A 1976 Billy Joel “Science Fiction Song’’ Suddenly Describes Today
By: Joseph Serwach
Tags: Arts And Culture, New York, Music, Culture, Writing

Cranking up the volume of the Billy Joel Channel, I tell my bride: “He wrote this in the 1970s. It’s called ‘Miami 2017,’ — it was about the future.’’

My bride shook her head like she saw a dancing ghost as the song starts:

“Seen the lights go out Broadway. I saw the Empire State laid low.’’

Broadway theaters, America’s finest, were supposed to be closed for one month due to the pandemic, but the shutdowns have been extended until at least June 2021. That single shutdown impacts 97,000 jobs for 15 months.

Now 71, Billy Joel wrote this song in 1976 when he was 27, trying to imagine what his beloved New York City might be like in the future.

He called the song “science fiction’’ like the 1981 film, “Escape from New York’’ or “Beneath the Planet of the Apes.’’

He titled his song “Miami 2017” (OK, three years off, but close enough). He figured he would be 68 by 2017, perhaps retired in a place like Florida. It’s told from the point of view of an older man describing a post-apocalyptic disaster ruining New York.

A disaster sending New Yorkers fleeing to Florida?

He describes New Yorkers (long proud they didn’t need cars) buying Cadillacs and fleeing New York. We then hear about forces who “turned our power down — And drove us underground.’’

Lock-downs in 2020 drove many underground. Barbers to gym owners went “underground’’ or openly defied emergency orders. Billy Joel added, “But we went right on with the show.’’

“I saw the ruins at my feet,’’ the song continues. “You know we almost didn’t notice it.’’

By August, the New York Post wrote about News Yorkers “fleeing the city in droves, moving to suburbs and other states.’’

Joel made a surprise appearance at a May 2020 “Rise New York’’ fundraiser, singing the song as the Empire State Building was lit up. But the pandemic was just the start of New York City’s problems. Many compared the decline to New York in the 1970s when Billy Joel wrote “Miami 2017.’’

As “30 days to slow the spread’’ became the “new normal’’ summer saw anxiety, depression, crime, and violence soar. The George Floyd case tore New York up with riots, looting, and attacks on statues and churches. A majority in a new poll feared America was on the verge of a new civil war.

The song predicts churches burning, comparing the scene to civil war: “They burned the churches down in Harlem. Like in that Spanish civil war.

The flames were everywhere, but no one really cared. It always burned up there before.’’

Another iconic moment of the pandemic was the U.S. Navy ship USNS Comfort being sent to New York City from the U.S. Naval base in Norfolk, Virginia, named in the song: “They sent a carrier out from Norfolk and picked the Yankees up for free.’’

The song predicts working-class Queens staying and references and “sank Manhattan out at sea,” alluding to a year when the rich who could work remotely left cities in greater numbers.

In a year when history is forgotten or deleted as monuments are toppled, he sings, “There are not many who remember. They say a handful still survive.

To tell the world about the way the lights went out and keep the memory alive.’’