The Eagles album Don Henley said predicted their downfall: “Fame is fleeting”
Any band that thinks they can spend their entire lifetime at the top of the charts is practically delusional. Whether it’s the world of film, music, or the written word, no one in the entertainment industry is entitled to be in the spotlight for the rest of their lives, and even if they are put on that pedestal, there’s bound to be some moments where their career takes a beating or their reputation becomes a little bit strained. And from the moment that Eagles first began in the early 1970s, Don Henley always had the sense that the whole thing could be over instantly if the wrong thing happened.
After all, the fact that they got famous in the first place seemed like a fluke half the time. Each of them had put in the hours to become superstars, but since there had been plenty of artists who had done the same thing with arguably better songs in their opinion, the fact that they were chosen as one of the biggest names in California for tunes like ‘Take It Easy’ was bound to mess with everyone’s head.
Henley and Glenn Frey always imagined themselves being in a great rock and roll outfit, but they never anticipated everything happening so quickly. They needed to strike again while the iron was hot, but when people picked up the album Desperado, most were more than a little bit confused by what they heard. They expected country-rock, but perhaps not this much country in the mix.
Bernie Leadon may have been their trademark country and bluegrass player, but their decision to make an entire concept album based around the modern idea of an outlaw rubbed some fans the wrong way. They only wanted songs that made them feel like driving down the open road, so why were they suddenly being subjected to tunes that had to do with gunslingers from hundreds of years ago?
Well, they could call it career suicide if they wanted to, but this was something that the band needed to get out of their system. Most of them knew how fleeting fame could be, so by telling the tales of the ne’er-do-wells that died with their boots on was a poetic way for them to talk about how their own time in the sun might be over.
Henley certainly endorsed the theory of it being a symbol of their own demise, saying, “I think the overriding premise was that fame – or notoriety – is a fleeting thing. We were commenting on the ephemeral nature of success in the music business (and the outlaw business). We were attempting to presage our own demise. Problem is, we – or at least our body of work – lasted much, much longer than we would ever have suspected.”
Even if the album met a few deaf ears in its time, the fact that they went through the same kind of concept again and made it work on Hotel California was a masterclass in growth. People might not have known what it was all about when talking about gunslingers, but if the songs have riffs like ‘Life in the Fast Lane’ and are coated with a neon look at Hollywood, there’s a good chance they were going to get on board.
The Long Run may have been the moment where they officially ran out of gas for a while, but Desperado is still a fascinating curiosity for the band’s middle period where they weren’t sure what they were supposed to be. It was anyone’s guess where they would go, but they knew that if it all blew up in their face, they would have seen the whole thing coming from a mile away.
