Billy Joel Unveils Massive Soundtrack for ‘And So It Goes’

Billy Joel has released And So it Goes, a mammoth seven-hour 155-track soundtrack to the HBO documentary of the same name.

The new collection appeared on streaming services on Saturday morning (July 26) and features dozens of previously unreleased tracks, ranging from rare radio performances to special mixes of songs from Joel’s catalog that were created especially for the film. In the same way that And So it Goes puts focus on the singer-songwriter’s career on stage, the companion soundtrack is loaded with no shortage of concert tracks from across his long career. Additionally, commentary and anecdotes from Joel himself (taken from the film) are interspersed throughout, offering additional context about the music.

What’s on the ‘And So it Goes’ Soundtrack?

You’ll find all of the big hits on And So it Goes, but also plenty of nuggets. Among the highlights are songs from Joel’s early bands, including The Hassles and his short-lived “heavy metal” band Attila. There are also fresh mixes of several songs from his much-maligned 1971 debut album, Cold Spring Harbor, which was unfortunately plagued by production issues in which the final tracks were mastered at an incorrect speed. The debut performance of his signature “Scenes From an Italian Restaurant,” captured during a May 1977 concert at C.W. Post in Greenvale N.Y. is another choice gem. Broadcast at the time on area radio station WLIR-FM, the gig allowed fans to hear a preview of music from the Piano Man’s forthcoming The Stranger album nearly four months before it was released.

Listen to Billy Joel’s ‘Scenes From an Italian Restaurant’ Recorded Live at C.W. Post in 1977

The soundtrack was produced by Joel associates Steve Cohen, Bradshaw Leigh and John Jackson. For Cohen, who first joined the singer-songwriter’s team in 1974 as lighting director, the live material fans will hear on the new And So it Goes streaming release outlines why it was important that the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee chose to use his road band in the studio for his albums.

READ MORE: Billy Joel: ‘And So it Goes’ Movie Review

As the documentary reveals, he believed so strongly in his group that he turned down the chance to work with legendary Beatles producer George Martin, who wanted to bring in different players. “Billy, would write a song, they go in the studio, they play the song, they record the song, and then they go out live and play it,” Cohen explained on the UCR Podcast. “It would sound just like the record, because they recorded the record exactly the way they played it live. There was no disconnect.”

Listen to Steve Cohen on the ‘UCR Podcast’

Will There Be Additional Archive Releases Coming From Billy Joel?

Both Cohen and Jackson, Joel’s archivist, say that the soundtrack for And So it Goes is the initial offering and fans can expect subsequent ongoing releases as they take archival materials used in the film and release it in a variety of ways, including YouTube. A performance of “Piano Man” recorded in 1975 on the Old Grey Whistle Test will debut on that platform Monday morning (July 28).

“His team was actually very forward in collecting audio and video, including things from the screen cams,” Jackson tells the UCR Podcast during a separate conversation. “Having a sound man [Brian Ruggles] with him since 1972 and a visual staging and lighting guy [Cohen] since 1974 helped out a lot. [They had a] forward vision of like, ‘We should really film this. We should capture this with proper audio.'”

“It didn’t hurt, that at a certain point he was making a lot of money, so they could afford to do this stuff,” Jackson continues. “But, you know, having a team like that capture these things has made his archive quite substantial. That really played off the touring, which he did nonstop from 1971 until just now, basically. So there’s a ton of stuff that’s in his personal vault and there’s a ton of stuff that’s in Sony’s vault, with not a ton of overlap. We are determined to go through both things in the coming years.”

Listen to Billy Joel’s ‘Stiletto’ Recorded at the Summit in Houston, Texas