A Good Day In Hell - The Official ILM Track-By-Track EAGLES Listening Thread

one day and one track at a time. in honor of Joe Walsh. we can do this, people. and may God have mercy on our souls.

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Nb_x-mJ3FFw/TaSm412HHII/AAAAAAAAAaQ/SDDvvEHKOik/s1600/The-Eagles_l.jpg

http://www.walnutst.com/i/products/f1312567200.jpg

here we go...

"Take It Easy"

http://ring.cdandlp.com/groove-vibrations/photo_grande/114363815.jpg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sS442e79mZ0

in the wild...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XByaqHhBFqE

I won't participate unless Ned does.

it's the soft rock shot heard 'round the world. and the world would never be the same. browne/frey at their most browne/frey. plus, banjos.

Something I like about this song: In the last verse, there's a single substitution of an Am where a C has appeared in all the other verses. It's also supported in the vocal harmonies and is unexpectedly sweet-sounding.

it is, in a lot of ways, dumbed down byrds. musically. except for the demented banjos in the background. the vocals are so slow and deliberate and clear its almost as if they were hoping that it would catch on with children. bubblegum country rock? a lot of countru and southern rock from 1970 to 1972 was seriously dusty or backwoods or blues-based or a hippie homage to old bluegrass heroes. this totally cleans all the dust off. but, obviously, this is the genius. simple, direct, and catchy as hell. it was a song designed to be played 4000 times in a row.

As I've said in other Eagles threads, this song exists in the impenetrable part of my mind labeled CHILDHOOD so is kinda untouchable on critical grounds. It came out when I was two-and-a-half years old, and my family was stationed at an Air Force Base in the middle of the Arizona desert. I probably DID hear it 4000x in a row, with my family driving down desert roads with open windows. It was literally created to be the soundtrack for exactly the world I inhabited at that time.

also think its such an appropriate start. and a true test for the cranky. if you can control the desire to feel superior to this song then you are on the path to sainthood. this song is exactly what people hated about this band early on. it is the Urtext of eaglesdom.

When I listened to this song (and this album) the other day, after not having heard the song for years (I don't listen to the radio, like, ever), I was kinda shocked by the banjos. Somehow, they'd never really registered when I heard the song as a kid. Which is weird, because if there's a sound in the world guaranteed to appeal to small children, it would probably be the banjo. I mean, it's the closest thing traditional musical instruments have to that cartoon "sproinggg" sound!

MUSICIAN: Kootch, what was your feeling hearing Don and the Eagles' early stuff?

KORTCHMAR: I'll ell you exactly what my feeling was. When the Eagles first came out, I thought they were absolutely appalling. I couldn't stand them. Absolutely terrible. Especially things like "Peaceful Easy Feeling" and "Take It Easy."'Cause what they were saying was exactly the opposite of what I wanted to hear, what was going on in my life. Take Jackson's "Peaceful Easy Feeling": here's this song that says "walking down the road in Tucson, Arizona, seven women on my mind." (sic) And here I am trying to keep my marriage together, and this guy's got seven women on his mind! God, it sounded like they were having fun, but I sure wasn't (laughter).

http://alumnus.caltech.edu/~markowit/interviews/dh/musician/both.jpg

as with most Jackson Browne covers this sucks some balls compared to the original. yes that includes you Nico, fuck you.

also Kortchmar is misquoting there, obviously.

There are definitely better Eagles songs. This is pretty wimpy stuff.

Pretty cool to see them on the California Jam stage in that clip from the very camera that Ritchie Blackmore would destroy only a few hours later.

it should be noted that this is a standard country and bluegrass song to cover. thousands of country and bluegrass performers have covered this song over the years.

