Say something charitable about the Eagles.

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A band that I heard often enough in various contexts that I never needed or wanted to get anything by them since I didn't care any more than that. Hating them may seem kneejerk to some, but actively caring about them isn't much to my taste either.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Friday, 20 June 2003 00:16 (twenty years ago) link

I'm surprised their sexism hasn't come up more here, as I seem to remember that being one of the main things so many seventies critics despised about them. Which, in a way, I don't really get, given how many other sexist critics favourites almost always got a free pass (Costello, Stones, Dylan, even, you could argue--as a feminist organization once did--Bruce Springsteen--because he kept referring to women as "little girl" in his songs). Or if they didn't exactly get a free pass, they got credit for producing a "contradictory" or "difficult" response to their music. But not the Eagles--they were just out and out Evil. Anyway, "Lying Eyes," "Already Gone," "Take it to the Limit," "Take it Easy," and "Hotel California" are all great songs, though they put some clunkers on the radio as well.

― scott woods (s woods), Friday, 20 June 2003 00:18 (twenty years ago) link

[sorry that last post was partially in response to Michael Daddino, and Alex's "pretty mama" comment, which I assume he thinks is creepy or sexist or something...]

― scott woods (s woods), Friday, 20 June 2003 00:28 (twenty years ago) link

Would it be hypocritical for me to say that my gut repulsion towards the Eagles isn't based on the sexism per se so much as the finger-pointing paranoia which just so happens to be sexist? A tendency that I might add is of a piece with Henley's solo career, where goes and points his finger in some other directions (even some worthy ones) and sounds even more like a twerp for doing so, like in "Johnny Can't Read" or that greatest hits add-on clunker whose name temporarily escapes me and a couple others. As for Frey, eh, I don't know.

Which doesn't really answer the question of why Dylan, the Stones et al. get away with their rage. (Maybe that's why I've never wholeheartedly loved them, either, except for Costello and even then not his most enraged stuff, unless Blood and Chocolate counts, which it probably does.)

― Michael Daddino (epicharmus), Friday, 20 June 2003 01:32 (twenty years ago) link

dylan's music bores me as much as the eagles' music. as for the stones and elvis costello, most of their music doesn't bore me. plus some of the more notorious stones/sexist songs i think are funny and the women in question deserve whatever bile mick tosses at them (like "stupid girl" and "star star," the subject of the first being a dumb-ass yenta and the subject of the second being a groupie).

― Tad (llamasfur), Friday, 20 June 2003 01:41 (twenty years ago) link

I was at a flea market last weekend, and somebody had some crates of old records that they were selling, and someone pulled out an Eagles LP and put "Take It Easy" on the turntable, and almost immediately everyone in the vicinity started nodding their heads and tapping their toes - the song is just infectious, you really can't resist it. (Though once you've been through the chorus the first time, you might as well lift the needle off and put it away for another day, because you've heard enough.)

Johnny Cash's cover of "Desperado" is also quite nice.

― o. nate (onate), Friday, 20 June 2003 01:43 (twenty years ago) link

the song is just infectious, you really can't resist it.

TS: the eagles v. SARS!

― Tad (llamasfur), Friday, 20 June 2003 01:49 (twenty years ago) link

Except that people don't seem to enjoy having SARS.

― o. nate (onate), Friday, 20 June 2003 01:58 (twenty years ago) link

I bet some CREEP does

― Andrew Thames (Andrew Thames), Friday, 20 June 2003 02:01 (twenty years ago) link

Was this a Flea Market for the Extra-Chromosoned?

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Friday, 20 June 2003 02:01 (twenty years ago) link

Except that people don't seem to enjoy having SARS.

i wouldn't, either. although if the alternative is listening to the eagles, and since SARS isn't necessarily fatal (if caught early enough) ...

― Tad (llamasfur), Friday, 20 June 2003 02:02 (twenty years ago) link

The End of the Innocence is kind of a pretty song. Boys of Summer is great. I liked the Eagles themselves fairly well when I was a kid and really liked Desperado. I would never willingly put them on now, I don't think, but if I hear it, I don't run screaming.

― anthony kyle monday (akmonday), Friday, 20 June 2003 02:10 (twenty years ago) link

Also, Don Henly hates record companies right now and has been doing some work with Jenny Toomey in the Future of Music Coalition arguing for better artists rights, so, good for him.

