our relationships. It was a time all I thought about was her, all I talked about was her and all I wanted to do in my life was spend time with her.

On second thought, maybe I'm stuck in that moment.  I still think about my wife all the time, I talk about her constantly and all I really want is for Diana to stick around so that I can see her every day.

The Luckiest by Ben Folds Five

Last Monday, Diana and I celebrated our second wedding anniversary. As we've been entering our third year in marriage I can’t help but feel lucky that I have found Diana and have her in my life.



“The Luckiest” by Ben Folds Five is about this wonder of luck. Though this song initially songs like adult contemporary schmaltz, the profoundly intimate, revealing and honest lyrics elevate this song to a much higher level.

This song doesn’t feature great poetry or literary devices. Instead the words are stilted and stammering. However. this is exactly the reasons this song is so powerful. There is nothing harder than describing one’s feelings and the meandering thoughts perfectly reflect how we actually feel about love.

This song isn't about idealized love as Ben Folds sings in the first verse about not knowing where he was the day before he met his love.  All he know is that I get to see her every day and I feel lucky for that.  Ben Folds goes on to wonder if he was born at a different time and saw his love as a child, it’s an interesting thought. Would he make the same connection? It’s a question without an answer as he realizes that knowing one pair of eyes is what’s truly important.

The final verse is about a wife passing away a couple days after her husband. Folds acknowledges that this may be a strange way to express his love but he knows how that wife feels because he feels that way to and so do I.

What does it really mean to be lucky?

"Luck" is something that happens out of chance. More than that being “lucky” means that you did nothing to influences the outcome and because of this you did nothing to deserve this "gift."

Why do I get to find someone like Diana when there are so many lonely people out there who have work much harder than I to find that special someone? There’s no logic in that.

All I can do is make this “luck,” this “gift” mean something. I may not have done anything before meeting Diana to deserve her as a partner in my life but I’m going to take care of her and be the best man I can be for her.  This way when I die and I can tell whatever force put Diana in my life about the amazing life we shared together and he will be proud to have given me this gift.

 "I know that I am the luckiest."

Prelude/Angry Young Man by Billy Joel

Wrigley field suddenly went dark.

Elton John had just closed his part of the concert with an exhilarating performance of “Crocodile Rock” and the enormous stage providing the only light in the field went black. The sun had set on this warm Chicago evening and a sold-out stadium eagerly awaited Billy Joel to start his set.

As soon as I leaned back in my chair to reflect on Elton’s set, a flurry of notes filled the auditorium. On the first cymbal hit, white lights flooded the stadium. Billy Joel’s hands appeared on the huge screens on both sides of the stage like a blur as Joel attacked the keys with manic fury.

The band entered as the flurry of notes moved into angry syncopated hits followed by a more reflective and peaceful arpeggios (0:30). The rest of the band joined in to create a peaceful groove. Then the flurry of notes suddenly returned with an unrelenting intensity and instead of building into the peaceful arpeggios, the next section was a Joel pounding octaves on the piano setting up a rhythmic tension against the bass line (1:35). With the end of the “Prelude,” it was time for Joel to tells us about the “Angry Young Man.”

Billy Joel’s 1976 album Turnstiles marked his return to New York after living in Los Angeles. This album featured songs like “Say Goodbye to Hollywood” and “New York State of Mind” that reflected this move.



Even though these songs and others like “I’ve Loved These Days” had a heartfelt feeling of nostalgia, Joel’s sarcastic, disillusioned and bitter attitude shown through in “Miami 2017 (Seen the Lights God Out on Broadway” an story of a post-apocalyptic New York and in “Prelude/Angry Young Man.”



Billy Joel never released “Prelude/Angry Young Man” as a single but it has become a fan favorite during Joel’s live performance. After seeing him perform it live last night, I understand why.

Joel performed “Angry Young Man” not so much singing them but ranting. The words move pass so quickly in the verses in the and it’s not until the bridge do you get a real sense of what he’s talking about.

I believe I've passed the age of consciousness and righteous rage
I found that just surviving was a noble fight.
I once believed in causes too,
I had my pointless point of view,
And life went on no matter who was wrong or right.

When Joel got to the words “pointless point of view” and I could here the crowd sing along with this specific line more than other part of the bridge with a feeling of glory. Intellectually this seemed odd, but emotional it felt amazing.

I get frustrated with some thing sometimes and I often have rants. For example, I hate it when news stations don’t report facts? Like seriously, they haven’t done a paternity or DNA test to show that Michael Jackson’s kids aren’t related to him biologically, then stop reporting that people are speculating this. That’s not news and for the love of God stop analyzing hypothetical situations like the implications if they aren’t his kids. You might as well analyze the every other “what if” scenario, like “I heard from someone that Michael Jackson once bought woman’s underwear, what if Michael Jackson is actually a girl?”

As much as things like this aggravate me, it’s a great feeling when you give someone a rant and they know what you mean. Sharing emotion, any kind of emotion is a human connection that enriches our humanity. In his own way, Billy Joel brought together the frustration that we all share and made us feel for a moment of time that it was not so bad.