On A Dark Desert Highway: A Vocal Bluegrass Tribute to the Eagles offers heartfelt versions of the band’s greatest songs with soaring harmonies and delightful pickin’ on the banjo, mandolin, dobro and guitar. You won’t believe how beautiful these songs sound in the hands (and throats) of some of the best Bluegrass musicians in the business. If the Eagles had settled in W. Virginia instead of California, this is how their music would have sounded!

http://www.cmhrecords.com/web/images/products/8917_lrg.jpg

do you think that jackson browne oould live off of "take it easy" royalties? not that he has to. but if he had to. i'm going to say yes.

i have a friend whose father wrote a famous song - in the 40's! - and i was kinda impressed by how much money it made the family in a year. not enough to live on, but not nothing either. its a very famous song.

"loosen my load" is such a gross-sounding phrase

Oh man, I never even thought of the sexual connotation there before.

the only thing i have to say in favor of the eagles is that at least they were kinda pleasantly sleazy

just a ragtag band of misfits...

yeah everything about this song is gross, which is compounded by its expert execution. no doubt dudes could harmonize, but not well enough to make me overlook the material or sentiments expressed.... I can think of other harmony or country acts whose singing is so beautiful and intense that it creates a compelling contrast with otherwise bothersome lyrical content, this tension becomes part of the appeal. But the Eagles are not the Louvin Brothers or the Beach Boys. They aren't weird or damaged or desperate enough, nor are they beatific or angelic enough, they're just gross.

xp

at least they weren't trying to sell us abstinence like the malevolent mumford banjo mafia

• I have the best memory of a buddy finally going insane at two in the morning during a poker game when "Take It Easy" comes on and he can't stop laughing over "running down the road, tryin' to loosen my load."

• Rich Hall has this chapter in his Vanishing America about going to Winslow, Ariz., and waiting for a girl in a flatbed Ford to slow down and take a look at him. He gets a ride with her and asks about Jackson Browne. "Kinda quiet," she says and he replies, yeah, that's what he's heard too.

• I'm sure I'll get into it later, but background vocals on Eagles songs scare the shit out of me.

Ok, I think I'm gonna lose my shit about "loosen my load" now.

everything about the arrangement is so uptight, SOMETHING'S gotta get loosened amirite

I imagine a constipated Yosemite Sam running through Roadrunner territory.

Mumford does not take it easy, which sort of makes them worse. The Eagles were hilariously smug and arrogant making lite music. Mumford delivers its music with that annoying faux gravitas, as if it was Important. I'm sure the Eagles though they were Important, too, but only after enough people told them they were, and that probably only came after they were hugely successful and everyone around them was too afraid to say otherwise. "Wow, guys, 'Hotel California' really is like holding up a mirror to America. Like you said, it's about the American dream, but also the American nightmare!"

Song does nothing for me, and never did. Really, the Doobies' "Listen To The Music" is my own personal substitute for "Take It Easy" (not only banjo, it's got steel drums too!) for that 1972 west coast highway-driving feel.

The phrase "There's a girl, my lord, in a flatbed Ford" does sing nice.

I won't participate unless Ned does.

I am avoiding this shit like the plague. Aside from this post, obv.

All right, everyone. Ned's in.

Being from California, these are the songs of your people, correct?

Only Eagle actually from California was Timothy Schmit.

Listen, this isn't the place to start on any of your anti-immigrant rhetoric.

Being from California, these are the songs of your people, correct?

I take great umbrage at this suggestion, good sir

Sorry to get all Soft Rock Civil Defense Corps on you.

All native Californians are from Iowa iirc

"Listen To The Music" is my own personal substitute for "Take It Easy"

i love "listen to the music" to death. its an amazing song when all is sad and done. and the production is arguably just as tightassed as eagles but somehow it opens up into a field of infinite possibilities by the time you get to the psych break where the lazy flowing river does something to the castles in the sky.

lighten up while you still can

apparently frey came up with the flatbed ford line.

http://memimage.cardomain.com/ride_images/1/2179/3261/5446630016_large.jpg

oh fuck, where is my statues thread.

http://maxmccoy.com/blog/uploaded_images/IMG_0174-769036.jpg

Take It Easy is unfuckwithable; tight structure, sweet harmonising, singalong up to your eyeballs. Was this their first song? What pros.

lol @ the reflection

take it easy is ok

but it is sort of impressive, as far as "first song on first album totally defining the aesthetic of the band"

right up there with "black sabbath"/black sabbath/black sabbath

I feel like the first two missing panels of this cartoon involved Mr. Magoo somehow.

http://img571.imageshack.us/img571/9619/hs56.jpg

What's going on in those upstairs windows?

