The Entertainer is one of Joel’s many songs about record company execs taking advantage of his naïveté. I guess it could be a shot at his wealth, but it’s hard to make it into anything. I know Joel is a liberal, but he usually has taken the position that politics doesn’t belong on the stage, since a good portion of the audience will take exception. I’m a yuge fan, so I hope he leaves it here and isn’t shamed into officially denouncing The Donald.
I heard it as being about the pressures on the 'Entertainer' to continually give the public fresh music and the consequences of not doing so.
If I were to put a Trump spin on it...
Trump is promising the public with something and he must follow through with concrete changes or he will lose his 'audience'.
Trump job is much harder than Joel's though.
The musician creates a song...Trump job is to take a promise and make it reality.
Well we're living here in Allentown
And they're closing all the factories down
Even today, listening to that song chokes me up a bit.