My Favorite Songs 41

This Is the Time was released as the third single from Billy Joel's album The Bridge. The song reached No. 18 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 and topped the Billboard Adult Contemporary chart. Billboard called it a “melancholy rock ballad from a doom-filled perspective.” Cash Box said that the “songwriting genius of Joel is in force again in this wistful, melodic ballad.”

This song will forever be one of my favorites, if not simply for its cool, soft, and predictable tones, falling asleep to it numerous nights as a youngling, not yet fully understanding the lyrics. I still get chills when he reaches the refrain; and I find it interesting, no—blindly or naively profound—how I did not know the impactfulness of the words on my adult life, or how I could not even comprehend it yet, but even as a young adult I could just sense how powerful and meaningful this song really was without truly appreciating it. And I find that almost magical.