I can’t think of a specific reason why it made such an impact
on my summer. It did escalate my interest in the band to unseen new heights.
(Take my advice, if you’re a fan, watch the new documentary on the band, and
for the readers out there, read Don
Felder’s autobiography Heaven and
Hell, My Life in the Eagles).
Now one of the biggest selling acts of all time, including
the best selling artists of the 70’s and the 20th century, in 1973,
the band was a far cry from such a feat. After their debut album fared well
with three well received hits, Take It
Easy, Witchy Woman and Peaceful Easy Feeling, the band was
under pressure, as every band to ever record a debut album is, to up
themselves. The bands main men Don
Henley and Glenn Frey along with
friends Jackson Browne and J.D. Souther had gained attention
towards the true story of the Dalton gang, real life outlaws from the American
Old West.
Already being established as a country/rock band, the band
decided to make a concept album loosely based on the story of Bill Doolin and
William Dalton. The albums first track donned the names of the two outlaws. Doolin-Dalton starts the album off
almost completely with the feeling that it could belong to the soundtrack to an
old western movie. The sound of acoustic and acoustic guitar and harmonica make
you feel like you’re sitting at a campfire, trying to keep warm from the coming
cold night, unable to go home because you’re a wanted man. Eventually all
instruments chime in, including Don and
Glenn sharing and harmonizing
vocals, but it doesn’t lose the feeling of a cold night sitting in front of a
fire.
The album second track, Twenty-One,
changes things a bit by adding a complete country twang sound to the album.
Written and sung by lead guitarist Bernie
Leadon, back when the band was a four-piece and everyone have exceptionally
equal say in the bands direction. Bernie is also featured to be playing most of
the guitars on the song and banjo. The song has a fun feel to it, but is not a
rock song, rather a country song. It does, however, lead right in to the albums
hard rocker track, appropriately titled Out
of Control. The songs got a Chuck
Berry riff to it and speeds things up even more from where Twenty-One left off. These two songs
show the clashing interests between Bernie and Glenn.
The two hits from the album, undoubtedly two of the bands
best known songs to this day, are Tequila
Sunrise and the title track Desperado
(which means outlaw). Tequila Sunrise
is another song that is more of a country song than it is a rock song. Acoustic
guitar driven, just like any good Glenn Frey sung ballad, it’s the sound of
Bernie’s Mandolin that make this song an inescapable country hit. This is then
immediately followed by the piano driven Desperado.
While not actually released as a single at the time, the song has become to
welcome by fans that the band has ended practically every show with this song
in the encore. Before Don Henley was
the voice of the band that he is now, having only sung one of the bands hits
from the first album, Witchy Woman,
this song made him an even more credible singer for the band, which would
eventually lead to the bands management insist that Don sing more songs than
Glenn. But at this point, the bands vocals were still mostly evenly split up.
Side two of the album (this is the first time I’ve ever
really been able to say “side two” and mean it) starts off with bassist Randy Meisner’s main lead vocal
contribution to the album, Certain Kind
of Fool. The song goes back and forth between acoustic and electric
guitars, making it not quite a soft rock song, but not a hard rock song either.
Randy’s voice, as many Eagles fans know from his 1975 hit with the band Take It To The Limit, has a very
soothing sound. Not really suitable for anything hard but perfect for any
softer songs the band may have written. The song furthers the album in to its
cowboy story line, telling the story of a regular boys journey to becoming an
outlaw.
My favourite moment on the album would be the Doolin-Dalton Instrumental, which leads
in to my favourite track on the album Outlaw
Man. The instrumental wasn’t even credited on the back of the original
record cover for the album, it just served as an untitled intro to Outlaw Man, but it takes the album in
to new heights in terms of being a country rock album. It has very heavy use of
Bernie’s signature banjo playing skills with acoustic guitars accompanying it
playing the tune to the albums opening track. Outlaw Man, however, is the polar opposite to the instrumental. It
is dark, undoubtedly the darkest song the band has ever recorded. Originally
written and recorded by a man named David
Blue, the Eagles borrowed the song and turned it in to the albums second
single. While at the time it got airplay, it unfortunately became a much
forgotten song by the band.
The album goes back to its soft rock sound with Saturday Night. This song is still
played live every now and then by the band for the bright eyed fan that misses
this era of the band. It features Don on lead vocals, with Randy chiming in
with a secondary lead vocal. This is followed by Bernie Leadon’s second lead
vocal song from the album, Bitter Creek,
a slow, soft and somewhat dark sounding track, written after George “Bitter
Creek” Newcomb, a member of the gang that this album is written about. This is
then followed by the albums concluding track, Doolin-Dalton/Desperado, a reprise on two of the albums greatest
moments, merely playing both songs in a melee of 4 minutes and 51 seconds,
adding different lyrics to the same rhythm of both songs.
At the time, it turned out that this album was the worst
possible thing the band could have done. Record companies, and fans alike, did
not want a “cowboy” album, which is what forced Glenn to take even more charge
of the band to take them to a more rock sound, even eventually going as far as
firing legendary producer Glyn Johns
who produced the first two and a half albums by the band. This transition also
slowly pushed Bernie out of the band. If Bernie had his way, the band would be
a country band, but he was willing to compromise and meet the band in the
middle if they were willing to do the same, which was the case for the band’s
debut album and this one as well, but less so for the next two albums, which
would be Bernie’s last two albums with the band. Fortunately he has recently
rejoined the band as a guest on their current tour, in which they play songs
from the early albums that haven’t been played in years.
The album has since made its way back in to fans hearts,
after the success of later albums. It shows an era of the band that was still
very fresh but showed maturity beyond their years. As mentioned, it features
two of the bands biggest hits, and some songs that the band has even brought ban
in their set for their current tour, which has been hinted may be their past.
ALBUM HIGHLIGHT
“Saturday Night” – I know what you’re
thinking, why not Tequila Sunrise or
Desperado? Simple, while this is a “cowboy”
album, those two songs are probably the two least “cowboy”-esque songs on the album
(which is probably why they ended up being the biggest songs at the time).
Saturday Night has every bit of heart and feeling to it as those two tracks, but
at the same time it keeps an old west feeling to the album. I would say this
song would give a first time listener a better idea of the albums sound over
the two hits from the album.
FINAL RATING
9 (Out of 10)
Track List:
Side one
- "Doolin-Dalton" – 3:26
- "Twenty-One" – 2:11
- "Out of Control"– 3:04
- "Tequila Sunrise"– 2:52
- "Desperado"– 3:36
Side two
- "Certain Kind of Fool"–
3:02
- "Doolin-Dalton
(Instrumental)" – 0:48
- "Outlaw Man"– 3:34
- "Saturday Night"– 3:20
- "Bitter Creek" – 5:00
- "Doolin-Dalton / Desperado
(Reprise)" – 4:50
No comments:
Post a Comment