The album Joe Walsh was an emotional wreck recording: “I was angry”
Most artists can’t really hide their feelings when it comes time to write a song. It’s usually about revealing the darkest corners of yourself whenever someone sits down with a pen and paper, and regardless of how well it turns out, any fan can see through any kind of artificial emotion when they’re listening to a tune for more than a second. Joe Walsh never claimed to be anything less than genuine, but that makes for some pretty dark moments when working on albums like So What.
But for the first half of his career, Walsh was the epitome of the good-time spirit of rock and roll. The James Gang had been formed to be one of the best jam bands on the scene, and even if no one needed to think too hard when listening to ‘Funk 49’, it was clear that everyone was having a good time from the minute that Walsh’s iconic guitar lick came screaming in.
Once he ventured into a solo career, though, he was already on thin ice. He had been the hell-raising breed of rockstar for years, but after working on records like The Smoker You Drink The Player You Get, he was gutted to find out that his daughter, Emma, had passed away while he was gone.
Walsh wasn’t thinking about slowing down just yet, but after getting into a massive car accident, Emma would be pronounced dead. And for as many long nights that the guitarist had partying to the wee hours of the morning, there was no way any amount of booze or drugs was going to make him shake that off.
After separating from his wife, the future Eagles guitarist threw himself into the album So What, which is one of the darkest albums that he had ever made. Don’t let the goofy expression on his face fool you on the cover; this man had gone through more than anyone should have had to face, and he leaves nothing to the imagination on the final product.
Thinking back on that era, Walsh recalled being emotionally drained from what he had to do, saying, “I was a wreck. I called it that [So What] because I had this ‘So what’ attitude I was angry. I was really mad at God. And I felt that was a great reason to drink: ‘Poor me. God took my daughter away.’ And so I got an attitude, like, ‘This is the worst thing that’s ever happened.’”
And for all of the raw wounds still being nursed on some of the tunes, it does give way to raw beauty as well. Even when Walsh joined the Eagles, they thought enough of the tune ‘Help Me Through the Night’ to include it as part of their live set on occasions during the Hell Freezes Over tour, which practically served as a recovery anthem once Walsh finally beat the bottle.
But maybe the guitarist had God on his side without even realising it. There had been a lot of hurt that he had gone through to manage to stay standing throughout the 1970s, but once he finally weathered all that pain, he found that he had a treasure trove of iconic tunes left in his wake.
