Billboard, 1985: Miami Vice Theme hits #1

40 years ago on November 6, 1985, the number one song song in the country was the Miami Vice Theme by Jan Hammer.

Let that sink in for a minute. The theme song from a television show — a song with no lyrics — was the most popular song in the country.

Miami Vice debuted on NBC in 1984 and ran through 1989. The show had a huge impact on the look and sound of the 1980s. It wasn’t that Miami Vice created everything that contributed to the aesthetic, but how they bundled it together. The show took neon glow, pastel colors, hot fashion trends, and palm trees, and wrapped it around a weekly crime drama. Putting The faces of Don Johnson and Phillip Michael Thomas didn’t exactly hurt ratings, either.

And the thing was, the impact Miami Vice had on pop culture permeated every pore of 80s fashion… whether you watched the show or not. I did not watch Miami Vice regularly. Here is a picture of me from 1986 in front of my computer. I’ve shared this picture before, but I’m sharing it this time to point out that I’m wearing a Miami Vice jacket. That day I was wearing a blue undershirt but I had plenty of neon yellow and pink ones I wore with it, too. Oh, and this was not the only Miami Vice jacket I owned. I had both a white one and a gray one which I apparently wore even when I was sitting at home alone.

Miami Vice wasn’t this show that people tuned into for fashion tips. It just oozed style that went everywhere and stuck to everything. It glowed. Songs that appeared on the show were picked specifically to matchthe show’s vibe. “In the Air Tonight” by Phil Collins appeared in the show’s pilot. Glen Frey’s “Smuggler’s Blues” and “You Belong to the City” helped paint the show’s sonicscape.

Sonny Crocket (Don Johnson) even had his own theme, and while it wasn’t as popular as Jan Hammer’s theme to the show, the sounds instantly transport listeners to Miami, 1985. It sounds exciting, romantic, dark, and a little dangerous.

But it was another one of Hammer’s themes, the show’s theme song, that incredulously became a hit of its own. Synthesizers and electronic wizards like Jan Hammer continued to evolve the artform. The theme to Miami Vice not only sets the mood of the show but gets your heart pounding. The songs was performed on a Fairlight CMI synth. The Fairlight CMI was one of the first digital samplers, which allowed musicians and composers to capture their own sounds and transform them. The bass sound from the Miami Vice theme sounds similar to the one that appears in “Relax” by Frankie Goes to Hollywood, another song recorded using the Fairlight. The Art of Noice and Devo were also big fans of the Fairlight CMI.

Not only did the Miami Vice theme hit number one on the Billboard charts back in 1985, but it was the last instrumental song to do so until 2013 when “Harlem Shake” topped the charts. I would argue that “Harlem Shake” is not purely an instrumental and only topped the charts due to its popularity due to memes, but I digress. Unlike “Harlem Shake,” the Miami Vice theme won four Grammys and was nominated for 20.

The influence that Miami Vice had on pop culture lives on today. When most people try to recreate “that 80s vibe,” you’ll see a lot of paster pinks and purples and people leaning against cool cars with palm trees in the background. You have Miami Vice to thank for that.