― anthony kyle monday (akmonday), Friday, 20 June 2003 02:11 (twenty years ago) link

1. playing that riff from "life in the fast lane", however cheesy, brings joy and encouragement to every first year guitarist who learns to play it. some of these guitarists go on to make wonderful music

2. the one with the long hair's kinda cute

3. they're easy targets for the jokes of elitist hipsters who're afraid to like anything a)their parents listen to and b)release the 2nd highest grossing album in history

4. their horribly almost proggy usage of harmonising guitar solos hides the fact that harmonising guitar solos can seriously kick ass, thus making it more likely that people will be surprised when and if i use them tastefully and my fanbase will be ever the more rabid

5. ditto on the langley school comment

― Felcher (Felcher), Friday, 20 June 2003 03:28 (twenty years ago) link

'highest grossing'???

― James Blount (James Blount), Friday, 20 June 2003 03:30 (twenty years ago) link

"God's Own Singer" written by Bernie Leadon before he joined the Eags is a right nice song.

Donny wore his hair real nice some say...

― thomas de'aguirre (biteylove), Friday, 20 June 2003 03:41 (twenty years ago) link

Don't think any -ism has ever been the main motivation behind Eagle-bashing. No matter how many records they sold, their misogyny could never mean as much as the Stones' because they weren't capable of making it sharp enough.

The reputation of "The Boys of Summer" on this board is starting to snowball, which I'm fine with, misogynist or not.

― b.R.A.d. (Brad), Friday, 20 June 2003 04:01 (twenty years ago) link

I like the Eagles, but I own nothing by them and I have been known to bash them to score conversational coolness points. "All the hypocrites in the house, raise your motherfuckin' hands in the ayyyurrrr!"

Jackie N. and I used to listen to his sister Belinda's copy of The Long Run when she wasn't home. Sam S. and I rocked out to "Witchy Woman," and Scott H. and I used to sing "Take It Easy" when we went over to the elementary school gym to dunk on their little hoops. But I've never really met many women who love the Eagles.

― Neudonym, Friday, 20 June 2003 04:10 (twenty years ago) link

Oh man, I just listened to The Long Run and it is so good. "Teenage Jail" is great - sounds like a Black Sabbath song, with a synthesizer solo (maybe something from Sabotage)! The transition from "Teenage Jail" into "The Greeks Don't Want No Freaks" is among the funniest on any album ever! Also, I still can't really tell "The Long Run" and "Heartache Tonight" apart, but they're both great.

― Mr. Diamond (diamond), Friday, 20 June 2003 04:14 (twenty years ago) link

Do you like "The Disco Strangler"?

― Jody Beth Rosen (Jody Beth Rosen), Friday, 20 June 2003 04:16 (twenty years ago) link

oh yeah JBR why hasn't anyone sampled that guitar riff?

― Neudonym, Friday, 20 June 2003 04:22 (twenty years ago) link

yeah, "Disco Strangler" is great! (read you on it today, too)

It's funny how thin and whispy the guitar sound is! Like you wouldn't expect a band like them to attempt something like that, it's almost .. vulnerable.

And that kick-hihat (boom-tchik) sound is so not disco (hi-hat's would never be clipped off like that) it makes you wonder if it's this intentional piss-take or this horrible misapprehension!

(it's the same pattern on Zep's "Bron-Y-Aur Stomp" and um, some other cut that came to mind when I was listening but I forgot)

― Mr. Diamond (diamond), Friday, 20 June 2003 04:27 (twenty years ago) link

also, another totally weird thing about it is that it has no discernable melody, Henley just moves between two notes, stretching syllables and fighting the rhythm. Very strange cut.

"King of Hollywood" really sucks though.

― Mr. Diamond (diamond), Friday, 20 June 2003 04:36 (twenty years ago) link

They invented the word culetos. Or is it colitis?

― colin s barrow (colin s barrow), Friday, 20 June 2003 04:42 (twenty years ago) link

The American Pink Floyd. Glenn Frey was a very underrated guitar player. I think his leads on 'Long Run' are better than Walsh's and Felder's. Also the keyboard solo on "Teenage Jail" is the most fucked-up thing I ever heard in my life. I learned how to play it on the piano and did it over and over to annoy people. It's such a crap solo that everyone KNEW I was doing it to annoy them. But then, the synth solo from Van Halen's "Jump" is even worse, but when you play that one ppl think you're pretty skilled for some reason. I'll never understand ppl who don't play instruments.

