Eagles Take It to the Limit

By Rex Rutkoski

Joe Walsh is into some serious reflection.

“For a time,” recalls the former and present Eagle, “we were the best band on the planet.”

“The high point for me was Hotel California.  We didn’t know what we were doing.  We had no idea that album would affect the world.  Besides album sales, it affected the world community and it was so special to people.  It makes us feel valid, creative spokesmen, not rock stars.  It was an honor and a privilege to have done that.”

So here the Eagles are again, in the spirit of the song that Walsh co-wrote for that landmark 1976 album, living their “Life In The Fast Lane.”

This time, however, it appears to be a new, mature spirit that is guiding the band, still one of the world’s premier rock units.  This time, finally, it seems to be about the music.

The Eagles are together again for what appears to be a satisfying artistic run.

The results are currently being seen and heard in much-anticipated concerts, such as their performance May 21 at John Paul Jones Arena, Charlottesville, Va., and their latest CD, Long Road Out of Eden.

Their first reunion in the ’90s was no less than the tour that the members, fractionalized by dissent, said would happen only if a meteorological phenomenon of Biblical proportions took place: in other words, if hell froze over.

He, and they, are not the same old Joe, suggests Walsh.

“In the Eagles we could do anything we wanted, so we did,” the veteran singer-songwriter-guitarist recalls of those roller coaster years of emotion in the band in the mid and late ’70s.

Time also has matured and healed.

“I look at things differently.  I’ve settled down.  I see an awful lot.  I’m aware of an awful lot.  Sometimes I think I know too much.  It’s not silly Joe with the dumb (solo) album titles.  I’m really concerned with the planet and every living thing on it,” he says.

“I just want to show people I’m a valid spokesman for the art form I represent,” he explains.  “I’ve been full circle.  I’ve been rich a couple times, poor a couple of times.  It’s important that some of us old-timers keep fighting for the art form.  It’s supposed to be an art form, not ‘You sell 12 million records, I only sell one million, you’re better than me.’ ”

Reviewers are suggesting that The Eagles are again doing justice to their own very special art form.  There also appears to be a bit of revisionist history being written by some critics who were not quick to praise the band before it dissolved.

The members are not hiding the fact that it is fun again.

Don Henley says the Eagles are happy with their music, and they have survived. That’s no easy feat in this industry, he reminds.

The Eagles’ body of music has mirrored the joys and angst of modern times.  This band, which has been referred to as the Southern California Beatles, delivered the message for the age: Life is not always a peaceful, easy feeling; nor is it an existence in which the thrill is always gone.

Eagle Don Henley says that back when they were accused of being hopeless and cynical, he always thought there was a lot of hope and idealism in what they were writing.

He explains that the band was trying to encourage people to stand on their own two feet, to see that idols of any kind, whether they are rock ‘n’ roll or religious, generally have feet of clay.

A lot of the songs, he says, were memos to themselves.

It’s said that in finally coming to an appreciation of how deeply people were touched by that music, the Eagles began to think in terms that, yes, maybe hell could freeze over after all.

“The ultimate goal of rock is to create a sense of community, to give people an outlet for their feelings and let them know they are not alone in those feelings,” Henley says. “The Beatles got me through high school, which is a rough time. It’s hard being an adolescent”

Henley says that while rock ‘n’ roll often is defined as a tool for rebellion, he believes that is selling it short. “I think rock ‘n’ roll should be much more than simple rebellion. I think rock ‘n’ roll can be very constructive, as opposed to destructive. Although often it isn’t. I think it can and should be more than just background music.”

He hopes he contributes to the constructive aspects of the music. “I think my strength is perseverance and the college education my parents helped me get,” he says. “There’s a surprising lack of education in my profession, not that it is a prerequisite by any means. But if there was more education in my profession, there wouldn’t be such a plethora of crappy lyrics.” He laughs.

The contrasts in his life, and his passions, are in evidence everywhere: in his new music; in his new home life; in conversation.

He is a man at once at peace with himself and in turmoil.

The comfort, the security, comes, after having so long lived the single life, in the nurturing environment of his marriage, and in another new and joyous role as a doting father.

He seems, too, at peace with his artistry and his opportunity to communicate, and where he finds himself in this world of ideas and emotions. Always, always, he draws strength and wisdom from his beloved books on all subjects which he devours with ravenous hunger.

Yet, something is still missing and, in one respect, those books, that reading, point the way to what it is.

