Eagles - Take The Devil

This "Take the Devil" is a very good early Eagles-sound-sounding song. Compare it to the crap "The Disco Strangler" or even worse "The Greeks Don't Want No Freaks" on the so-so-at-best "The Long Run" and you see how far the Ea-guys wandered off their early path. Lead singer Randy "Take it to the Limit" Meisner and lead guitar Bernie Leadon, both quit/booted.



Can you believe all the cold, ice and zero electricity? But enough about Kim Kardashian and Kris Humphries's Honeymoon. That East Coast winter storm is bad too.

The Kardashian family has issued a statement asking people, due to this rough time in their lives, to continue to utterly disrespect their lack of class, dignity and need for cheap publicity and lack of privacy.

It is so cold and snowy back in New York, in Times Square the hookers are offering a Kim Kardashian special. For an extra $100 they dump your ass cold.

This divorce from Kim Kardashian will be hard on Kris Humphries. Imagine leaving all that behind?


Since you asked:
Reading the new Ben Fong-Torres (Editor "Rolling Stone" portrayed as Cameron Crowe's boss in "Almost Famous" ) book on the Eagles, "Taking it to the Limit." Nothing really big is new, but a truly interesting perspective.

Fong-Torres goes much easier on Frey and Henley then the other books, especially Felder's. . He paints Meisner and Leadon as disgruntled about the direction of the band - away from them - and a general unhappiness with success. Whether they liked or not - and they didn't - the band became the monster it became and they had to accept it if they wanted to stay. And they didn't accept it. Fong-Torres implies they quit and were not fired by Frey as do other accounts.


Meisner literally hated the limelight and Leadon was a bluegrass purest/hippie/surfer/grump. Folks, once again, if you don't like fame and the pressure that comes with it, don't chose to be a rock star or a movie star.

Whether or not Frey and Henley were the blatant song thieves they have been accused (Change a word, get a third) fact is the original artists versions of their songs were not nearly as cool, polished or commercial as Frey and Henley made them. Steve Young's version of "Seven Bridges Road" is a corny folk song. Jackson Browne's "Take it Easy" didn't do nearly as well. Joni Mitchel's chords that created "Best of My Love" vanished on one of her albums.

Frey and Henley had monster solo careers compared to all the other Eagles. Yes, they leaned heavy on collaborators, like J.D. Souther and my buddy, the great guitarist/songwriter, Danny Kortchmar, but the others tried to do that as well and failed.

Believe me, I am a huge Don Felder fan, but the fact is the dynamics of the band had dramatically changed when they reformed after 12 years. It does seem somewhat stubborn to fight over whether you're getting $100 million or $125 million.

Fong-Torres goes very gently on the conspicuous womanizing and drug use using cleverly disguised words like paranoia and jealousy. Fact was Frey was up to something like four grams a day holed up in his post-Eagles home in Santa Fe and Henley was spending mountains of cash on brandy, blow and hookers, ala, Charley Sheen, at his Mulholland Dr. estate.

The Eagles started out thinking this band was a temporary gig with all members believing it was a mere stepping-stone to their own eventual Jackson Browne/James Taylor-like solo careers. Only Walsh knew otherwise, having not liked his experience as the leader of The James Gang. They just boarded a train that kept going faster and faster and it became harder and harder to jump off.

Here is a theory you can utterly ignore. All males in the US between the ages of 8 and 18 in 1968 wanted to grow up to be "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid." Cool, handsome, independent, tough, famous, funny and fun. So did I. So did the Eagles.

Yes, we knew there wasn't an actual future in riding horses and robbing banks, but we all sort of quietly decided we would try and do it as close to that incredible American icon as we could. Me? I thought I was going to be an Olympic Decathlon Sundance with a switch to NFL running back after my gold medal.

The Eagles decided to be Butch and Sundance with their guitars. That is what the entire album "Desperado" is about. And, to their credit, they pulled it off for the most part.

The problem was Butch and Sundance didn't have or need bosses. The Eagles did. Whether it was record executives, managers, producers or concert venue owners, they were always working for someone else and it rubbed them the wrong way, especially Henley and Frey with their huge egos.

