The Stranger (30th Anniversary Legacy Edition) [Remastered]

iTunes Review

Billy Joel's fifth solo album, 1977’s The Stranger, is the one that broke him through to superstardom and began his reign as one of the most successful singer-songwriters of the 1970s and 1980s. The Stranger remains one of the best-selling albums of all-time; its single “Just the Way You Are” won two Grammies for Record of the Year and Song of the Year. This 30th Anniversary Edition includes a re-mastered version of the original album by the album’s legendary producer Phil Ramone and an additional concert, “Live at Carnegie Hall 1977,” recorded on June 3, 1977, a month prior to the album’s sessions, that displays a solid, intuitive group that could deliver great drama (“New York State of Mind”), show great musical dexterity (“The Entertainer”) and was primed for the new material they were about to record (“Just the Way You Are,” “Scenes From an Italian Restaurant”). The original album features a great number of future Joel standards, from the opening sass of “Movin’ Out (Anthony’s Song)” through the ballads (“Just the Way You Are,” “Vienna”) to the sociological undertakings of “Only the Good Die Young” and “Scenes from An Italian Restaurant,” where Springsteen’s New Jersey relocates to Long Island with a kick of Tin Pan Alley added to the mix.