It is not such a charmed life for Don Henley that he will allow himself to ignore what he believes, what he knows, are the realities of the time, including: our lack of respect for one another and for our environment; corporate greed and power grabs; and the struggles for artists as they fight to retain ownership of their own creations.

Yet Don Henley is not jaded. He hasn’t given up on the idea that we can begin turning things around. “Yes, if I wasn’t to some degree optimistic I don’t think I would have brought children into the world,” he says. “But I think things will get worse before they get better, both in the world of business and on the environmental front. And we really need to regain a sense of civility. The way people treat each other now is appalling.”
He addressed that latter sentiment in “Nobody Else In The World But You,” the opening song on his Inside Job solo CD, in which he sang, “You have so much of everything, except for true consideration.”

“All you need to prove the validity of that song is to get in your car and drive down a busy freeway at rush hour,” Henley says.

 He says becoming a parent has impacted on his artistry. “Certainly when a child comes into our lives we are forced to look at the world through that child’s eyes, which is a good thing. There are a great many things we as adults have forgotten, or at least squashed down to our subconscious. Kids have a way of reminding us of some good and simple things we have forgotten.”

His children are the best things that ever happened to him, and they have changed his life enormously for the better, Henley says. “I am quite content, excepting of course the normal concerns of a parent. I am quite content with my home and personal life. So that’s all fine. What I’m not content about is the world outside.”

“We have become complacent about the cynicism and decadence and lack of civility in the world,” Henley says. “I’m referring in part to what is going on in the music business but also in the broader world of business in general. These are ugly times for artists, and for their intellectual property. The conglomeration, the consolidation and unbridled grab for power in the media industry scares me to death.”

He pauses to tell his interviewer about two books he is reading on the subject, then offers to mail copies to him.

Ongoing is his work with the Walden Woods Project, which he founded in 1990, hailed as one of the most successful preservation/education endeavors in the United States.
His Thoreau Institute, an addition to the Walden Woods Project, is respected worldwide as an effort combining the best of history with state-of-the-art cyber-learning techniques.

In 1991, in addition to organizing benefit concerts, he compiled and co-edited with writer Dave Marsh a book of environmental essays, the proceeds of which went to support the Walden Woods Project.

“We need to raise a minimum of $28 million for an endowment so it can be self-sustaining after I’m gone,” he says.

The project is making the impact he hoped it would. “We’ve come quite a long way. I invite people to see what has been accomplished (online) at www.walden.org. We have a lot of seminars, programs and classes.”

Asked if he could get but one point across about the environment, what would he want it to be, Henley replies with one of his favorite quotes from Thoreau: “What good is a house if we don’t have a tolerable planet to put it on?”

“The facts are in. It’s now a consensus in the world scientific community that the planet is in trouble,” Henley says. “Talk to any competent scientist, who is not in the pocket of an energy company, and that scientist will tell you every living system on this earth is in a state of decline because of human activity.

“The weather is changing, the climate is changing. That to me is the most important issue we face. Today the ecological health of this planet is the bottom line. It sustains not only our lives in every conceivable way and it is the thing our economy is based on.”

So, Don Henley tries to get that point across in any way he can, including his music.
“The primary goal that I have with each successive album is growth. I want these albums to reflect a growth and maturity. I’m often dealing with similar subject matter, and I try with each successive album to get nearer the truth. I try to get at the core of the issues I write about.”

The creative process is still somewhat of a mystery to him, he says. “I have to sort of work myself up into that particular state of mind. I’m not in songwriting mode all the time, which actually makes my work more difficult. I’m now trying to be at least partially in songwriting mode all the time so I don’t have to take that transition.”

There always will be plenty about which to write, he assures.  “I keep abreast of current events, read the paper, watch TV news and subscribe to dozens of periodicals. I have an extensive library of all the world’s great literature and I read as much as I can.”

What hasn’t he done but might still want to attempt in his career?

“Oh boy,” he replies, laughing. Yes, there are still dreams, he assures. “I’d like to make several different kinds of albums. I’d like to make a blues album, a country album or a combination of the two, maybe a country-blues album, whatever that means (he laughs again). I’d like to record an album of what I think will be the great modern torch songs, or standards as they are sometimes called.”

Henley says he also would like to write a book or two, including an autobiography.
“We all think our own lives are so fascinating,” he says, laughing again. “One of the biggest regrets I have is that I haven’t kept a diary.”

“But,” he adds through a chuckle, “my long-term memory is starting to come back.”
It’s a safe assumption that fans have not forgotten him, or his high-flying band.