Two problems are inherent to hits collections. First, without fail, they leave off songs that many would have liked to see. And second, if a collection works -- that is, if it converts a listener from a casual to a hardcore fan -- it slowly becomes redundant as the fan buys the original albums that the hits came from.

Here, those two problems are especially big. The first is bad for the collection; two of the left-off songs, "Uptown Girl" and "She's Always a Woman," are integral enough to Joel's fame that it's hard to defend their absence here. But the second speaks very well of The Hits indeed: If you buy this record, you'll almost certainly want to invest in a few other Joel recordings.

Like Cheap Trick, Billy Joel is one of those artists you've been hearing your whole life even if you didn't realize it. If you've ever spent any time listening to a basic rock radio station, at least half of this record will already be familiar. There are the mega-hits that everyone connects to Billy Joel by name, most notably "Piano Man," but there's a whole lot more, too: You know that song that goes, "You had to be a big shot, didn't you? / You had to open up your mouth"? Joel. "You may be right / I may be crazy / But it just might be a lunatic you're looking for"? Joel. That sappy one about how men should share their feelings, with a bouncy chorus of "Tell her about it"? Joel.

Lots of people have heard these tracks for years without being motivated to spend money on a full record, and this is their chance to get all the big hits in one place. That alone makes The Hits worthwhile. But listening to them all back to back, one gets the sense he's missing out on something big.

These tracks became popular for a reason: The melodies are infectious, the instruments are arranged to fit just perfectly around Joel's piano, and the lyrics are remarkably well-written. What's more, while a few seem cheesy by modern standards ("We Didn't Start the Fire" doesn't work anymore), most of them could be released today, and if they stood out, they would stand out only because they're classier and more intricate than what dominates the pop airwaves in 2010. If Joel penned so many of the songs that form the backbone of modern radio, and if those songs hold up all these years later, there must be plenty of worthwhile material that missed out on radio play.

Seventeen years after Joel left pop music to focus on classical composing and touring, the record-buying public finally has a way to get all of his hits on a single disc. The quality of that disc makes it forgivable that it took so long.

-- Robert VerBruggen is an associate editor of National Review. You can follow his writing at http://www.google.com/profiles/robertv4311#buzz or http://www.twitter.com/raverbruggen .