The first time Eagles consciously made a hit record: “We finally succeeded”
There’s no denying that the Eagles flew the flag for rock and roll music throughout the peak of the 1970s, whipping up a storm of iconic screaming guitar riffs in the process. But with the nub of artistic genius so often dominated by joint frontmen Don Henley and Glenn Frey, it was rare for other band members to take the helm, and as such across the span of the Eagles’ songbook credit is most roundly attributed to the leading duo.
However, in many ways they wouldn’t have garnered this status if it wasn’t for one breakthrough song – and it happened to be a tune fronted by neither of the main men. It came in the form of a moment in the spotlight for then bassist Randy Meisner, in the song ‘Take it to the Limit’. Written as part of the Eagles’ fourth album One of These Nights in 1975, the track became the band’s biggest hit up to that point and marked the start of an illustrious tenure atop the realm of rock.
According to frontman Frey, there was no bitterness between the band that their breakthrough had come from their unsuspecting pal instead of the real leaders, saying: “I just remember being very happy for Randy.”
It had taken a long road to get to this point, what with this being from the Eagles’ fourth record, so there was likely just a huge sense of relief among them that things were looking up. Frey continued: “We had tried, unsuccessfully, to get a piece of material for him — or from him — that might be a hit single, or turn into one. I don’t think we ever consciously tried to make a hit single. We finally succeeded with ‘Take It To The Limit’.”
But as the singer pointed out himself, the song turned out to be a bit of an anomaly with the hindsight of the band’s full discography. “That’s the first Eagles single to sell a million copies. It was our first gold single, maybe our only gold single. People always tended to buy our albums instead,” he conceded. “We still had hit records, but they wouldn’t sell through as 45s much. We had a lot of number ones, but I know that ‘Take It To The Limit’ was our first gold single.”
That lucky streak translated across the world, breaking into the top five of the American charts and climbing to number 12 in the UK, marking the band’s greatest charge across the pond to that point. Even “when Randy would sing it in Japan — it was mass hysteria,” Frey jokingly recalled. But despite this era of flying high, there was trouble in paradise that lay ahead for the Eagles all to do with Meisner’s fraught relationship with the limelight.
As time wore on, tensions between the bandmates began to heighten, and everything came to a head in 1977 when Meisner refused to perform his signature song on stage due to illness. It led to him breaking from the Eagles’ wings in spectacular fashion and launching out on his own solo career, never again returning to the band where he made his name. It just shows how these things can come back to haunt you – a big hit turned into an even bigger bust up, where the Eagles really did ‘Take It To The Limit’ of their fate.
