This is an IHeart podcast.

This is Alec Baldwin, and you're listening to Here's the Thing.

My chance to talk with artists and writers, policymakers and performers to hear their stories,

what inspired their creations, what decisions change their careers, and what relationships

influenced their work.

Billy Joel's fans have gotten to know him quite well over the past four decades.

Don't go changing to try and please me.

You never let me down before

From the open-hearted declarations of old-fashioned love

And She's Got Away and Just the way you are

To the hard-rocking social commentaries

We didn't start the fire and Allentown.

When we're living here in Allentown,

and they're closing all the factories down.

If like me, you grew up listening to Billy Joel's music, you can chart phases of your life by each of his albums.

Maybe that's because Billy Joel's songs are so passionately connected to who he was at the time he wrote them.

Check one, two, two. Can I get more level? Hello, hello, hello. And when you're actually sitting in the same room as him with a piano nearby, well, you can't help yourself. I want you to play me something if you don't mind, because your fans would demand that. I mean, I still remember you said that to me years ago, how predictable it was, wherever you were, that there was a piano, but it was like, Billy, could you, uh, do you mind? Right. Just a couple of songs. Right. It's his birthday, you know. It's Christmas, and we were wondering if you could play. There it is. It's...

And it's tune.

We just had it tuned.

We just... Just for you. We're such fans. You don't mind, right? That's your life. Yes. But it's, you know, it's fun. You can't have act-alongs. You can't act along. But you can have sing-alongs. I can always sit down at a party, play the piano,

and everybody starts singing,

I can go to a pub in England.

...