The 1966 album Don Henley and Glenn Frey both called the greatest: “Overwhelmed”
Don Henley and Glenn Frey didn’t want to get into the music industry to be another great rock and roll band.
Eagles were supposed to fly way higher than anyone ever thought, and by the time that they reached the end of the 1970s, they had turned themselves into the greatest hitmakers of all time. They came at a high price once Frey broke up the band after an argument with Don Felder, but if he and Henley had the same goals in mind, they were always going to create something spectacular.
Because when looking through all of their records, it was always building towards Hotel California in one form or another. They did play around with a few more country tunes in their early days and maybe even threw in some strange detours that took them nowhere, but every single record was a different learning experience for them. They wanted to create music that no one had heard before, but the main objective was to hook in the listener from the very first notes they played.
Everyone knew the opening strums of ‘Take It Easy’ or the acapella opening of ‘Seven Bridges Road’, and that all came from them internalising the lessons people like The Beatles had to teach them. And while Billy Joel thought that the band was at least on par with the Fab Four in some respects, Henley and Frey both figured that The Beach Boys were one of their biggest influences.
Then again, anyone growing up in California would have said that they were shaped by Brian Wilson in some form. Wilson was the modern pop genius whenever he got behind the mixing board, and even though the rest of the world would have been happy if he kept making songs all about cars, surfing and young love, he had a lot more to work with when he got the idea for Pet Sounds.
Every single instrument had to be absolutely perfect, and when Frey first heard the record, he was knocked out that it could have come out of one person’s head, saying, “John Lennon told Brian Wilson this was the greatest record he’d ever heard. It’s not three chords and an attitude. It’s so sophisticated. I was overwhelmed.” Frey may not have been able to tell Wilson about the inspiration, but considering how much Henley loved the album, the guitarist may have got off the hook easily.
Wilson was known to be cordial with virtually anyone who liked his music, but even when Henley had stars in his eyes when asking the legend to sign a copy of the record, the musical genius couldn’t help but get a few jabs in, saying, “I took a Sharpie from the table in the dressing room. I wrote on his record, ‘To Don: thanks for all the great songs. Brian Wilson,’ Don was so grateful. It was almost like he couldn’t talk. He turned to leave. ‘Hey Don,’ I said. ‘Wait a second.’ I took the record back, crossed out ‘great,’ and wrote ‘good.’”
That might sound pretty brutal, but anyone who got the nodding approval of Brian Wilson would have probably been floating on air for a few days. Wilson could be extremely candid about his opinions, and while the Eagles did have a few songs that seemed to pull from The Beach Boys a little too much, they created a sound that was all their own whenever they worked on some of their classics.
Wilson was proud to be a link in the chain of music history, but Henley and Frey seemed to soar even higher whenever they played most of their hits. They were looking to be a band that could do Wilson proud whenever they made a record, but there are certain masterpieces in their catalogue that even manage to outshine some of Wilson’s greatest work on tracks like ‘Desperado’ and ‘Wasted Time’.
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