― dave q, Friday, 20 June 2003 07:15 (twenty years ago) link

I'll cop to this: I hate them for what they represent, whereas the music is overplayed but often tolerable. I can't think of a single Eagles track that I LURVE (and the love-in for "Take it Easy" mystifies me, since that's one of their worst songs!) with the possible exception of "James Dean," but "Best of My Love" and their cover of Tom Waits' "Ol' 55" are both very nice. "Those Shoes" is really good atmospheric coke music, and "Heartache Tonight" is pretty okay within the context of seventies-revival radio.

I don't understand Chuck's claim that they 'rock', since they almost never rock, either in the Little Richard earlyearlymorning sense nor in the Kiss Detroit Rock City sense, nor even in the 1-2-3-4 Ramonesy sense. "Life in the Fast Lane" comes closest, but even it peters out into synth-boogie about halfway through. And the lyrics suck.

― J (Jay), Friday, 20 June 2003 10:33 (twenty years ago) link

it's pure cocaine stardust fm radio and indirectly responsible for the beachwood sparks andd the cosmic rough riders. more later!

― doom-e, Friday, 20 June 2003 10:37 (twenty years ago) link

re 'Little Richard' - "Out of Control"? "Chug All Night"? "James Dean"? OK maybe those weren't their finest moments tho...but the most amazing thing about this thread is Chuck Eddy dismissing the 'social context'! (btw where's the love for "After the Thrill is Gone", it's the most jaw-dropping rich-famous-rockstars-have-feelings-too! affrontery I've ever heard (cuz it's SOOOO downbeat, not even a 'well at least we still get to play music!' vibe that lets everyone 'excuse' "Life in the Fast Lane"), 'American Life' and 'The Wall' are like monastic repentance in comparison

― dave q, Friday, 20 June 2003 10:48 (twenty years ago) link

The original lineup was the Monkees' secret comeback (Henley=Dolenz, Frey=Jones, Leadon=Nesmith, Meisner=Tork, even Azoff=Don Kirshener). They lost me when Walsh joined, although everything he was involved in up to then was finestkind, was most of "Life's Been Good." But speaking of so-hip(pie)-it-hurts drole playing (which Warren Zevon does much better, for better or worse), methinks the desperadudes doth protest too much ("Get Over It" indeed, sez the umpteenth reunion tour poster where "Life in the Fast Lane" is the "Born in the USA" of misinterpreted-by-the-audience-they-purport-to-condemn anthems from the 1970s).

Still, I love playing their stuff on guitar, especially "Take It Easy," "Already Gone," "On The Border," even "Hotel California." Great at parties, 'cuz the girls know the words, too. Same with "Desperado" on piano (and "Jump" too, although I skip the Styx soloing).

PS Nice Big Pussy move on Don Felder.

― Chris Clark (Chris Clark), Friday, 20 June 2003 11:34 (twenty years ago) link

wait, are you saying you play guitar at parties?

― g--ff c-nn-n (gcannon), Friday, 20 June 2003 12:59 (twenty years ago) link

their harmonies, like csny's, have a strange way of lulling me to sleep. but they were ace pop songwriters, and "new kid in town" is pretty much perfect.

― fact checking cuz, Friday, 20 June 2003 13:12 (twenty years ago) link

Well, I don't think that any member of the Eagles have raped or murdered anyone. That's about the best thing I can say about them.

― Matthew Perpetua (Matthew Perpetua), Friday, 20 June 2003 13:14 (twenty years ago) link

DON FELDER KILLED MY GRANDMOTHER!

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Friday, 20 June 2003 15:25 (twenty years ago) link

That's "something charitable"?

― Jody Beth Rosen (Jody Beth Rosen), Friday, 20 June 2003 16:05 (twenty years ago) link

Whateva. Y'all are too caught up in the vogue. Hotel California is probably the greatest song ever written. THERE, I SAID IT!!!! The album version won't prove this however, as the outdated production is quick to prove. Anyone seen the original video for the tune? I'm talking about the one filmed at an L.A. show in the late 70's, not the Hell Freezes Over performance. It is PRIME CHOICE.

― Francis Watlington (Francis Watlington), Friday, 20 June 2003 16:24 (twenty years ago) link

It's crap.

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Friday, 20 June 2003 18:26 (twenty years ago) link

They knew how to write songs, were embarrassingly self conscious, and capitalized on an american ideal that had run its course. David Geffen hypnotized them with the magic crystal. I'm glad I got to hear them as a child because with out them Happy and Artie Traum might not make any sense today. Zevon endures. Steve K to the plate...JA

― JohnAllen, Friday, 20 June 2003 20:00 (twenty years ago) link

Did anyone else find "Get Over It" really offensive?

