Credit: Far Out / Asylum Records
Sat 15 August 2026 22:00, UK
While it’s easy to place the Eagles into many different musical brackets, with them having crossed over from country into soft rock at various intervals, one sphere that people often don’t associate with the band is disco.
The genre, born from a mutation of funk, soul and R&B, was taking the charts by storm towards the latter half of the 1970s, with many disco hits immediately landing at the top of the charts upon release. At the same time, Eagles were occupying a different market, charming their listeners with their refined brand of rock and roll that strayed away from the overt macho nature of the bands who had previously dominated this lane. The two, to be frank, didn’t seem to have much room for overlap, and they didn’t need to either.
And yet, despite having conquered the charts with ‘Best of My Love’ in 1974, a song that stayed true to the band’s origins, the temptation to cross over into uncharted territory for the lead single on their next album proved to be too strong, and despite there being little margin for error as they attempted to capitalise on their success, their unexpected foray towards the chequered dancefloors proved to be a stroke of genius.
‘One of These Nights’, the lead single from their 1975 album of the same name, while not strictly disco, possesses something of a disco-inflected beat, and given how inescapable the genre was around this time, it’s hardly surprising that it would find itself seeping into other areas of music subconsciously. Eagles may not have been everyone’s first choice of act to try and produce a crossover hit of this ilk, but they somehow managed to get it straight to number one in the US.
To further emphasise just how much disco was taking over the charts in the summer of 1975, the song that immediately preceded ‘One of These Nights’ at the top of the Billboard charts was Van McCoy and the Soul City Symphony’s ‘The Hustle’, the sole hit for McCoy as a lead artist rather than a songwriter. Immediately after ‘One of These Nights’ was dethroned after just one week at the top, the Bee Gees’ ‘Jive Talking’ went to number one, marking the start of their disco era. Disco was, intentionally or not, in full swing.
Perhaps even more remarkably, this had made the Eagles the first band not considered a disco act to have achieved a crossover hit in this regard, with only Elton John before them having beaten them to the outright claim with ‘Philadelphia Freedom’ a few months prior.
What the band had created was arguably their masterpiece to date, and while it still ostensibly sounded like they were the ones behind the song, with plenty of the same country-tinged elements, close harmonies and blues rock guitar soloing strewn everywhere, the way they’d managed to combine the two disparate styles was truly groundbreaking for the time.
Further reading: From The Vault
While many modern country acts do still appear to want to stay in their lane and play by the strict rules of the genre, there are also many who have chosen to incorporate some of the same driving grooves in the way the Eagles did. Sturgill Simpson’s Johnny Blue Skies alter ego has dipped into disco country in a similar fashion, but it’s ultimately taken five decades for someone else to try and repeat the merger of country, rock and disco.
The Eagles hadn’t just fluked their way to the top; they were trendsetters, and while Don Henley and Glenn Frey may have been laughed off for even suggesting they could do such a thing, they ultimately emerged as the victors in this situation.
