The only reason the Eagles ever got signed, according to Don Henley: “A lot of credit”
According to Don Henley, one of the only downsides to the Eagles’ success was how small their world suddenly became.
As with most musicians who explode on the same level, striking a balance between the lifestyle and maintaining good health, mental and physical, is a challenge. In fact, many in Henley’s circle ended up succumbing to the downward spiral of sex, drugs, and rock ‘n’ roll, or, at the very least, suddenly realised their world had shrunken and time had gotten considerably shorter with no means of hanging on to a shred of normalcy.
He’d discussed this once, reflecting on how success often comes with an invisible chord, and you either feel tethered to some inexplicable force or boxed in by something just as difficult to put into words. In 1975, when the band appeared on the cover of Rolling Stone, Henley pointed to a Joe Walsh lyric to bolster his point: “You burn the candle at two ends/Twice the light in half the time.”
He went on, explaining how, once you’ve got your dream, your universe “becomes defined to a little square”, and eventually, you don’t know what’s going on outside of your own bubble. At the time, the members were still clutching onto a mentality they had when Henley and Glenn Frey were on the road with Linda Ronstadt – that this was a good money game, and everything else was a bonus.
In fact, Bernie Leadon said precisely that in the same interview, saying that it’s a good project to make ends meet, and it just so happens that the music is worth something as well. He’d explained that they’re different because they don’t just pander to every which way the industry wants them to go in like most people in the pop world, and actually enter the studio and make their own choices.
In the beginning, however, each member had the backing of the scene around them and a few big names in the business. Frey, for instance, lived with JD Souther, and the pair of them eventually moved into close quarters with Jackson Browne. When Frey started frequenting the Troubadour, it was the same time that Henley did and, at first, neither really bothered with each other. “I just thought Glenn was another fucked up little punk,” Henley said.
Eventually, however, their dynamic took flight, and soon enough, they were in front of David Geffen (with whom Frey already had a connection but was shot down after he felt he shouldn’t be a solo musician). The second time he found himself at the serious hands of Geffen, the Eagles had formed and were looking for his approval. At the time, they relied on Leadon to do the talking, having arrived without any taped material to show him.
However, another voice backed them up, bolstering their appeal to the one person they needed the most at the time. As Henley recalled, “Geffen had no idea what we sounded like, and here comes Bernie walking in saying, ‘OK, here we are. Do you want us or not?’ It was a great moment. Geffen kinda said, ‘Well… yeah.’ A lot of credit has to go to Jackson [Browne], who convinced David we were good. Geffen himself couldn’t carry a tune in an armoured car. Still, he kept us alive while we got some songs together and rehearsed by playing four sets a night in a club in Aspen.”
While Browne served as an early champion of the group, it was producer Glyn Johns who eventually inspired them to greatness, giving them the direct, straight-talking treatment they needed to stand apart and not fall into the trap of becoming another polished rock act that would be forgotten after a couple of years. After they realised that wasn’t the case, the world felt a whole lot smaller – but the entity that was the Eagles only grew into its own unstoppable empire.