― sundar subramanian (sundar), Friday, 20 June 2003 20:25 (twenty years ago) link

yes

― Jody Beth Rosen (Jody Beth Rosen), Friday, 20 June 2003 20:30 (twenty years ago) link

Their cover of "Take it Easy" made money for Jackson Browne, who dated Nico. I wish I'd dated Nico.

― Salmon Pink (Salmon Pink), Friday, 20 June 2003 20:32 (twenty years ago) link

Jackson Browne is the devil.

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Friday, 20 June 2003 20:44 (twenty years ago) link

Why is "Get Over It" offensive? Is it just bad? I barely remember it.

― Mr. Diamond (diamond), Friday, 20 June 2003 20:59 (twenty years ago) link

"Get Over It" = whiny ex-hippies scolding those who do not have $$ for complaining. It's baby-boomer sanctimony at its absolute nadir.

― J (Jay), Friday, 20 June 2003 21:04 (twenty years ago) link

I still like "Those Shoes," though.

― J (Jay), Friday, 20 June 2003 21:04 (twenty years ago) link

"Get Over It" isn't even so offensive for the message (although anyone with any sensitivity whatsoever knows that you don't just get over depression and trauma -- get a brain, morans). It's that I listen to the song and feel like I'm sitting there with Henley et al at the songwriting session, and they're all "let's write an anthem about how much those whiny Oprah shits get on our nerves!!" and then I think about all the dumbass rednecks driving around with their Confederate-flag stickers on their dashboards, singing along and going "whooo-eeee DAMN RIGHT."

― Jody Beth Rosen (Jody Beth Rosen), Friday, 20 June 2003 21:38 (twenty years ago) link

Eagles - Get Over It lyrics

I turn on the tube and what do I see
A whole lotta people cryin' "Don't blame me"
They point their crooked little fingers ar everybody else
Spend all their time feelin' sorry for themselves
Victim of this, victim of that
Your momma's too thin; your daddy's too fat

Get over it
Get over it
All this whinin' and cryin' and pitchin' a fit
Get over it, get over it

You say you haven't been the same since you had your little crash
But you might feel better if I gave you some cash
The more I think about it, Old Billy was right
Let's kill all the lawyers, kill 'em tonight
You don't want to work, you want to live like a king
But the big, bad world doesn't owe you a thing

Get over it
Get over it
If you don't want to play, then you might as well split
Get over it, Get over it

It's like going to confession every time I hear you speak
You're makin' the most of your losin' streak
Some call it sick, but I call it weak

You drag it around like a ball and chain
You wallow in the guilt; you wallow in the pain
You wave it like a flag, you wear it like a crown
Got your mind in the gutter, bringin' everybody down
Complain about the present and blame it on the past
I'd like to find your inner child and kick its little ass

Get over it
Get over it
All this bitchin' and moanin' and pitchin' a fit
Get over it, get over it

Get over it
Get over it
It's gotta stop sometime, so why don't you quit
Get over it, get over it

― ham on rye (ham on rye), Saturday, 21 June 2003 08:32 (twenty years ago) link

"I'd like to find your inner child and kick its little ass" = the eagles are punker than the punkiest punk who ever punked!!

(i wish they were actually called the wagles, though, like i just typed)

― mark s (mark s), Saturday, 21 June 2003 08:44 (twenty years ago) link

What a stupid fuckin' song, the first line gives it away. Don, TURN OFF THE FUCKIN' TUBE

― dave q, Saturday, 21 June 2003 08:56 (twenty years ago) link

Check out the version of hotel california...

http://www.eugenemirman.com/

― john allen (john allen), Saturday, 21 June 2003 13:27 (twenty years ago) link

this lawyer thinks that fools that point to "billy" shakespeare's "the first thing we'll do is/kill all the lawyers!"* line have outed themselves as morons, just as effectively as beginning any sentence with "as rush limbaugh/ann coulter/bill o'reilly/george bush says ... "

yet another reason to kill don henley and glen frey.

* the person who utters this line is a low-life rabble-rouser leading a mob; in other words, shakespeare did not approve of these sentiments. not that that inconvenient fact ever stops shitheads like don and glen from spouting off that line ... not to mention that they prob. love the lawyers they hired to go after eric b & rakim for "unauthorized sampling."

― Tad (llamasfur), Saturday, 21 June 2003 13:41 (twenty years ago) link

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