Billy Joel is still a New York driver.
A conversation from his car phone, as he drives from office to home in Long Island's swanky Hamptons, is punctuated by angry outbursts at fellow motorists and dark mutterings about cars with New Jersey license plates."Huh? What? You want me to run them over? OK, thank you."
It's a mellower Billy Joel at age 44 - but not too mellow.
In between shouts, Joel talked about a loss in faith brought about by long-running legal problems, his family's inspiration to his work and a desire to be the songwriting chronicler of middle age.
At least initially, fans are responding. His current album, "River of Dreams," entered the Billboard album chart at No. 1, following eight of 10 previous studio albums that hit the Top 10. The opening dates of what Joel says will be his last extended tour were immediate sellouts.
(Joel will perform in Salt Lake City's Delta Center at 8 p.m. Wednesday, Dec. 15. Tickets will probably be tough to come by at this point, though.)
Joel spoke just before depositions began in preparation for a trial on the $90 million lawsuit he brought against Frank Weber, his ex-manager and former brother-in-law.
His legal problems were compounded early in August when a struggling songwriter filed a lawsuit charging Joel with ripping off two songs that were offered to the singer years ago.
When Joel started writing songs for "River of Dreams" more than a year ago, he found the music reflected his mood - bitter, angry, wounded.
"I had the blues," he said. "I thought, `Who am I to write that kind of stuff because the perception of me is that I'm this hugely successful pop star who's married to Christie Brinkley and who am I to have the blues?'
"I didn't want to say that I did," he said. "And I put it off and put it off. I was in a quandary. I borrowed a page from John Lennon, because he was never one to hold back the way that he was feeling. . . . I thought if he could do that, maybe I could try to do that."
So it's an angry Joel as his album opens. He rants about crumbling suburbia in "No Man's Land," and proceeds into a thinly veiled attack on Weber in "The Great Wall of China."
Joel sings that "advice is cheap you can take it from me" and "you take a piece of whatever you touch."
And then a funny thing happens. Joel lightens up. His mood improves appreciably, and by the second half of the album he's singing love songs to his wife and 7-year-old daughter Alexa Ray.
The sequencing of the album mirrors the order in which the songs were written.
The key to the transformation is one line from "The Great Wall of China" that Joel apparently took to heart: "You only beat me if you get me to hate."
"There's a story about a loss of faith and a crisis and because of that, a philosophical realization and a reaffirmation of what is substantive and a reaffirmation of faith," he said. "In the end, that's the story of my life."
Joel updates "Uptown Girl" in a tender song about his wife. "All About Soul" is about the powerful, unspoken bond between a husband and wife.
His "Lullabye (Goodnight, My Angel)" was sparked by a conversation with his daughter as he tucked her into bed.
"She asked me one night, `What happens when you die?' and this is the question every parent has to confront," he said. "I thought, `Do I tell her about the angels, do I tell her about the heaven stuff, or do I tell her what I really believe?' "
Joel originally began producing his album himself, but realized he needed a musical foil. "I'm not very good at being objective about my work," he concluded.
Danny Kortchmar, who has worked with Don Henley and Neil Young, was brought in. Musically, the result is an aggressive rock album - the Piano Man's favorite instrument is buried underneath a wall of guitars.
Joel said he doesn't want "River of Dreams" to be known as his lawsuit album. But he conceded it was a creative catalyst because it took him out of the childlike cocoon where most rock stars reside.
"I always thought being in your mid-40s would be an incredible, crashing drag," he said. "And I find out that it's not.
"I was looking to people like Paul Simon and Bob Dylan to explain how the rest of our lives were going to go," he said. "And they didn't. Paul went to Brazil and South Africa, and Bob went to heaven. They did it very well, but they didn't reveal enough of what was going on in their lives for me to understand what I was going to go through."
Few musicians have addressed middle age, fatherhood and aging in the rock 'n' roll generation, he said.
"I realized I'm still as nuts as I was when I was a teenager," he said. "I'm wildly romantic and crazy and still as silly as I ever was, but I know a lot more. It's not bad. I think it would be nice for the peoplewho are coming up behind me who are thirtysomething to know, `Hey, this ain't half bad.' "
On one of his new songs, Joel addresses knowing enough to realize he doesn't know everything. "Shades of Grey" notes that things that seemed perfectly clear as a youth are much less so now.
That sounds much different from the suburban street fighter who used to curse out critics onstage.
He's even willing to let the Honda that's been tailgating him to pass, although not without a few grumbles.
"Up until recently, I was very insecure about my job," he said. "Most musicians are. . . . I'm not insecure anymore. I've been doing this for 30 years. I've been with Columbia for 20 years and was a professional musician for 10 years before that. And I actually have a job.
"You know what, Billy? You got the job."