By the summer of 1976, when the Eagles were making their Hotel California album, they were already so far over the rainbow they were shitting pots of gold. When co-founding member and country music missionary Bernie Leadon stormed off, taking his banjo with him after yet another clash over the band’s “direction”, the Eagles stopped masquerading as wholesome weed-and-wine minstrels from Laurel Canyon. They were now playing what singer/guitarist Glenn Frey called “satanic country rock”.
Frey, a James Dean-worshipping Motown devotee from Detroit, had arrived in LA in 1969 playing Chuck Berry covers. For Frey, as with his co-songwriting compadre Don Henley, a lantern-jawed Texan not much taken with fucking around, the country thing was merely a ticket to ride; just what happened to be happening where the Eagles hatched. If they had formed in London instead of LA, they would have been a glam-rock band, no beards or doubledenim allowed.
Indeed, Frey might have been more comfortable – musically, a least – in a glam-rock band. He liked to throw cigarettes into the air and catch them in his mouth – a trick he stole from James Dean. He drew “parallels between rock’n’roll and being an outlaw”, adding: “I feel like I’m breaking a law all the time.”
Similarly, Henley was less concerned with country music as he was with fame and fortune. He liked soul music, and appreciated country, but that wasn’t what fuelled the success of the Eagles. It was the sheer force of personality of Frey and Henley. Glenn and Don. And their desire to be considered in the same 70s category as giants the Rolling Stones and Led Zep.
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Denne historien er fra June 2024-utgaven av Classic Rock.
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Joan Armatrading
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