Joey

About Joey

"Joey" is the ninth track from Concrete Blonde's third and most successful album Bloodletting. The song was released in 1990 and was written and sung by Johnette Napolitano. One interpretation is that the song is about a photographer (Joey Mas) who is inordinately fond of alcohol. Napolitano mentioned in her book Rough Mix that the song was written about her relationship with Marc Moreland of the band Wall of Voodoo (who would eventually die of kidney failure following a liver transplant). The song was written in a cab on the way to a photo studio in Philadelphia; it was the last vocal recorded on the album due to Napolitano's reluctance to record the lyrics, which were hard for her to deal with. The song became the group's biggest hit, spending four weeks atop the US Billboard Modern Rock Tracks chart and crossing over to pop radio, reaching number 19 on the Billboard Hot 100; it remains their only charting song on the latter chart. The song also reached number two in Australia, held off the top spot by Faith No More's song "Epic," and ended 1990 as Australia's sixteenth best-selling single. In Canada, the song reached number four on the RPM Top Singles chart and was ranked number 53 on the magazine's year-end chart for 1990. more »