This Day in Rock ‘n’ Roll History (NY-Inspired Billy Joel Scores With ‘Turnstiles’)

May 19, 1976—Though Billy Joel did not achieve the chart-topping LP that executives desired on his fourth studio album, he staked out the sound that paved the way for later success—and created what many feel was a high-water mark in his career as a singer-songwriter—with Turnstiles.

A week or so ago, The New York Times created a hornet’s nest with a list of the 30 greatest living songwriters that some (like critic Ted Gioia) derided as methodologically suspect. Predictably, even more readers complained that their choices didn’t make the roundup, with Joel among the most glaring omissions. 

(See this podcast with the Times critics debating this egregious exclusion and others, in a manner that YouTube respondents variously assailed as “smug,” “insufferable,” “oblivious,” and “unbelievable.”)

I know that the Piano Man’s output has, for some reason, not always won critical acclaim. You can count me among his longtime fans. It’s not just that his concerts have been electrifying, but his recordings display to the utmost his skills as a lyricist and musician. Turnstiles is a prime example.

This album also represented his attempt to wrest creative control of his material in the most decisive fashion. His label, Columbia Records, suggested that he work with James William Guercio. This producer, manager, and songwriter, through such acts as Chicago, Blood, Sweat and Tears and the Buckinghams, was at the time an influential proponent of jazz rock—or, as I noted in this prior blog post, “brass rock,” characterized by a driving horn section.

At the Caribou Ranch recording studio in Colorado, Guercio was exerting tighter control over his productions. In Joel’s case, the producer pushed for studio musicians, including from Elton John’s backup band.

After listening to these sessions, Joel decided that, though this studio hires might have benefited the English superstar, it wasn’t what he wanted. He called the sessions off, and pressed his case with Columbia for a backup group of his own to work on his next album.

To make doubly sure that he got what he wanted, Joel took over the producer’s chores as well. That turned out to be a mixed blessing. He may have come closer to the sound he wanted, but, as he recalled in a 2009 Billboard interview, “I’m not a producer. I’m a good partnering producer when I work with somebody like Phil Ramone or Mick Jones; I have a lot of ideas. But I don’t know technically always what I should be going for.”

The real benefit came from the comfort level he felt from working with what became the “Billy Joel Band”: bassist Doug Stegmeyer, drummer Liberty DeVitto, guitarists Russell Javors and Howie Emerson, and saxophonist Richie Cannata. It was like what another up-and-coming Columbia artist, Bruce Springsteen, had wanted and gotten, with the now-legendary E Street Band.

Because he permanently parted ways with those backup musicians a couple of decades later, Joel didn’t achieve the longevity and camaraderie that The Boss gained with his “Band of Brothers.” But for the time they played together, there was a drive and cohesion to his sound.

Equally important for Joel, after three years of feeling lost in Los Angeles, the longtime Long Island resident moved back east. The title of this new collection, Turnstiles, was a celebration of that decision.

(Incidentally, the cover of the album was shot in an actual abandoned subway station. The assorted non-Joel figures in the photograph were meant to suggest people associated with different songs, so the teenaged girl with the headphones, for instance, represents “All You Wanna Do Is Dance.”)

Joel’s move back home also was something of an act of defiance against anti-New York sentiment in the nation. The singer-songwriter decided it was time for a change when he saw the notorious 1975 New York Daily News headline at the height of the bankruptcy crisis: “Ford To City: Drop Dead.”

On vinyl, Joel reacted with a dystopian piece of science fiction, "Miami 2017 (Seen the Lights Go Out on Broadway)." After 9/11, it became an unexpected anthem of resilience for the metropolis. Now, we are almost a decade after the future that he imagined.

If "Miami 2017” seemed tailor-made for arena rock, “New York State of Mind” felt more like its natural setting was a small jazz club. Indeed, it has become something of a pop standard, covered by the likes of Tony Bennett, Carmen McRae, Mel Torme, Barbara Streisand, Shirley Bassey, and Diane Schuur with Stan Getz.

I embraced two other songs because in some ways they reminded me of the work of two cultural figures I was just beginning to enjoy.

With backup singers, castanets, strings, and especially an opening drumbeat reminiscent of “Be My Baby,” “Say Goodbye to Hollywood” was Joel’s tribute to “Wall of Sound” producer Phil Spector and then-wife Ronnie. (In fact, the latter released her own estimable cover version a year later, noting in interviews that she identified with the song’s theme of a break from California following her divorce.)

The other cultural figure I thought of was F. Scott Fitzgerald, on “I’ve Loved These Days.” So many of the images and themes evoked here—spending beyond one’s means, pearls, caviar, foreign cars, champagne, and cocaine—could have been drawn from the pages and life of the author of “The Great Gatsby.”

One other tune deserves special attention, as Joel would return to its main concern later in his career: “Summer, Highland Falls.” Named for the upstate New York town where Joel stayed upon his return from the West Coast, the song functioned as an emotional taking stock and recalibration.

He has been frank in admitting that lines like “It’s either sadness or euphoria” recognized the manic depression with which he has battled through much of his life, even at the height of his success—a condition he explored later in “I Go to Extremes” and “You’re Only Human (Second Wind)”.

Though the album only peaked at #122 on the U.S. Billboard chart on its release, songs from Turnstiles helped solidify his growing acclaim as a top-notch live performer, as exemplified from several from the LP being included on his first live collection, Songs in the Attic (1981). Eventually it reached platinum status.

Joel did not produce another LP until 1993 with River of Dreams. Like Turnstiles, that marked a watershed of sorts, as it turned out to be his last collection of original pop tunes. 

His concert partner Elton John admonished him to sit down and write some more, but if Joel felt his creative well had run dry, it’s hard to take issue with his decision to take this turn in his career. It would only have invited more critical derision than he’d experienced already.