Billy Joel’s got a good job and hits in his head.
OYSTER BAY, N.Y. — “You see that boat out there?” Billy Joel asked, pointing beyond the dock and the helicopter pad in his backyard to Oyster Bay Harbor. “That’s an oyster boat — a dredge. I worked on one of those, when I was 17 or 18. I used to look up at these big houses and say, ‘You rich bastards!’ I remember looking at this house and cursing. Now I own the place.”
Early one Friday afternoon, Joel, 69, was smoking a small cigar on one of the front lawns of his 26-acre manor, cleverly dubbed Middle Sea, at the tip of Centre Island, a peninsula on the North Shore of Long Island. The estate was built by a railroad baron, George Bullock, some hundred years ago. Joel bought it in 2002 from a big shot at Goldman Sachs.
“This is Gatsby country,” he said, as three rescue dogs romped around a long table, which sat beneath a trellis. Nearby, a nanny looked after his 9-monthold daughter, Remy Anne, his second child with his fourth wife, Alexis Roderick.
Joel remains one of the most successful artists in the music industry, even though he has not released an album of new pop songs since 1993 and tours on what he calls a “pussycat schedule.” He has had a monthly residency at Madison Square Garden since January 2014; on July 18, two days before our interview, he played his 100th ever show there. Each concert has sold out, which is a level of success the Garden’s other franchises can only envy. “It’s bigger now than it was at the height of my recording career,” Joel said, more puzzled than boastful.
Joel identifies as a smartass: “I rub people the wrong way, with that stupid Long Island chip on my shoulder.” It is his nature to be blunt, unapologetic and self-mocking, especially on the topic of his looks. He had just finished a photo session, gritting his teeth throughout, when he sat down to talk.
Q: Which is worse, having your picture taken or talking about yourself ?
A: Taking pictures is painful. I don’t look like a rock star, which I don’t mind.
Q: Did you ever look like a rock star?
A: There was a minute, back in the ’80s, when I was dating Christie (Brinkley). She styled me. They chopped my hair and spiked it up — I never had good hair — put decent clothes on me. All my life, I said, “Maybe I’ll turn into Cary Grant.” It never happened.
Q: Do you still sing your songs in their original key or do you lower them?
A: Some of them we drop a whole step, some we drop a half step and some are still in the original keys. When I get to a point where I got to go more than a whole step down, it’s probably time to hang it up. I find myself onstage thinking: This is a young man’s job. What am I doing?
I saw Bruce (Springsteen) before I went onstage the other night and I said, “Bruce, those songs are (expletive) high.” He goes, “I know, man.”
Q: You two had some career parallels and were on the same record label. Are you friends?
A: Yeah. Bruce and I go back to the early ’70s, when we played the same clubs. I’m a bridge-and-tunnel guy, like Bruce is. He’s got a show on Broadway and I’m doing the Garden. It’s ironic. We’re all George M. Cohans now.
Q: This summer is the 25th anniversary of your last pop album, “River of Dreams.” Did you dislike it?
A: In the early ’90s, I started listening to the Beethoven symphonies and I said: “I haven’t done (expletive). This is great.” I was, let’s see, 44 years old. It was time to do something else. I wasn’t going to make albums just because the record company had a contract on me.
Q: A contract “on” you? Like the Mafia?
A: That’s how I see it! They own the recordings, so I’m writing for them. I saw it happening with Elton (John), other bigname artists. The last album didn’t sell as much, got to put out another album, and they end up diluting their legacy by putting out albums that are no longer good. With “River of Dreams,” I took myself out with a No. 1 album.
Q: But when you’re a songwriter, melodies don’t just stop coming into your head.
A: No.
Q: So when you wake up in the morning with a melody in your head, what do you do?
A: I write. I continue to write the music. I develop it, I do expositions, variations. But I haven’t recorded it. I haven’t even notated it. It’s all here (taps his head).
Q: So you don’t care if anyone else ever hears it?
A: I’ve had more fame than I deserve. I thought I was going to make a living and it turned out I got a hundred shows at Madison Square Garden, Kennedy (Center) Honors, the Gershwin (Prize), da da da. It’s pretty cool, but I’m not Beethoven.
Q: Not releasing new albums might work to your advantage. When you go to see Elton John or the Rolling Stones, there’s always a section where they play a few new songs, and ...
A: And nobody wants to hear the new album. You’re right. I tell that to the audience sometimes: “We’re going to do your favorite songs. I’m not going to play anything new.” “Yay!” But then I get accused of pandering. “He only gives them what they want to hear.” Well, they paid a (expletive) of money to see me, they should get what they want. That’s my job: I’m an entertainer.
Q: What about starting a band?
A: Sting and Don Henley and I always joke around: “Just for the (expletive) of it, let’s put together one of those supergroups that explode after, like, a year.” I think it could be fun to join a band. I enjoyed it when I was a teenager. And I’d consider writing songs in that kind of milieu.
I get asked a lot, “Why’d you stop?” I set a very high bar for myself and I couldn’t get there. I couldn’t be as good as I wanted to be and it was frustrating. So I’d get drunk, just to make myself forget about my frustration, and my personal life went to hell. I’d been divorced a couple of times already and I said, “Enough of this mishegas.”