The song the Eagles actually meant to be a hit: “Our first gold single”
For a band whose disposition is built upon sunny melodies and cool harmonies, the Eagles were a fairly fractious collection of musicians. Led fearlessly by Don Henley and Glenn Frey, they turned backstage violence into on-stage beauty with a discography that celebrated the very best of Americana.
For the most part, Henley and Frey contributed to the band’s finest hits, partly because they were great songwriters and partly because they were the only constants in the band, with members falling in and out around them whenever an inevitable backstage bust-up happened.
But while ‘Hotel California’ and ‘Take It Easy’ reign as some of their greatest hits, showcasing their songwriting prowess that platforms sprawling guitar solos and three-part-harmonies that ooze the Californian sunshine from which they hail, it was another single contributed by one of the more understated players that sold a million copies first.
Randy Meisner was one of the original members of the band, along with Henley, Frey, and Bernie Leadon. While he anchored the bass, he played a pivotal role in developing the band’s three-part harmonies with an acute ability to hit the high notes others couldn’t. While there were many other factors at play, it was his particular singing technique that drove him to exhaustion and his eventual exit from the band in 1977.
But not before he delivered one of the band’s biggest hits, which he wrote and sang lead vocals on. ‘Take It To The Limit’ was the band’s first to go gold, and while you may think that would be a cause of jealous rage for Frey and Henley, it was actually a cause of long relief, for they had been trying to encourage Meisner to step forward with a song for a while.
“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,” Frey once said. “I don’t think we ever consciously tried to make a hit single. We finally succeeded with ‘Take It To The Limit’.”
It was a more bonafide rock and roll take from the Californian band and undoubtedly pleased the charts. But despite their back catalogue of singalong hits, it was surprisingly their first track to go gold.
“That’s the first Eagles single to sell a million copies,” Frey said. “It was our first gold single, maybe our only gold single. People always tended to buy our albums instead. 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.”
Ultimately, Meisner’s signature high note at the end of the track contributed to his eventual exit. In 1977, an ill Meisner refused to perform the song on stage, given the physicality of performing those vocals, and he bid farewell to the band and any future performances of his solid gold hit.
