(Credits: Far Out / Asylum Records)
Sun 15 March 2026 18:45, UK
The journey of the Eagles wasn’t a game of chance.
Don Henley wanted to be in the greatest band that California had ever seen, and while they weren’t going to encroach on Brian Wilson’s territory by any stretch, they were certainly going to give everyone at the Troubadour a run for their money when they first began playing. And while it took them a while of shopping around for their first few songs before David Geffen signed them, getting their first album into the world was a lot more mind-expanding than you might have thought.
First off, it should come as no surprise that these guys were no strangers to having a good time with a few drinks here and there. Henley may have been one of the most clearheaded members of the group in many respects, but when they first started recording their debut, even Glenn Frey had to admit to feeling a little bit uncomfortable when producer Glyn Johns insisted on having no drugs in the studio for the entire session. That wasn’t the case later, but Henley at least thought they could get some quality work done.
But all bets are off when it comes to the photo shoots behind the scenes. This is normally the time for people to have some fun doing whatever the hell they want to, and since Desperado ended with the band getting the fire department called on them, the first album cover should be a bit more lowkey, right? I mean, a shot of the skyline as the sun comes up isn’t really the most dangerous-sounding thing in the world, but to get that shot, they needed to immerse themselves a little bit.
They had wanted a shot of the California desert, but before they even made it to the location, they figured that they would stay at the Troubadour bar until closing time before the sun came up over the hills. And while they were in the midst of one of the most barren parts of the country, the band figured that they would have some fun with some peyote that they brought along with them for the trip.
They were cooking some peyote tea right as the sun was rising, but even if it took a while to kick in, Frey remembered freaking out the minute that everything actually hit. Any psychedelic like that isn’t really for the squeamish, but once they actually saw an eagle out in the wilderness, Frey ended up fumbling over himself a little too much when he had to answer the call of nature halfway through his trip.
Right as the photographer was looking to get the shot, Frey ended up stumbling over himself and busting his ass before getting any shot of an actual eagle, saying, “I left the campsite and I could hear the guys yelling, ‘Eagle, Eagle’. I look up and it’s soaring right above me, huge wingspan. I’m struggling to get my pants back up and I fall down. And I could see the bird looking back saying, ‘Eagles, huh? I don’t think so.’”
Even if their flying counterparts didn’t agree with them being the biggest band in the world, there’s something a lot more earthy about the way that the album sounded compared to everything else. They had come off being the sidemen of the greatest country rockers in the world, so getting to bask in the sunlight of the cover was the perfect introduction for a band that was cooking up songs like ‘Take It Easy’.
The cover itself might only be a sunrise, but that’s actually part of the reason why it works so well. Their music was practically a ray of sunshine in and of itself, so if they were going to introduce themselves to the world, this was only a glimpse of the massive musical rays that they were going to give to the world.