Boo hoo hoo, us poor Eagles, we have mean record producers (Glyn Johns) and terrible pressure to increase album sales (Asylum Records and then A & M) The Eagles spent a lot more time drinking beer with hookers (i.e. Cloris Leachman's Agnus) then they spent on the trail avoiding a posse.

The very start of the Eagles was mind-blowing to me. Frey and Henley had come in riding pretty high both with record deals, both very driftwood sculptures and turquoise jewelry heavy bands, Frey with Souther and Longbranch Pennywhistle and Henley with Shiloh.

Both bands bombed and both were broke. Hanging out and the long and narrow bar at the Troubadour now sounds so glamorous due to the names who hung out there, James Taylor, Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, the Doors, Janis Joplin.

But imagine some semi-dive West Hollywood bar with a bunch of failed actors desperate to be movie stars instead of musicians and it is the same vibe: sad, desperate and pathetic. Frey came to Henley with a gig to back Linda Ronstadt at Disneyland for $200 a week including free hotel rooms. They almost pulled hamstrings jumping at the deal.

Meisner and Leadon were far more accomplished in the music business having recorded and toured with name bands, Poco, Flying Burrito Brothers and Ricky Nelson.

David Geffen was one of the all-time opportunist/hustlers. He had an amazing ear for talent, saw the talent in the Eagles and signed them to his "music company" which was held together at this point by Scotch tape and band aids.

Geffen had a connection to a bar in Aspen, the Gallery, and sent the boys there as The Teen King and the Emergencies. There they played to crowds way, way worse than my old band the Railheads. One bartender, two cocktail waitresses and two groupies.

It is hilarious how many people have told me they used to go see the Eagles play in Aspen. That is a bald-faced lie, they weren't yet called the Eagles. In fact, Frey insisted they were Eagles. Not The Eagles.

When I first saw Eagles it was at Arlington Race Track in Illinois in 1975, they were touring to promote "One of These Nights." We got there late because we didn't know who the first acts were and wanted to pass on them: Jackson Browne and Linda Ronstadt. One thing that stuck out was how clean and tight this band was live.

This was an era of some incredibly embarrassing concerts. Grace Slick passed out on the stage and she couldn't sing when she was sober. Saw America at a beautiful venue outside Chicago called Ravinia, and one of them was so drunk he kept falling off of his stool. Under the "No Fun Aloud" rule under Henley, the Eagles made statues look like Joe Cocker.

Some douche-bag threw a smoke bomb on stage and Frey picked it up and burned his hand.

It was love at first sight. All the songs the Eagles did I had previously sort of confused with America, the Doobie Brothers and the Allman Brothers. Hearing all those great songs back-to-back, I was hooked. When Henley sang we were confused. None of the guys standing in front of the mikes were singing and it didn't occur to us the drummer might be singing.

After it is all said and done, the Eagles personality and direction had no choice but to go the way of its most influential member, Don Henley. Despite being wildly talented as a singer and lyricist, far less so as a drummer, it is generally considered common knowledge that Don Henley may be the biggest a-hole who has ever been in rock and roll. Maybe Axel Rose is worse, but only maybe.

OK, I take it back, Gene Simmons and Ted Nugent are way ahead of even Axel as the biggest a-hole in rock history leaving Henley in the dust of a dark desert highway.

Like Azoff, Henley is famously rude and downright ugly to stagehands, roadies, hotel staff, waiters; not to make excuses, but Glenn Frey and the rest of the band had no choice but to adopt and turn into versions of Henley to keep up.

Or quit or get fired, like Leadon, Meisner and Felder.

Let's put it this way: in the Seventies Henley was rocking a perm-white-fro and then, in the Eighties, he had a slicked-back ponytail. Sums it up for me.

In the end, and the fact he is a notoriously bad tipper, that is all you need to know about the guy I once wanted to have a drink with more than anyone, including Eric Clapton.

The "We thought we could change this world with words like love and freedom" Eagles sold out to Wal Mart.

Talk about kissing paradise goodbye.