Billy Joel: Captain Jack Meaning

Song Released: 1973

Captain Jack Lyrics

Captain Jack - Billy Joel

Saturday night, and you're still hangin' around.
Tired of living in your one-horse town.
You'd like to find a little hole in the ground,
For awhile.
So you go to the Village in your tie-dyed jeans.
And you stare...

1. anonymous

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   Jun 29th 2017 !⃝

   Billy Joel lived across from a tenement building, while writing songs, he watched the local drug dealer, nicknamed Captain Jack, sell heroin to some kids.
2. anonymous

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   Apr 12th 2016 !⃝

   The song is about someone who hates where he is and is tortured by depression and anxiety, who turns to heroin to save himself. (Or possibly kill himself). It is overall a sad and depressing depiction of a hopeless lonely life.
3. anonymous

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   May 26th 2015 !⃝

   This whole album is said to be a autobiographic album. Captain Jack to me is about Billy Joel's early failures, which alludes to the song Piano Man, and how he turns to Captain Jack, which is a nickname for heroin, to escape from his pain. He hangs out with the junkies and leaves his world to go to his "special island." As his life goes downhill, his father dies, he can't pay for school anymore, he is bored and lonely, and turns to heroin to take him out of his misery.
4. anonymous

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   Apr 30th 2013 !⃝

   I think it is about an addict who does drugs and uses other outlets to remove himself from reality. I cry every time I hear this song because it is still such a relevant issue that we face today and struggle with for both the addicts and those who love them.
5. anonymous

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   Jun 25th 2012 !⃝

   I think he's talking to a guy who does something to get high because he can't get out of this small, crappy town and he can't get a job.
6. anonymous

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   Apr 11th 2012 !⃝

   I see where Billy Joel commented on what he thought the song meant. However, one of the best things I learned in life is never to ask an artist to interpret his or her art.
7. anonymous

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   Aug 25th 2011 !⃝

   I'm actually doing an assignment on this and you guys didn't help at all. Actual meaning is about a heroin dealer, 'Captain Jack', and some pathetic kid who masturbates and does heroin. Billy also has said that it isn't a pro-drug or pro-masturbation song, and describes the depicted teengers lifestyle as a loser kind of lifestyle.
   Good song though.
8. anonymous

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   Aug 3rd 2011 !⃝

   I thought captain Jack was whiskey, as in Jack Daniels...
   
   Martin
   
   
9. anonymous

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   Jun 28th 2011 !⃝

   Heroin: captain jack is a nickname for the drug.

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