"You Belong to the City" is a rock song written by Glenn Frey

Glenn Frey

Glenn Lewis Frey is an American musician, singer, songwriter, and actor, best known as a founding member of the Eagles. Frey formed the Eagles after he met drummer Don Henley in 1970 and the two eventually joined Linda Ronstadt's backup band for her summer tour. The Eagles formed in 1971 and...

 (of the Eagles) and Jack Tempchin

Jack Tempchin

Jack Tempchin is an American musician and singer-songwriter, best known for writing the Eagles classic "Peaceful Easy Feeling" and co-writing their hits "Already Gone", "The Girl From Yesterday," "Somebody," and "It's Your World Now."...

, and recorded by Frey during his solo career. It was written specifically for the television show Miami Vice

Miami Vice

Miami Vice is an American television series produced by Michael Mann for NBC. The series starred Don Johnson and Philip Michael Thomas as two Metro-Dade Police Department detectives working undercover in Miami. It ran for five seasons on NBC from 1984–1989...

in 1985. The song nearly reached the top of the charts, peaking at #2 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100

Billboard Hot 100

The Billboard Hot 100 is the United States music industry standard singles popularity chart issued weekly by Billboard magazine. Chart rankings are based on radio play and sales; the tracking-week for sales begins on Monday and ends on Sunday, while the radio play tracking-week runs from Wednesday...

 chart, although it did reach the top of the Billboard Top Rock Tracks chart. This song, along with Jan Hammer

Jan Hammer

Jan Hammer is a composer, pianist and keyboardist. He first gained his most visible audience while playing keyboards with the Mahavishnu Orchestra in the early 1970s, as well as his film scores for television and film including "Miami Vice Theme" and "Crockett's Theme", from the popular 1980s...

's "Miami Vice Theme

Miami Vice Theme

The musical piece Miami Vice Theme was created and performed by Jan Hammer as the theme to the television series Miami Vice. It was first presented as part of the television broadcast of the show in September 1984 and released as a single in 1985, peaking at the number one spot on the Billboard Hot...

", helped the Miami Vice Soundtrack album reach the top spot of the Billboard 200

Billboard 200

The Billboard 200 is a ranking of the 200 highest-selling music albums and EPs in the United States, published weekly by Billboard magazine. It is frequently used to convey the popularity of an artist or groups of artists...

chart for 11 weeks in 1985, making it the best-selling album of the year and the most successful TV soundtrack of all time. Frey has performed this song live when touring with the Eagles in this past, but has not done so since 2005. A version of the Eagles performing the song can be found on their DVD Farewell 1: Live from Melbourne released that year.

History

All instruments were performed by Frey except the iconic saxophone part played by studio musician Bill Bergman. The song was recorded at Fool On The Hill studios, New York City, in end of 1984. The synthesizer used in this song was a Yamaha DX7

Yamaha DX7

The Yamaha DX7 is an FM Digital Synthesizer manufactured by the Yamaha Corporation from 1983 to 1986. It was the first commercially successful digital synthesizer. Its distinctive sound can be heard on many recordings, especially Pop music from the 1980s...

.

Music video

At the beginning of the video, the notes of the introductory saxophone riff are played as Frey sits in his apartment, looking out the window and smoking. Elsewhere, a woman prepares at home for a night on the town. She has Miami Vice playing on the television, a pattern which is repeated every time a television is shown in the video. Frey leaves the apartment and walks the streets of town, his journey interspersed with scenes representative of New York nightlife and culture. He crosses paths with the woman when the taxi she is riding in almost runs over him. Later, they meet again when Frey sees her through the window of a pub, then walks in. She sees him and he watches her brush off the advances of another man, but makes no move to approach her himself. Finally, he gets up to leave, but the woman catches him as he hails a taxi and they decide to walk back to her place together. The video then cuts to Frey leaving her high-rise the next morning. In the final shot of the video, Frey gazes out onto a vista of New York City.

Charts

Chart (1985/86)	Peak position
U.S. Billboard Hot 100	2
U.S. Billboard Hot Mainstream Rock Tracks	1
U.S. Billboard Hot Adult Contemporary Tracks Hot Adult Contemporary Tracks The Adult Contemporary chart is a weekly chart published in Billboard magazine that lists the most popular songs on adult contemporary and "lite-pop" radio stations in the United States...	2
Canadian Singles Chart	6
UK Singles Chart	94
Dutch Top 40	37
Polish Singles Chart	1
New Zealand Singles Chart	46
Australian Singles Chart	3

External links

• "You Belong to the City" lyrics