“Morgan Wallen’s ‘Dangerous’ No. 1 for Fifth Week on Billboard 200 While ‘If I Know Me’ Hits Top 10 for First Time”: https://bit.ly/3jZQrjb

Maybe radio just isn’t that important.

That has been the mantra of the major labels forever, especially in the country sphere, radio is everything and you move tonnage without it. But Morgan Wallen’s been off the airwaves for weeks and not only has his business held steady, it’s increased! One week’s consumption could be an anomaly, but not two weeks in a row.

It turns out that Morgan Wallen is perceived as talented and he released the best country album of the year. And that’s how music is sold, via word of mouth. Top down has been dying for twenty years, ever since Napster, now it’s all bottom up. The purveyors don’t dictate, the public does!

But Bob you say, Morgan’s fans are all racist rednecks!

That could be true, well, not completely, but they’re also people sick of the politically correct police. The worst thing that happened in Democratic circles this year was the decision to rename high schools in San Francisco. Is there ANYBODY who thinks Abraham Lincoln’s name should be stripped from a public school? Well, I guess there are a few, living in a bubble in San Francisco itself, but the rest of the nation is laughing, it’s utterly ridiculous. While we’re at it, why don’t we take down the plaque of Babe Ruth at Yankee Stadium, he was a womanizer who liked to imbibe. Nobody’s perfect. That does not mean we can’t change, it’s just that if standards are too strict, like three strikes and you’re out laws, or zero tolerance policies in educational institutions, people end up rebelling, because they’re unfair, every situation is different and…

I hate Betsy DeVos, but she was right about rape in college. It should be investigated by the police, not the administration, the same administration that is beholden to the inanities of special interests. Where is George Carlin when we need him? IT’S A BOOK! Trigger warnings? Maybe if there’s a real trigger on a gun, but words? Aren’t educational institutions supposed to be hotbeds of debate, of different ideas? Of course rape on campus is a problem, but such a thorny issue needs to be investigated without bias. Rapists should pay the price, but those who are innocent should not. Just like the death penalty, we kill innocent people on a regular basis, is this just the cost of law enforcement, of punishing those who deserve it, by death which has proven not to be a deterrent? Furthermore, police and prosecutors are not innocent. Which the accused might be. Let me see… Do you want to do eighteen months in prison or take a risk you’ll be locked up for life? What would you choose with those odds?

So there’s a whole set of people who don’t care about speech transgressions. Are some of them racist? Of course! But we penalize someone to improve society at large. And the goal is to rehabilitate the offender, not put them in the ground forever, certainly not for speech. Believe me, you’re just one slip from being canceled yourself, happens all the time, especially in a world where words go from all right to taboo on a regular basis.

And the world moves much too fast for anything to stick anyway. Morgan Wallen’s offense was weeks ago, since then we’ve had impeachment, the Texas disaster, so much more. No one can keep up with all the news even if they’re trying!

And for years lefties have been saying hate the person, but don’t hate the work. Fran Lebowitz just said this on Netflix. So, could this same paradigm be applied to Morgan Wallen?

Or does it just come down to the simple fact that “Dangerous” is good, and you cannot deny good, especially in a world pandering wankers, where mediocre permeates the landscape and is sold as great when it is not.

They let Amy Cooper off:

“Charge against Amy Cooper dropped after completing racial bias education program”: https://cnn.it/2NFq85C

The Black birder she called 911 about refused to cooperate with the prosecution, he didn’t want to ruin Amy Cooper’s life. She made a mistake, should she lose everything because of it? Funny how a Black man is more open than so many white people.

Then again, the test for being anti-racist is not what you say, what you believe in, but whether your actions end up improving the plight of minorities. If you live behind gates and refuse to allow highways and low income housing to be built anywhere near you, you’re part of the problem, not the solution, don’t ever think otherwise.

So if the goal of the left is to punish Morgan Wallen to the point where he has no career, is wiped from the map, it is not working. If anything, his fan base is growing. Another strategy must be employed to eviscerate hate speech.

Then again, Wallen posted an apology to Instagram, where America really lives, not on country radio:

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Morgan Wallen (@morganwallen)

Want to reach the public? Do it online, radio and network television reach a smaller fraction of the public than ever before.

And speaking of online, the fiction that country music fans are backward and have not embraced the internet has been proven completely untrue. Morgan Wallen dominated Spotify when “Dangerous” was released. Country fans put up the listens, not hip-hop fans and certainly not rockers, who still believe Spotify is the devil and must be avoided at all costs as the format’s footprint and influence wanes. I mean if the format is spearheaded by the Foo Fighters, you know you’re in trouble. And some might say that’s a cheap shot, but more than a month after its release, “Dangerous” is still #1, five weeks in a row in fact. Meanwhile, Foo Fighters’ new album debuted at #3. Yes, country is bigger than rock these days, never forget it. Because country is more listenable, it may be the rock of the seventies, but today’s rock is so derivative as to be unlistenable.

The times they are a-changin’. Morgan Wallen never should have said what he did. He should pay a price for his words. But the point is to get the message to not only him, but those who listen to him. And I’m not sure that is happening in this case.

Or maybe it’s a matter of the one-eyed man being king in the land of the blind. The blind in this case being so much of the hit parade.

