Credit: Far Out / Steve Alexander
Fri 18 September 2026 20:30, UK
Being in Eagles isn’t that easy a tightrope to walk all the time with Don Henley and Glenn Frey at the helm.
They knew what they had in mind for their band, and they were going to do everything they could to make sure that everything was right whenever they worked on their record, and if you were in their way, they were going to go right over you. That’s not always the best kind of position to be in, but if you ever tried to stop them from flying in any way, none of the members was willing to forgive and forget all the time.
Just ask what happened to Bernie Leadon back in the day. They weren’t nearly the band of brothers that they had been when they started making records in the early 1970s, and after Leadon poured a beer over Frey’s head backstage at a show, he knew that he was no longer needed in the band. They had grown too far apart from him, and the idea of having Joe Walsh and Don Felder playing off each other was a much better partnership than anyone could have imagined.
No one really needed to see Walsh join the band, but he was incredibly necessary for bringing that rock edge back into their sound. Felder could play like no one else, but there were more than a few times when Walsh could kick their songs in the ass a little bit when they played them live. He could add the perfect solo to whatever they were doing, and there were more than a few times where he turned ‘Already Gone’ into the fierce rocker it was always supposed to be when they first cut it.
But the biggest outlier in the band for the longest time was Felder. He was usually keen to shut up and let the rest of the band sing their hearts out whenever they played their gigs, but all that resentment for so long started to get to him a little bit. So when he had a massive argument with Frey in the middle of a set, it wasn’t like he was looking forward to being in the band for much longer.
For a brief moment in time, though, it did look like the band had put the past behind them just a little bit. Hell Freezes Over showed all the members on good terms for the first time in a while, and Felder even seemed to be having fun playing every show, but when he started to see the kind of negotiations that went on behind the scenes, his taking exception to getting paid less was all that he needed to get the permanent axe from the band.
The guitarist would have been fine having a conversation and clearing things up, but ever since the day he was removed from the band, he has never been able to get back in contact with Frey ever again, saying, “[I was surprised by] the anger that was displayed, and the bitterness, especially from Glenn. It really left me taken aback that he was still so angry about all of that, and I couldn’t understand why, to tell the truth. I’ve been way past it for about ten years now.”
Further reading: From The Vault
And when you look at History of The Eagles, you do feel for Felder in a few scenes, looking back at their career. He wasn’t shafted all the time, but when you look at the kind of camaraderie that he wanted out of his bandmates, seeing him almost on the verge of tears in his final scene tugs at your heartstrings, especially knowing that he and Frey never got to properly make up before the singer’s tragic passing.
It’s hard to judge what a reunion between Felder and the band would have been like, but he didn’t want to dwell on the past, either. He liked the idea of moving on to bigger and better things whenever he got the chance, and even though he missed the friendship he had with his bandmates, he was ready to move on and make a name for himself if the time called for it whenever he played guitar.
ADD AS A PREFERRED SOURCE ON GOOGLE 
The Far Out Classic Rock Newsletter
All the latest Classic Rock content from the independent voice of culture.
Straight to your inbox.