It makes me think about all the perfectly scribed love letters and drunken e-mails I have written over the past twelve years, and about all the various women who received them. When I hear “Just the Way You Are,” it never makes me think about Joel’s broken marriage. I think the fact that Joel divorced the woman he wrote this song about makes it his single greatest achievment. Obviously, some would say that cheapens the song and makes it irrelevant.
The sad irony, of course, is that Joel divorced Elizabeth three years after ‘Just The Way You Are’ won a Grammy for Song of the Year. The short-term analysis is that this is a criticism of perfection, but in the best possible way it’s like Billy is saying he loves Weber because she’s not perfect, and that he could never leave her in times of trouble. He specifically asks that she “don’t go changing” in the hopes of pleasing him. It was written about Joel’s wife and manager Elizabeth Weber, and it outlines how he doesn’t want his woman to try ‘some new fashion’ or dye her hair blond or work on being witty. To this day, women are touched by the words of “Just the Way You Are,” a musical love letter that that says everything everybody wants to hear: you’re not flawless, but you’re still what I want. Another song off The Stranger - “Just the Way You Are” - proves that sentiment twice (once cleverly and once profoundly. “Joel’s music always has an undercurrent railing against the desire for perfection. Then I read Chuck Klosterman’s essay in Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs, “Every Dog Must Have His Every Day, Every Drunk Must Have His Drink” which includes the following rumination (devotion?) on the song: You hoped – you prayed – that the love of God couldn’t be boiled down to such greeting-card mush. Not because the lyrics were off somehow, but because they were so darn cheesy. If so, and you’re at all like me, you may have rolled your (inner-)eyes. We’ve all heard it at umpteen weddings, and if you’re a Christian, you’ve probably heard it used in a sermon or three, a pop-blueprint of how God loves his people. Which is tough, since a number of his hits are downright unavoidable, none more so than “Just the Way You Are”. I.Apart from his first couple records, I’ve never been much of a Billy Joel fan (with the notable exception of “The Downeaster ‘Alexa'”, naturally). G minorGm F# minorF#m B minorBm E minorEmĪ7A7 D MajorD G+G D MajorD G+G A minorAm G+GĪ augmentedA D MajorD D7D7 A minorAm G minorGm I never want to work that hard Mmmmmmmmmm I took the good times I`ll take the bad timesĮ minor 7Em7 A7A7 D MajorD G+G D MajorD G+G D MajorDĭon`t change the color of your hair Mmmmmmmmmmmm We never could have come this far Mmmmmmmmmmmm Intro G+G D MajorD G+G D MajorD D MajorD B minorBm G+G B minorBm D7D7 G+Gĭ MajorD B minorBm G+G B minorBm D7D7 G+G
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