I am having a debate with some 50+ men on who sang the original Uptown Girl.  I know Billy Joel did it in my generation.  But who did it first.  They are saying Frankie Valen and the Four Seasons.  Is this true.

To my knowledge it was an original.

However I've read that people have often compared it to sounding like the Four Seasons, etc. Personally I never saw this myself - it seems perfectly 80's to me. However, he did have some oldies influences on the Innocent Man album ("The Longest Time" sounds like a barbershop quartet and "Leave a Tender Moment Alone" is like a doowop ballad).

Yes, an original all right - and the influence was The Four Seasons...

Most of that album's songs were throwbacks to the kind of music that Joel had grown up with in the 50s/60s...

In 1982, his personal life was in turmoil - he'd just divorced his first wife - and he was involved in a serious motorbike accident at the time of recording his 'Nylon Curtain' album - which was a very dark affair...

After he'd survived all of that, he decided his next album would have a much lighter theme, celebrating the joys of his youth...

It turned out to be his biggest seller globally...

I believe that Uptown Girl was written for Christy Brinkley-when Billy Joel was dating him (before they married).




Cat

I believe that Uptown Girl was written for Christy Brinkley-when Billy Joel was dating him (before they married).
Cat


Yes indeed - it was written about Christie when he was surprised that "someone like her would date someone like him". She also appeared in the video.

In the early 90s when they were still together he would tell the story before singing the song. After they split he point blank refused to ever sing it again.  In fact - when I saw him and Elton John perform together - Elton sung it instead - and Billy sung the original Candle in The Wind in return.

Joel wrote this for supermodel Christine Brinkley, who he married less than two years after this was released. Joel is from Long Island, New York, and always considered himself a working-class, regular guy. He was very surprised when the glamorous Brinkley went for him.
The whole album, especially this song, was a sort of tribute to '60s Pop music. Specifically, this one is done in the style of doo wop groups like the Four Seasons.
Brinkley was in the video, playing the Uptown Girl. Joel portrayed a mechanic working on her car.


just some information about the song from this site

http://www.songfacts.com/detail.lasso?id=1666