The song that transformed the Eagles, according to Glenn Frey
If you somehow found yourself in a time machine, there would be a hefty list of iconic music eras you would send yourself to. And while it may not be top of the list, nor the most controversial, no one would begrudge you for saying you’d simply like to be sent back to 1970s Los Angeles, in the driver’s seat of a convertible, listening to the Eagles.
While they may have typified a brand of smug, whitebread, unthreatening rock and roll, there’s a little part of all of us that can’t help but envy the level of old-school Hollywood opulence they enjoyed. During that decade, the Californian rockers were the sonic embodiment of free and easy West Coast living – although the atmosphere behind the songs was anything but. And no song typified this disposition more than their first single, ‘Take It Easy’.
The band’s signature harmonies are front and centre of the tune, which flutter around the song’s blue sky composition like a convocation of the bird they use as their namesake. It’s accessible, catchy, and, for the most part, optimistic. The borderline sleaziness of a song that somewhat celebrates the strain of struggling romantic partners seems to be in keeping with the reputation of the band and singer of this track, Glenn Frey. But despite the fact he occupies the character of the song wholeheartedly, the song’s genesis wasn’t his responsibility.
No, for that, Eagles fans can thank Frey’s Los Angeles neighbour and fellow musician, Jackson Browne. At the time, both artists were working on their respective debut albums, and when Browne played the basic melody of ‘Take It Easy’ and admitted it was something he’d been struggling to finish, Frey’s ears perked up.
“I told him that I really liked it,” Frey recalled. “‘What was that, man? What a cool tune that is.’ He started playing it for me and said, ‘Yeah, but I don’t know — I’m stuck.’ So he played the second unfinished verse and I said, ‘It’s a girl, my lord, in a flatbed Ford, slowin’ down to take a look at me.’ That was my contribution to ‘Take It Easy,’ really, just finishing the second verse.”
The next part of the story is to be interpreted at your own will, as Frey’s own delight at picking up what would become his band’s calling card hits has surely clouded his perception of how enthused Browne was to see it go.
“Jackson was so thrilled,” Frey added. “He said, ‘OK! We co-wrote this.’ But it’s certainly more of him. Sometimes, you know, it’s the package without the ribbon. He already had the lines about Winslow, Arizona. He’d had car trouble and broken down there on one of his trips to Sedona. He spent a long day in Winslow. I don’t know that we could have ever had a better opening song on our first album. Just those open chords felt like an announcement, ‘And now … The Eagles.’”
And Frey was right; the song became the perfect track to introduce the world to the Eagles, typifying the country-rock sound they would go on to define. It became somewhat of a soundtrack for the sunglass-wearing, coastal living life their music so proudly celebrated, something Don Henley thinks attributes to the overall success, telling Rolling Stone: “The song’s primary appeal, I think, is that it evokes a sense of motion, both musically and lyrically. The romance of the open road. The lure of adventure and possibility – Route 66, the Blue Ridge Parkway, Pacific Coast Highway”.
