Billy Joel - 52nd Street - (Columbia Records, 1978)

This is a PopSpot of Billy Joel's album 52nd Street. Billy is on the south side of West 52nd Street just east of 7th Avenue in the north part of Times Square.

PopSpots reported on the location of this album in one of our early PopSpots, but at that time I had to basically construct the side of the building where Billy was standing from several partial pictures. You can read that whole PopSpot found here. Its got about 50 photos and lots of specific details.

Recently, a PopSpot reader named Dr. Shoichiro Otake sent in a treasure trove of pictures of the location that he had taken on August 4, 1980, when he visited New York from Japan many years ago. It took him several visits to Times Squate to find the locations, as he wasn't sure the photo was taken on 52nd Street, but he found it on his last day in New York. He recently sent us the pictures. They are great rock 'n' roll and New York historical reference.

An outtake from the original session. (photo: Jim Houghton)

The album cover. (The album was released on October 13, 1978 by Columbia Records/CBS Inc. Cover photo by Jim Houghton.)

Shoichiro's photo of the album cover location.

Dr. Shoichiro poses where Billy was standing.

Dr. Shoichiro again. But the passerby who took his photo put her finger in front of the camera. (Hey, that's rock 'n' roll!)

A photo from further back. The service elevator that led to the top floor Columbia recording studio would have been about 10 feet to the left, past the tiny deli.

A side view. The service elevator, which the musicians used to get up and down from the recording studio quickly, instead of using the busy main elevators around the corner on 7th Avenue, is to the left of the yellow awning.

Here's the side of the coffee shop/restaurant on 52nd Street.

This is a photo looking along the side of the restaurant taken from the corner of 52nd Street and 7th Avenue.

The Griddle Coffee Shop sign with the Americana Hotel behind it. The hotel is still there, now called the Sheraton New York Times Square.

This is a magazine ad for the album showing the coffee shop sign in the background.

And, to end, this is the scrapbook where Dr. Shoichiro has kept the photos for the last 4 decades. Thank you, Dr. Shoichiro for sharing your memories of Billy with your fellow Billy Joel fans and rock fans around the world via PopSpots!