The History of The Eagles: A Review

Don't even try to understand, but if you lived through the 70’s like I did  there is no way to escape this fact: The Eagles (note: it is not really “The Eagles” it is just “Eagles”. However, for purposes of this post they will be referred to as The Eagles to keep me from going crazy) were as important as The Beatles.  For people of the late baby boomer generation,  Glenn Frey and Don Henley are our John and Paul. Except we probably didn’t know their names back then-I’m pretty sure I didn’t know Don Henley was in The Eagles until he sang “Dirty Laundry” in 1982.

The Eagles (left to right): The Take It To The Limit Guy, Glenn Frey, Don Henley, Joe Walsh, The Guy Frey and Henley hated.

There is a new documentary out on Showtime and will soon be on DVD. It is The History of The Eagles and it tells the story of the band and how they hated each other. The  history of the band is ironically full of tension and strive considering they were always telling us to “lighten up while you still can”.

The Eagles started out like most bands: watching Ed Sullivan. If you watch any rock documentaries at all, it seems everybody watched The Beatles on Ed Sullivan and then went out and started their own band. We didn’t in my house. I’m pretty sure my parents thought The Beatles were communists (with "that old long hair") and  Ed Sullivan was probably one too.  I remember watching Ed introduce a mouse puppet named Topo Gigio. This probably explains why I write humor blogs and I’m not in The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

                                                                 Ed and Topo

 

Frey (from Detroit) and Henley (from Texas) somehow meet each other while standing on a corner in Winslow, Arizona. Then a girl in a flat bed Ford stopped and asked them to join her band. That girl: Linda Ronstandt (she wasn’t just another woman). Soon, they found a place to make their stand and The Eagles were formed.

                    I spent most of the 70's drooling over this woman.

The early Eagles were Glenn Frey, Don Henley, the guy Frey/Henley hated, another guy who Frey/Henley hated, and the guy that sang “Take It to the Limit (he had always been a dreamer). They had some really big hits, like “Already Gone” which warned the children of the 70’s “that you’ll have to eat your lunch all by yourself”. They also recorded “Witchy Woman” and “One of These Nights”, which this reviewer hated.

Soon, one of the guys that Frey/Henley hated left the band which today is referred to by Rock historians as “One of the stupidest decisions ever made” because he was replaced by Joe Walsh. Walsh, who was already a big time Rock star at the time, was famous as being the only person ever totally stoned 24 hours, 7 days a week, 52 weeks out of a year.

With Walsh on board, The Eagles released “Hotel California”, which is probably their best album and the title a massive hit song that you have probably heard every day of your life since 1977.  The remaining guy  in the band that Frey/Henley hated (Don Felder) helped write the song, which still galls  them today that they have to share that money with this guy. Soon, the band, fueled by massive amounts of drugs (surprise, surprise) and ego (surprise, surprise) broke up after the album “The Long Run”.

Frey and Felder spent a great deal of benefit concert for the re-election of Alan Cranston yelling at each other because Felder said to Sen. Cranston after Cranston thanked him for coming, “You're welcome, I guess.”  This snarky remark has got to be one of the worst reasons to split up a band since Yoko Ono. Ten to one, Cranston didn't even hear it or understand it. Plus, you are going to gut a cash cow over a perceived slight to Alan Cranston?

This happened in 1980. For the rest of the 80’s, Frey and Henley kept cranking out the (solo) hits. The Eagles reunited in 1994. Frey/Henley finally fired Felder in 2001 and they spend a good deal of Part Two of the documentary explaining this guy is a total jerk because he wants as much money as Frey/Henley and he wasn't even on Miami Vice.

The History of The Eagles is an interesting documentary.  Warning: this is a lot of unpeaceful uneasy cuss words. A lot of talk about drug use.  There is what looks to be a home movie featuring full frontal hippie girl nudity and a couple of still photos of nude women on stage with the boys of summer.

It was interesting to see the shots of the crowds of the various live performances. The crowds back in ’77 seem so young. The ones in ’94  are not quite as young. The crowds in the recent concerts look like quite old. But they still dance to music. Some dance to remember.  Some dance to forget.