(Credits: Far Out / Steve Alexander)
Sun 14 December 2025 18:23, UK
Being in a rock band is a lot like being in a marriage. For all of the hardships that the musicians have to work through together, it’s always about the compromises that result in classic songs, always willing to change with the times to create something timeless. While the Eagles have benefited from having every member add their sonic spice to the music, Glenn Frey thought that one band member helped turn them from a typical rock outfit into one of the greatest bands of their generation.
When Frey first started coming to Los Angeles, though, he thought that his future lay in the sounds of folk music. Working as a duo with songwriter JD Souther, many of Frey’s early songs revolved around stereotypical folk tunes that fell in line with the country-rock movement happening with bands like The Byrds.
While Frey kept kicking around his demos to anyone who would hear them, he finally made ends meet working with Linda Ronstadt. With a lineup that contained many members of the Eagles, Frey eventually convinced Ronstadt to let them go out on their own, resulting in the group’s first lineup with Don Henley, Randy Meisner, and Bernie Leadon.
Even though the band each had their own set of influences, there was a certain standard they had to work at to keep their spot in the band. Getting much of their material from their various collaborators on their debut, it wasn’t until Frey and Henley began writing songs together that everything started to gel.
Working on tracks like ‘Tequila Sunrise’ and ‘Desperado’, the pair developed a unique partnership in rock and roll, bouncing ideas off each other until they found just the right words to fit the melody. While Frey could write songs about being world-weary about life on the road, Henley brought a serious edge to their music.
Outside of the tales of rock and roll excess, tracks like ‘Hotel California’ and ‘The Last Resort’ took on grandiose topics regarding the human condition. Henley took a firm look at how the world treated the planet and what that meant for the next generation. That intense subject matter would only continue into Henley’s solo career, writing love songs with an earnest touch like ‘The Last Worthless Evening’ and ‘The Heart of the Matter’.
Upon reforming for the band’s various reunions, Frey claimed that Henley was the ex-factor that made the band’s songs come alive. Instead of the typical love song formulas, Henley’s way of turning a phrase into art helped separate them from the radio-friendly rock and roll clogging up the charts during their time.
In an interview with Rolling Stone, Frey claimed that Henley’s voice as a writer was the reason behind the band’s success, saying, “Don has an incredible ability to get a message across and be entertaining at the same time. That’s such an important component of the band. You can’t just go tadummm – ‘We’re all going to hell in a Hummer’ –— tadummm. Not being contrived like that is what sets us apart. Without Don, we’d just be love songs and harmonies. We’d be Air Supply”.
At the heart of what the band did was Don Henley, someone with an exceptional attitude when it came to writing music. He captured moments in time like nobody else and approached each song individually with such a specific goal that they became separate entities in their own right.
Henley’s voice also became central to the band’s work, having a silky-smooth register that made fans want to listen again and again. While Frey may have been the one who started the idea for the Eagles in the first place, Henley was always the mastermind turning their sweet ballads into rock and roll masterpieces.
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