(Credits: The Eagles)
Wed 3 September 2025 19:00, UK
Being in one of the biggest bands in the world isn’t something that happens by accident. It takes a lot of practise and discipline for anyone to become that much of a well-oiled machine, and even if Glenn Frey and Don Henley worked their asses off to turn Eagles into a cultural force, there were always going to be heights that they couldn’t reach.
Then again, Frey liked the idea of reaching as high as he possibly could as an artist, and that was never going to happen if he stayed in Linda Ronstadt’s band.
It paid pretty well and he was able to sustain himself as a musician, but the more he played off of Henley in the group, the more he realised that he was bound to have more fun forming a band with him than keep playing the same setlist every night. And when ‘Take It Easy’ came out, the world got a good look at what their brand of California sunshine sounded like.
But as soon as they got famous, there was always a bit of a stigma surrounding Eagles. They had fantastic songs that few songwriters could hope to make, but there were also people willing to bring them down for no reason. Despite wanting to dream bigger, Desperado fell on deaf ears half the time, and even when they had hits, people were complaining because they weren’t nearly as heavy as a band like Led Zeppelin.
Is that fair? Absolutely not, but the bands don’t get to make the rules that the rest of the world holds them to. Everyone thought that the coolest bands in the world needed to worship at the altar of Jimmy Page, but even if Henley was writing mellow music a majority of the time, it was hard to really fault them every time ‘New Kid in Town’ came on the radio or when they had genuinely great rockers like ‘Already Gone’.
Aside from the Zeppelins and the Floyds of the world, every band that came out after 1964 were always going to be copying from The Beatles’ playbook. The Fab Four had set the precedent for what could be done in rock and roll, and even with all they had going for them as America’s go-to rock and roll outfit, Frey felt that kind of track record was unattainable.
There were moments that worked throughout their catalogue and Hotel California is damn-near perfect, but Frey felt their live performances never matched up to what his idols did even when they started, saying, “[In 1972] we suddenly realized that even with a top ten single we weren’t the Beatles. We realised we weren’t creating mass hysteria and then things started to cool out. I mean we’d be doing ‘Take It Easy’ and everyone would go ‘Oh yeah that’s who they are.’ But you realize that longevity and keeping your band together is what makes it.”
Even if they were only that one band that people listened to but never figured out the name of, that was hardly a knock against them. In this business, melodies matter over anything else, and if an artist like Elton John is never heard from again, people will always remember how ‘Your Song’ made them feel after the oversized glasses and sequinned outfits have long since faded from view.
So, really, the fact that Henley and Frey created music that’s faceless is both a blessing and a curse. Everyone knows their songs and will be singing along for decades to come, but even if they aren’t the most recognisable faces in the world, it was always about the work that they put out rather than being famous.
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