Well, when two trompe l'oeil figures love each other very much . . .

"it's a girl my lord, in a flatbed Ford, slowin' down to take a look at me" is the only contribution Frey made to the song. Save for that one line, the song is written by Jackson Browne whose own version of the song I prefer:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FMA3lIeqV8M

Of course Frey would write the line that makes him look like Paul Newman.

I'm curious about the exact nature of the relationships with those seven women, particularly the one who says she's a friend. Why is that was enough distinction to call her out specifically? Did most of the women he knew not want to be mistaken for being friends with him?

The new RIAA cert for the Eagles' Greatest Hits album is absurd and doesn't mean what most people - including almost every source reporting it - think it means. I'm a total music charts/sales geek and I could break it down in detail, but suffice it to say that A) this is U.S.-only sales; worldwide, Thriller is still the best-selling album of all time by a very large margin and B) RIAA certifications no longer reflect actual album sales and have become almost meaningless to anyone outside the industry. They're now a weird amalgam of album sales (physical and digital), digital singles sales, and streams. Thriller has likely still sold more copies, even in the U.S.

Yep.

good to know. that makes me feel better

in short: take it easy, everyone

No doubt the Eagles have sold more than the last time the RIAA certified those albums, but "selling" isn't streaming, and selling matters not a whit in 2018.

THIS FUCKING PICTURE

https://storage.googleapis.com/afs-prod/media/media:621b972b2d3049ad9bf361b83b46c6ae/800.jpeg

is Don playing bongos on his guitar there

GLENN: Not the first time he awkwardly slapped some bongos...

DON: Well, yeah.

Greatest comment I've seen about the Eagles today, on a friend's FB page about this:

The public like them because their lyrics are decipherable and make singing along easy. Say what you want about their other abilities, but those guys could enunciate.

lol

Hey, everyone. Pleasant Plains here with a new song from the Alternative Nation. Coming out of Boston, the same stomping grounds of Dinosaur Jr., Pixies, Buffalo Tom and Throwing Muses, here's Evan Dando and THE LEMONHEADS with their latest, TAKE IT EASY.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fp8dh6n0t-E

heard "peaceful easy feeling" in the wild today. this makes me want to hear it again. evan dando should stick to suzanne vega, charles manson and love positions covers.

He's definitely learned how to help himself.

Well, yeah

Eight months before HBO’s Leaving Neverland documentary raised new questions about Michael Jackson’s legacy, executives at the late pop star’s record label and estate were pondering another unexpected -- and unrelated -- development involving his business.

Jackson’s 1982 album, Thriller (33 million copies sold), had just lost the status it held for almost a decade as the best-selling album of all time in the United States, ceding the title to the Eagles’ Their Greatest Hits 1971–1975 (38 million), according to the RIAA. Though the two albums have jockeyed for the top spot since the 1980s, trading the lead five times, executives from both Jackson’s estate and Sony Music were stunned by the news that Their Greatest Hits had gained nine new platinum certifications in a single day from the RIAA for the years 2006 to 2018 -- meaning 9 million additional U.S. album sales had been made or discovered over those 12 years.

“After Thriller being the recognized No. 1 album seller in the United States for a decade, we were obviously surprised and concerned when we were overtaken despite all metrics we use stating otherwise,” Sony Music Entertainment CEO Rob Stringer said in a statement earlier in 2019, before the documentary premiered. “All we are asking for is transparency in the process so we can understand how sales numbers changed so dramatically at such short notice.”

apart from Thriller and the Eagles GH perpetually displacing each other, there is another thing that MJ and Don Henley share, which is what I thought of when I read the first clause of the opening graf…no doubt Henley has been mucho nervous for the past 1 1/2 years…

veronica, he's a victim of love

ha ha imagining the day Twitter is like "The Boys of Summer guy got arrested for what?"

