In fact, the song was rumoured to be about Stevie Nicks (who Henley briefly dated) and her ex, Lindsey Buckingham, of that other late-‘70s mainstream mellow colossus Fleetwood Mac. Certainly Eagles will have been consuming industrial quantities of narcotics by this point in their career. What could he have possibly meant?ĭruggy excess, for sure, but also just fast, loose living in general. “There were lines on the mirror, lines on her face,” sang Henley. It wasn’t all laidback good times at the Hotel California, as this blistering rocker amply demonstrated - welcome aboard, Joe Walsh, who co-wrote this with Messrs Henley and Frey. Not quite yet, though: New Kid In Town was Eagles’ third No 1 in the US. In the title, Eagles continued the outlaw/cowboy theme mined throughout their work.Īnd oddly in the lyrics the band, probably the biggest on Planet Earth that year, were already casting forward to the moment that they would be usurped by someone younger and, well, better - a faster gun. With Frey on lead vocals and acoustic guitar, this was the first single from the blockbuster monster that was Hotel California. It was also Frey’s idea to create a sort of cinematic scenario for the protagonist entering “a weird world peopled by freaky characters is quickly spooked by the claustrophobic feeling of being caught in a disturbing web from which he may never escape.”Īs for the use of the word “steely” in the lyric, “They stab it with their steely knives, but they just can’t kill the beast,” that was payback to Steely Dan, who had nodded archly to Eagles in their track Everything You Did, from that other 1976 landmark of mellow FM vibes (but watch the fangs), The Royal Scam. Probably the biggest song by America’s biggest ever band, featuring one of the best known guitar solos of all time, rhythmically at least Hotel California patented a brand new idiom, country-reggae - according to Frey, its working title was Mexican Reggae. It worked: peaking at No 2 in the States and No 23 in the UK, Lyin’ Eyes also won a Grammy and cemented Eagles’ position as a massive American band. You will either find it an easy-listening bowdlerisation of the authentic country-rock template, or complete and utter hick-pop harmony heaven.Īccording to Don Felder, Frey’s pickiness and determination to get every note and syllable right was evidenced by his deliberation about the exact pronunciation of the song’s first word “city”. ![]() For me, it would be One Of These Nights.”įrey took the lead on this song about a woman cheating on her husband. If I ever had to pick one, it wouldn’t be Hotel California it wouldn’t be Take It Easy. “It was a breakthrough song,” opined Frey. It also saw a considerable leap in terms of the pair’s songwriting, betraying Frey’s love of R&B. For Frey, who brought the supple rhythm guitar while Don Felder played lead, this was the song where the band’s love of the studio, their sonic immaculacy and attention to getting the sloppy-sharp details just right, came together. The soulful croon was Henley’s, the outlaw mythos (“ You’ve got your demons, you’ve got desires - I’ve got a few of my own”) his and Frey’s. ![]() He recalls: “I would hear these remarks like, ‘Well, you know, I don’t feel much like a desperado.’” The song’s haunting atmosphere was enhanced by the lush strings of the London Symphony Orchestra - Henley remembers “some older gentleman” bringing in chessboards to play between takes to relieve the boredom. ![]() Henley took the lead vocals on this campfire ballad while Frey supplied the poignant piano chords. ![]() It didn’t concern the cocktail of the same name - tequila plus orange juice with a dash of grenadine on top to approximate the dazzling hue of a sunrise - but was about someone guzzling tequila from night till morning, a portent, perhaps, of the hard partying to come for the stadium behemoths.Īnother Henley-Frey co-write designed as part of the parent album’s theme of rock star-as-outlaw.
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