The Eagles member Linda Ronstadt called “the best source for singers”
Artists like Linda Ronstadt were always on the hunt for the next great song.
As much as singers like the idea of creating showstopping tunes out of anything they can get their hands on, you’re not going to touch people’s souls unless you have the right combination of lyric and melody to put everything around. And Ronstadt always knew that she could count on some of the best people in the business to work with her on whatever album that she wanted.
Then again, her taste in her own voice had led to everything being swapped around a few times. As much as she was indebted to the country rockers back in the day, like JD Souther, she was never afraid to take a chance on someone who had a little bit more nuance to their writing as well. She knew that Randy Newman and Warren Zevon had the potential to create beautiful tunes, and even if she didn’t have the most confidence in her rock and roll voice, there’s a reason why a song like ‘You’re No Good’ sounds fantastic coming out of her.
But when Ronstadt approached her craft, it was never in the same way that everyone else focused on their tone of voice. Whereas someone like Mick Jagger might focus on getting the right attitude across to the crowd whenever he performed with The Stones, Ronstadt had to be aware of the kind of lyrics she was singing half the time. The measure of any good vocalist is to sell someone on the song, and that meant having to understand the tune so they can deliver it properly.
And that kind of mentality is also what drove Glenn Frey and Don Henley when they started working on their own. Eagles needed to make sure that any song that wound up on a record was perfect, and even if it didn’t fit Henley or Frey’s voice, they knew that whatever they did could work with Bernie Leadon’s lower voice or the soaring high harmonies of Randy Meisner in the early days.
Frey was happy to be free from being a salaried musician, but he never forgot about Ronstadt, either. He had a great deal of respect for her taking chances whenever she could, and when she was in search of the right rock and roll song, she remembered that Frey would always be there to recommend the perfect tune for her to work on.
When combing through material, Ronstadt felt that Frey knew exactly what suited her voice when he talked her into recording the song ‘Back in the USA’, saying, “Glenn Frey is the single best source of material for singers. He’s got stacks of cassettes he’s made of all these different things. ‘Back in the USA’ came on and I said, ‘God that would be a great song to sing. I think I’ll do that one.’”
And while Ronstadt isn’t normally the first person most think of as being a connoisseur of Chuck Berry, she made the song her own much better than any of her contemporaries would. This was the era when punk and new wave were first starting to break into the mainstream, so hearing her tackle this song along with Elvis Costello actually was a breath of fresh air from listening to Devo gradually deconstruct the concept of rock and roll.
While Ronstadt was far from the first person to say that her rock voice was her strongest asset, the real magic behind her vocals always came when she found songs like this. It’s not exactly the most demanding song in the world, but even if casual fans could sing along to it, they were never going to have the same passion as she did.
