#Poetic justice remix on snowtape movie#

And maybe you don’t - but if your parents are worthy of the faith you’ve placed in them, they’ll let you make your own mistakes. Maybe you get the approval you secretly crave. One way to define the arrival of adulthood might be when introducing a new partner to your parents is no longer cause for embarrassment.

Steven Hyden is the author of a book about Pearl Jam, “Long Road,” out in September. And I wonder: Did she picture him telling the new woman in his life “I love you” between the chorus and the verse? Now when I hear “Déjà Vu,” I think about Elizabeth Weber, and I imagine what it must have been like for the subject of “Just the Way You Are” to hear “Uptown Girl” for the first time. Yet in “Uptown Girl,” Billy Joel is the one who has moved on, after delivering a litany of amorous platitudes to his ex. In this way, “Uptown Girl” connects “Walk Like a Man” to “Déjà Vu.” On either side of pop history, you have essentially the same story - a heartbroken romantic loser smarts over rejection by a dishonest lover. This is how ancient hits are reinvented as the buzziest smashes of today. It plays upon memories, ingrained biases and everything else that composes our collective psychic baggage. The Four Seasons’ protagonist is assured his ex will soon “be cryin’ on account of all lyin’.” It evokes the harmony-rich pop of the Four Seasons, specifically their 1963 smash “Walk Like a Man,” in which, as it happens, a guy gets his heart broken and is consoled by his chauvinistic father. Sonically, “Uptown Girl” harks back to Joel’s youth.

Contrast this with “Just the Way You Are,” in which Joel sings about overlooking the subject’s faults as an expression of true love. The lyrics are about Joel’s proving himself to a lover above his station, no matter his own faults. In the video for “Uptown Girl,” Joel now paid tribute to a new woman, the supermodel Christie Brinkley. Until that point, Weber had been the subject of his most famous love songs, including the 1978 Grammy-winning juggernaut, “Just the Way You Are.” Now the less simple part: “Uptown Girl” was released in 1983, as part of Joel’s ninth LP, “An Innocent Man,” which he made after divorcing his first wife, Elizabeth Weber. We can thus assume he grew up exposed, daily, to Joel’s “Greatest Hits - Volume I & Volume II,” as dictated by local municipal ordinance. Nigro is a 39-year-old man from Long Island. First, Rodrigo has confirmed the line actually comes from co-writer Dan Nigro. suburbs would favor deeper cuts, like “Summer, Highland Falls” or “Zanzibar” - an actual recent TikTok hit - right?īut upon investigation, I realized the Joel reference in “Déjà Vu” has both a simple explanation and a deeper, more sophisticated resonance. Did the couple in “Déjà Vu” also bond over episodes of “Three’s Company”?Īlso, even if we are to presume Billy Joel has been reclaimed by a younger generation, it strains credibility to imagine this would involve “Uptown Girl,” one of the dorkiest tunes of Joel’s catalog. It’s odd that a 72-year-old Long Island classic rocker would loom so large in her life. But Rodrigo is a cool teenager from California. Those choices align with these middle-aged East Coast men.

#Poetic justice remix on snowtape movie#

There is the matter of what I’ll call “character integrity.” I get - to cite other recent Joel references - why the compulsive liar Howard Ratner would play “The Stranger,” a song about hiding your true self, in the movie “Uncut Gems,” and I buy that the self-martyring Kendall Roy, from HBO’s “Succession,” would enjoy “Honesty,” an anthem about how everyone else is less principled than you.

Initially, the reference to “Uptown Girl” confounded me.

Including this one: “I’ll bet that she knows Billy Joel/’Cause you played her “Uptown Girl”/You’re singing it together/Now I bet you even tell her/How you love her/In between the chorus and the verse.” In “Déjà Vu,” Rodrigo imagines her ex with a new girlfriend and speculates that the unnamed cad is using the same moves he used on her.