Consumer Guide Album

Billy Joel: Glass Houses [Columbia, 1980]
From the straight-up hubba-hubba of "You May Be Right" to the Rick Wakeman ostinatos of "Sometimes a Fantasy" to the McCartneyesque melodicism of "Don't Ask Me Why" to the what-it-is of "It's Still Rock and Roll to Me," it's all rock and roll to him, but to me it's closer to what pop meant before ironists and aesthetes, including yours truly, appropriated the term. Closer than any skinny-tie bands, that's for sure: gregarious, shameless, and above all profitable. Of course, if it doesn't make up in reach what it lacks in edge, ironists and aesthetes needn't notice it's there. And beyond "Sleeping With the Television On," I couldn't tell you thing one about side two, which I just played three times. B-