Credit: Far Out / Album Cover
Sun 4 October 2026 2:00, UK
Anyone that ever heard Joe Walsh knows why the Eagles needed him throughout their career.
Even though the country rockers were doing just fine creating mellow ballads whenever they made their first records, Walsh lent them their street cred as a legitimate rock and roll outfit, especially when he started sprinkling in his solo songs into a lot of their performances. But whereas most of the band managed to stay fairly still throughout most of their concerts, he was also the one reminding his bandmates that they were being paid to give the audience a show.
If you were to look at nothing but Glenn Frey and Don Henley sitting very still back in the day, singing their songs, you would be bored out of your mind, but Walsh was the kind of fun-loving guy that they needed. If Frey and Henley were the two emperors of the band and everyone else was put on the side, Walsh was the comic relief character who was showing everyone that they could kick some ass every so often whenever they launched into tunes like ‘Life in the Fast Lane’.
But it’s not like he was only giving them his credibility when he joined. He knew that he could get better as a songwriter by watching Frey and Henley work, and you could hear him starting to stretch himself out when working on tunes like ‘Pretty Maids All in a Row.’ His tunes had a lot more maturity to them after he joined, and while it only lasted for a few years, Walsh knew that he had a vision for what his music was supposed to be.
All the way back to the days of the James Gang, Walsh figured that it was all about finding the kind of tunes that could make people want to dance every single time he performed. Rock and roll wasn’t something that the audience looked at and meticulously studied, and if he could get asses shaking through the first few seconds of ‘Funk 49’, he had done his job effectively. But there was a way to go too far.
It’s no secret that Walsh likes to act a little bit goofy every now and again during his shows, but the thought of him getting too theatrical wasn’t in the cards for him. All he needed was to be himself to get people on his side, and when looking at a band like Kiss, he couldn’t help thinking that everything seemed a little too manufactured for him to really co-sign anything that they were doing.
He could respect the musicianship that some of the members had, but Walsh felt like rock and roll wasn’t about the circus atmosphere, saying, “I really want to give people their money’s worth musically. I want them to come and see good players and hear good music, I’m really not into… For me, bands like Kiss have replaced the circus; it’s almost like theatre, you know? I just want to play music, and if that holds up, then I’m really proud.”
Further reading: From The Vault
It’s one thing not to like the music, but you can see where Walsh was coming from whenever you hear Gene Simmons talk about Kiss shows. He is more than happy to give the fans the night out that they deserve, but given that he usually talked about Kiss as an entity and an enterprise most of the time, a lot of the camaraderie that comes with being in a rock band seemed to be lost along the way.
Kiss has become a brand a lot more than a band these days, and while Walsh is guilty of a few sellout moments as well, he knew that his music wasn’t about that kind of approach. He wanted people to relate to the songs rather than thinking of him as some musical superhero, and if one person could see where he was coming from in any number of his songs, that was all he could ask for.
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.