Truly, it is The End of The Innocence...

all she wanted to do is dance!

https://i.imgur.com/PzJw95Y.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/ygkSwBj.jpg

all she wanted to do is dance!

On the floor.

In the round.

This guy just left this Half-Price Books after loudly looking for The Long Run on CD. He was asking people, made them search the database, first in-store, then all of the locations in the city. Seriously jonesing to no avail--ended up saying he was going to eBay.

THE LONG RUN

Should've made him blow a gasket by going, "Dude, just get Greatest Hits Vol. II".

today's final jeopardy clue:

"Rolling Stone said this 1976 album had 'the best & worst tendencies of L.A.-situated rock' & was an 'unflattering portrait of the milieu.'"

contestant 1: (nothing)
contestant 2: rumours (not quite spelled out on his screen)
contestant 3: exile on main st.

alex: well, no*

*it's possible that's not exactly how alex phrased it

if contestant 3 ever comes in my record store, oh man, he’ll have a fierce rolling of the eyes likes of which he won’t soon forget

lol

LA-situated? ....Exile?

O_o

Rumours a good guess!

No sorry the answer is Greatest Hits Vol. 1

The answer is Dowse Myself in Kerosene.`

Eagle in the Wild: https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/joe-walsh-nixes-concert-after-gop-ties-revealed-191977/

???

How about https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/the-eagles-to-launch-40th-anniversary-tour-in-2012-176670/

The Joe Walsh lineup of the James Gang haven’t cut an album since Thirds in 1971. “We should record at least four things playing the way that we used to,” says Walsh. “I don’t want to use Pro Tools and I want to overdub, because you can’t do that live. But if we can do at least four things new and get them on the Internet, I think with that and a cross section of the old stuff, we’d have all we need to go out and try and kick some ass. I hope we get to do that in the first half of 2012. I really hope it works out.”

Heh, especially with his namesake running for President, I thought it was Walsh’s ties revealed, not the event’s.

Joe Walsh has a rather decent tune on Sheryl Crow's latest.

IN THE WILD: "New Kid in Town" AND "Try and Love Again."

https://pbs.twimg.com/profile_images/71457152/siren_400x400.gif

I like "New Kid in Town."

They're touring next year boasting shows featuring a full performance of Hotel California plus 'A Greatest Hits set', all w/'Orchestral Backing'.

TS: "with an orchestra" vs. "on ice" as the ultimate shark-jump tour shtick

The orchestra is proving to be a big selling point on the current Who tour. Unfortunately, it’s treacly, predictable as fuck, and pointless. So, while those qualities detract from a Who show, they’ll likely vastly improve an Eagles performance.

Well, there are loads of Eagles songs with orchestration already.

DON: I'm looking forward to going out on the road with the orchestra. We'll finally be able to present our music as Glenn and I had originally envisioned, but were unable for whatever reason to present as such, in concert on prior tours.

GLENN: We always had the budget for orchestras, but drugs, girls, Budweiser, and girls with drugs and Budweiser don't pay for themselves, ya know!

DON: Well, yeah.

Iggles and co.

i bet the orchestral version of Chug All Night fkn slaps tho

Chug In C Minor

Chug Swear Didn't Know C's Minor

in the wild: listening to smuggler's blues on the radio, wondering how and why it isn't a warren zevon song.

"i wish you peace" sounds kind of nice today

no one asked Patti Davis what she thought.

Don Felder is playing at a gun show/outdoor expo in Houston soon.

*Only saw half the commercial last night, but there was gun show footage alongside pics of Felder and co-headliner comedian Tom Papa.

Already Gun