The artist that made Don Henley become a frontman: “This must have”
The frontman might have the most misunderstood role in all of music. Although anyone can claim to want to sing their favoruite songs to masses of people and have everyone eating out of the palm of their hand, the idea of someone having to maintain that energy for hours on end during a show and somehow balance the nerves of playing to that many people is something they wouldn’t wish upon their worst enemy. And for someone as reserved as Don Henley could be behind the scenes, he needed to take a few cues from his musical brethren to grow as a frontman.
Then again, it was much easier for Glenn Frey to do most of the talking whenever Eagles played. He had the gift of gab and was one of the most calming presences in the group whenever he had a guitar in his hand, so even if Henley did most of the singing, he could usually sit patiently behind the drum kit and let the rest of the band do their thing before moving into the next song.
But even in Eagles, not everyone was praising the band for having the greatest show in the world or anything. Sure, their songs sounded immaculate whenever they got up onstage, but since all they did was stand there and play the tunes, it’s easy to see how most people would rather have stayed at home and listened to their records than watch a bunch of statues perform them.
So when those same people had to make the transition to MTV, it wasn’t exactly going to be smooth. Joe Walsh may have been the best possible candidate for the channel with his off-kilter humour, but looking at what Henley did during his prime, he made sure to keep everything close to the chest. His music needed to be taken seriously, which meant drawing on what he saw with artists like Bruce Springsteen.
Outside of listening to other stage performers, Henley said that Springsteen and the comedian Brother Dave Gardener were going to be the key for turning him into a frontman, saying, “I used to have these records by this guy Brother Dave Gardner, and I started drawing on that. He was a sort of southern Lenny Bruce-existentialist Southern humour. I saw Springsteen a couple of times, and that must have influenced me, too-his raps, although the gist of mine is a little different from his.”
But the key differences were also in how Henley carried himself whenever he performed on MTV. There were some stylised videos for songs like ‘The Boys of Summer’, but he knew better than to get dressed up in too many ridiculous outfits. He wanted people to still focus on the music, and when he eventually made his way into the 1990s, songs like ‘The Last Worthless Evening’ and ‘The Heart of the Matter’ are far more tasteful than what people like The Beach Boys were doing.
Then again, Henley wasn’t afraid to speak his mind, either. While he never went out there to deliberately talk about politics, he always wanted to keep the performance spot sacred whenever he played a tune, and that meant continuing to remind everyone about the stories behind the songs every now and then or talking about the community that comes from everyone singing their troubles away.
Even if Henley considered himself to be a decent performer as a solo artist and when he got back with Eagles, there’s no real competing with Springsteen. ‘Golden Throat’ can put every ounce of himself into every show he does, but looking at the state of ‘The Boss’ whenever he performs, it almost feels like the Earth could collapse if the song doesn’t tear the roof off of any arena.
