David Lee Roth has added an unexpected twist to his 2026 North American solo tour: a cover of Billy Joel’s “New York State of Mind.” Fan-shot video from Roth’s April 18 show at Spirit Mountain Casino in Grand Ronde, Oregon finally surfaced online two weeks after the song first appeared on the setlist, confirming that the Van Halen frontman is still willing to reach well outside the usual hard-rock lane.
Joel’s original version appeared on his 1976 album Turnstiles, and while it was not released as a single, the song has become one of his most beloved and most frequently performed tracks. SetList.fm places it among his most played songs, logging 628 performances and ranking it as his 11th most performed track.
That explains why Roth’s choice feels less random than it first sounded. “New York State of Mind” has long outgrown its album-only status and become a genuine American standard. It has also been covered by artists including Barbra Streisand, Tony Bennett, and Oleta Adams, and Joel has performed it with peers such as Garth Brooks, Elton John, and Bruce Springsteen.
Roth’s version arrives during a busy stretch on the road. According to the article, he is next scheduled to play Memphis on May 1, with the rest of the run stretching through July 9 in Calgary and leaving Sturgis on August 7 as his final scheduled date at that time.
The performance also connects back to a little-known near-collision between Billy Joel and the Van Halen world. In a 1990 interview, Joel said he had originally wanted Eddie Van Halen to produce his 1989 album Storm Front, but the schedules never lined up. The job instead went to Mick Jones of Foreigner, who had also co-produced Van Halen’s 5150.
That detail makes Roth’s cover feel even more loaded. This is not just a singer dipping into somebody else’s songbook; it is a very specific piece of New York-rooted music history being reframed by a rock figure whose career has always thrived on surprise, attitude, and reinvention.
For fans, the appeal is obvious: Roth leaning into a Billy Joel classic is the kind of curveball that can either collapse under its own weirdness or land with real charm. In this case, the buzz around the performance suggests the latter — an older rock icon reaching for a song that is bigger than genre and making it his own for a night.
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