There are songwriters/bands/singers who are somewhat timeless---they steadily turn out good stuff and occasionally have a hit;
Then there are the one-hit wonders, of whom we're all familiar (Ace, "How Long has this Been Goin' On?")
More puzzling are the bands/songwriters who turn out an absolutely incredible album, where almost every song is a classic or cutting edge, then they never seem to recapture it.
Think of Boz Scaggs, "Silk Degrees," or, for you older rockers, "Moby Grape" by Moby Grape, where every song was refreshing. Billy Joel's "The Stranger" was one of those albums. I don't know how many #1 hits he had off that, but it was a few.
There were no number one hits off of The Stranger. Just four Top 40 hits that have entered the pop lexicon. Joel’s three Number 1 hits are not among his best songs (It’s Stil rock and Roll To me, Tell Her About it, We Didn’t Start the Fire). Apart from those he’s written dozens of standards (songs everyone knows and cam hum at the drop of a hat).