One album cover shows a storm warning flag for winds of force 10 to 12 on the Beaufort scale. Another fact says the man behind it, singer and pianist Billy Joel, had just fired most of his backing group. The eleventh studio album Storm Front arrived on October 17, 1989, and it sounded like a musician clearing the deck.
The eleventh studio album Storm Front arrived on October 17, 1989, and it sounded like a musician clearing the deck.
Bringing in Mick Jones
Why would a pop-rock star known for hit singles and arena tours cut loose the guitarist, bassist and keyboard player who had been with him for years? The answer starts with a name from hard rock. Joel brought in Mick Jones of the band Foreigner to co-produce, on a recommendation from Eddie Van Halen after Jones had produced the album 5150 in 1986.
The shake-up was radical. Out went guitarist Russell Javors, bassist Doug Stegmeyer and keyboardist Dave Lebolt. In the studio, Joey Hunting took over on guitar, while Tommy Byrnes played the tour. Schuyler Deale replaced the bassist, Jeff Jacobs the keyboardist. Longtime members Liberty DeVitto, David Brown and Mark Rivera stayed, and percussionist Crystal Taliefero joined for the first time.
New players, new texture
Storm Front was still a Billy Joel record in the most literal sense: every song was written by him, and he played piano, clavinet, percussion, accordion, Hammond organ, harpsichord and synthesizers. But the new collaborators changed the texture. The title track drew inspiration from the driving rhythm section of Peter Gabriel's 1986 song "Sledgehammer," as Joel later explained on SiriusXM.
The commercial payoff was immediate. Storm Front became Joel's third American chart-topper. The single "We Didn't Start the Fire" arrived in September 1989 and earned Grammy nominations in 1990 for Song of the Year, Record of the Year and Best Male Pop Vocal Performance. The recognition went beyond the singles. The album earned Grammy nominations in 1991 for Best Male Pop Vocal Performance and for Producer of the Year, Non-Classical, for Joel and Mick Jones. It also reached No. 1 in Australia and No. 4 in Canada. The album also found an audience far beyond the United States. In Australia it reached the top of the ARIA chart, while in Canada it climbed to No. 4 on the RPM chart.
Seven singles and a Garth Brooks cover
The album kept producing singles well beyond its release week. "I Go to Extremes" climbed to No. 6 on the Billboard Hot 100, while "And So It Goes," "The Downeaster 'Alexa'" and "That's Not Her Style" also cracked the top 100, at No. 37, No. 57 and No. 77. Seven singles came from Storm Front in all, from the rapid-fire history lesson of "We Didn't Start the Fire" to the ballad "And So It Goes." The album's final single, "Shameless," arrived in January 1991. It later found a second life when Garth Brooks covered it for his album Ropin' the Wind, taking the song to the top of the American country chart. The recording sessions drew on a wider circle of musicians than the core band. A children's choir from Hicksville High School sang on "Leningrad," with the choir arrangement by Bill Zampino and the orchestral arrangement by Arif Mardin.
There was one name on the credits that stood out from the rock lineup: violinist Itzhak Perlman, listed as the "World Famous Incognito Violinist." It was a small wink on an album that otherwise announced a harder, leaner Billy Joel, one who had replaced old friends with hired guns and a rock producer.
The firings could have backfired. Fans might have missed the familiar faces on stage, and a co-producer from the arena-rock world could have buried Joel's piano under guitars. Instead, Storm Front gave him his third American chart-topper and a run of hit singles that kept the album in rotation for more than a year.
Nearly four decades later, the storm flag still flies on the cover of an album that was less a farewell to the old band than a bet that new players could push the same songwriter somewhere louder. The gamble paid off at No. 1.