From the ghostly image of Joel on the cover, a song about drug abuse, bombastic choruses, orchestral sweeps, banjo, wild west imagery and bar room melancholy nothing seems to make sense on this breakthrough album from the veteran singer songwriter.
But that’s why we love it.
We also adore it because it’s so uncool in places and the coolest thing in the world in others.
While a favourite Joel album of ours, we concede it may not necessarily be his best, with that honour arguably going to The Stranger a few years later.
But by gum the melodies here are great. The ambition outrageous, and the piano playing wonderful.
It’s his first after being signed by Columbia, following an awful debut solo album, released with his vocals at the wrong speed, and time spent out of place with odd bands in the late 1960s such as Atilla.
The opener Travelin’ Prayer is not what you’d expect from Joel.
Drums dominate the intro, the earworm bass takes over the rest, before Joel hits the piano chords.
It’s a fast-paced ho-down of a love song that features smart banjo from Eric Weissberg of duelling banjos fame, and twang a plenty. Is this really the work of a piano based singer songwriter?
The ear worm maestros at his new label clearly thought it was good enough to be a single, just about scraping into the US’s Hot 100 at the time.
Next up the main draw, with more than 1bn Spotify streams, is the title track – as Joel recounts his recent time as a bar room piano player in California. It’s his signature tune and such a fine one that it doesn’t need the orchestra of some other tracks. Just Joel, his piano, harmonica and even an accordion! It’s a beautiful, timeless, classic.
Jauntier piano earworm with Ain’t No Crime follows.
You’re My Home is another great love song, about his first wife Elizabeth Weber and muse for much of his early career.
And now a Western centrepiece literally clip clops onto the album, as Joel, backed by an insanely good rock orchestra recounts the Ballad of Billy the Kid. It’s a rock classic. There’s plenty to hate at the end of this track, where for the final verse Joel has the temerity to compare himself to the famous gunslinger, except he rides into town with a six pack of beer not a six shooter. It’s an uncool misstep, that we can’t help but adore.
There’s another single up next, Worse Comes to Worst. It also just about bothered the Hot 100 with its wah-wah funky guitar and almost, just almost, reggae beat.
Stop in Nevada recounts his time travelling out to California with Weber, who later became his manager too, and her son.
If I Only Had the Words (to Tell You) turns up the schmaltz factor with gusto. Marvellous.
Somewhere Along the Line is a middle of the road rock classic and then sadly we come to the end.
But it’s a great end – a long orchestral rock epic about heroin called Captain Jack.
It’s a live favourite and responsible for this album, with Columbia signing him after hearing him perform it on Philadelphia radio. It was written as an anti-drugs song about a rich loser addict, but with its uplifting chorus about being high some have mistaken its intention over the years.
Incidentally while he has long since dropped this track live, we understand he still plays it when in Philadelphia.
And there we have it. Great, ambitious songs, superb piano playing, plenty of love and heart, and a career is launched.
The album went Gold a few years later and Joel went on to break records, selling 12m copies of another marvellous album, The Stranger, a few years later, and then, more recently, playing Maddison Square Gardens more times than is humanly possible.
Enjoy! I will, as I hum the bass line to Travelin’ Prayer some more.
Classic Album Review by Joe Lepper (originally posted via Facebook’s Temporary Fandoms group)
Useful links
Travelin’ Prayer (Columbia Records signing day performance 1973)
Captain Jack live 1976 (complete with Tim Henman style fist pump)
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