Friday marks the 50th anniversary of Billy Joel’s third studio album, Streetlife Serenade, which achieved top 40 success for the future Rock & Roll Hall of Famer.
Released on October 11, 1974, the album is best known for the song “The Entertainer,” a response from Joel after his classic track “Piano Man” was cut for radio. In the song, he sings, “If you’re gonna have a hit, you gotta make it fit, so they cut it down to 3:05.”
While “The Entertainer” became a fan favorite and a mainstay in Joel’s live performances, he notes that the song is often misunderstood. The lyrics may seem like complaints about his status as a music superstar, but Joel intended them to be sarcastic—a nuance that he believes fans and DJs frequently miss.
“The disc jockey saying, ‘OK, first he’s a piano man. He’s b******* about playing in a piano bar. He’s moaning about his life,’” Joel explained in a video about the album on his website. “’Now he’s got a successful record. Now he’s b******* about being successful.’”
Streetlife Serenade followed his 1972 breakthrough album, Piano Man, and even Joel admits it wasn’t his strongest work. He attributes the decline in quality to being preoccupied with opening for other acts, sharing that he “didn’t really have a lot of time to write new material.”
“But there was a lot of pressure to put out another album after Piano Man, and I just didn’t have a lot of stuff,” he said. “There’s even two instrumentals, and when’s the last time, you know, a singer-songwriter put out an instrumental?”
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