“A fresh look at timeless Billy Joel classics with new songs from piano men Matthew Friedman and Kyle Martin" It all started innocently enough... Sitting around lunch one day in Atlantic City, NJ while in rehearsals for the national tour of Billy Joel and Twyla Tharpe’s Broadway show, Movin’ Out, the subject of recording a CD of Billy’s material came up. “Sure, sounds like fun,” and “Yeah, that’d be great, let’s do it” as well as “No problem, I’ve got the rig to record it - I’d love to produce it” were all things that were said. (That last part was me and my big mouth...) Well, fast forward 10 months and a LOT of miles, diners, truck stops, bad hotels, 280+ shows (and counting) and give or take 300,000 people and what you are (hopefully) listening to as you read this is the result of a true labor of love - and maybe, more than just a little insanity... This project was conceived, produced, recorded and mixed on trains, planes, in cars, on a tour bus, in theaters (NOT the movie kind...), cafés, coffee shops, bars, restaurants and a veritable multitude of hotel rooms across the US and Canada. I’m sure we annoyed, perplexed and disturbed more hotel staff and guests than you could imagine recording and mixing these tracks at all hours of the morning, afternoon and night. We thank our unwitting (unwilling?) hotel neighbors for not killing us, or worse... We were remarkably blessed with an amazing group of guys in the tour band, some truly talented and wonderful people we met along the way, and the time, resources and mental instability to make this happen. We sincerely hope you have as much fun listening to these tracks as we did creating them. Matthew Friedman: Piano, Vocals (1,3,6,7) Acoustic Guitar (7), Backing Vocals (1,2,3,7,8) Kyle Martin: Piano, Vocals (2,4,5,8) Backing Vocals (2,4,7,8) John Isley: Tenor and Baritone Saxophones; EWI; Additional Keyboard, Bass, and Drum/Percussion Programming and Sequencing; Backing Vocals (2,7,8); Orchestral arrangement and programming (1) Johan Nilson: Electric Guitars Michael Ferguson: Bass Guitar Taurus Lovely: Drums Rob Cookman: Organ (4,6) Chris Fischer: Organ (7) Justin Braboy-Hapner: Backing vocals (2,7,8) The "Right Here" Choir: Karolina Blonski, Leah Harper, Shayna Harris, Andrew Pirozzi All songs produced, recorded and mixed by John Isley Drums recorded by Derek Sylwestrazdk (3,8) at The Beach Recording Studios, Calgary, Ontario, Canada and Darren Crisp (1,2,4,5,6,7,) at Crisp Recording, Fayettville, Arkansas. Mastered by Darren Crisp, Crisp Recording, Fayetteville, Arkansas Photography by Thomas Newberger Light abstract photography by Chris Jett Cover design by Brian Turner