But one thing we’ve learned for sure, the institutions we thought were all powerful are no longer so. Radio couldn’t kill Morgan Wallen’s career, his fans like his music too damn much.

“How does it feel

To be on your own

Like a complete unknown

Like a rolling stone?”

And they talk about coming together, uniting.

For the past four years Trump and the Republicans have done nothing but denigrate California, attacking its weather, politics, you’d think it’s Hades the way they talk. But now that the Lone Star State is in trouble, it’s somebody else’s fault. The wind. God. Ignoring climate science and allowing the free market to run its energy delivery and…there is no energy! People are dying, never mind being cold, without heat, and isn’t this amazing in the state that made its bones on energy to begin with?

This is what happens when you don’t plan for the future, when you don’t spend any bucks, when you expect no bumps in the road and therefore don’t even plan for them.

Like the average American. Then again, the average American can barely make ends meet. The average American depends on the government as a safety net, in case of the worst case scenario.

But monies spent for preparation of an ill that may never come to pass are seen as wasted. We need the government to run lean, just like the car companies. The same car companies whose plants are now idle because they can’t get enough computer chips. Oh, they could have localized production, but that would have cost more. And they don’t want the inventory and now better prepared foreign manufacturers have scarfed up what little excess production is available in their home countries. Our entire nation is operating on a just-in-time basis. Look in your refrigerator, your cupboards, how long can you go without a trip to the grocery store? You depend on the supermarket being open. Just like you depend on heat in your house. It doesn’t even occur to you that access may be cut off. And if it is, you’re sure someone is at fault and the problem will be rectified instantaneously. But the truth is everybody can’t win in America, everybody can’t come out whole, especially not with the system we’ve got. And if there’s anybody responsible you’ve got to go to stacked arbitration to plead your case. The little guy does not matter, never did, but even less since the evisceration of unions and the adulation of billionaires.

So California is a state run by Democrats. With high taxes and…well, it turns out the Golden State was better prepared for disaster than Texas.

But even more important is living is easier in California.

I used to be addicted to Bob Costas’s 1:30 AM interview show “Later” on NBC. It was Carl Reiner, or another New York transplant, who told the story about being back in NYC with his buddies and marveling how great the city was. So, they all moved back, and then a couple of years later they all returned to California. New York City is the greatest city in the country, if not the world! But I’d rather live in Los Angeles. As do so many others.

As I sit here writing this it’s in excess of seventy degrees and the sky is blue. It was not only a beautiful morning, but a beautiful day. What’s not to like? Weather rarely interferes with your plans, and it never ever snows in Los Angeles or San Francisco, never mind go down to zero. And if you like that kind of weather, if you’re endeared to snow, it’s only a drive away, to the tallest peaks in the continental United States. Living is easier here, without the downward thrust, the jacket of east coast imperialism, of your roots, of where you went to college and how much money you make. Easterners are proud of their hearty stock. But so are Alaskans. I’ve got no problem with you living there, just don’t tell me you’re better than me for doing so, life doesn’t have to be made artificially hard.

Texas… Well, Austin is a hotbed of liberalism, but Houston is on a flood plain and most of the state is flat, dry and hot, what’s so special about that? As far as Florida goes, sure, you can keep your house in bankruptcy, but have you ever been there from May to October? Not only is it hot, IT’S HUMID! A condition we do not have in California, as well as bugs… That mosquito season in New England? California does not have it.

And life is so good in California that so many people moved here that land became ultra-valuable. Now let me get this straight, a single family dwelling is seven figures in Los Angeles, but what’s a block in Manhattan worth? Yes, Los Angeles is a low-rise city, one could argue the land is undervalued! And as a result traffic is terrible, then again it was Detroit auto companies who rid the city of efficient light rail.

Why was housing so expensive in San Francisco? BECAUSE PEOPLE WANTED TO LIVE THERE, THAT’S WHERE THE OPPORTUNITY WAS, and to a great extent still is. Sure, you can work remotely, but never underestimate the power of interaction, collaboration, it’s when you bounce your ideas off others that sparks truly fly, that you come up with new ideas, almost nothing is created in a vacuum.

And why is the entertainment industry based in Los Angeles? Because here you can be free and easy, there’s no barrier to entry, the uneducated person has as much of a chance as a Ph.D. Walk into a record company or movie studio and start touting your blue chip education, no one cares, that’s not what it’s about, they’re not hiring cogs in the wheel, they need creative people, with vision, who can make something out of nothing, which means you must operate unfettered, or relatively so. You’ve got to give people room.

Do I think Gavin Newsom is perfect? No. But he seems to be learning and as for that dinner at the French Laundry, tell me about all those Texans who were Covid deniers, who didn’t even wear masks!

All those people who left California?

Expect them to come back, the business titans anyway. As for the rank and file, once you leave the state you usually can’t afford to come back, that’s how much land prices increase. But if you’re a mover and shaker, you don’t want to be in a backwater, that’s how cities came to be in the first place, they were a concentration of talent and wealth! You can’t go to dinner with your tech buddies in San Antonio or Sarasota, and if you want to make a record in the hinterlands…you can do so, but sans so much infrastructure that can aid you in its creation and marketing.

Not that I expect anything to change vis a vis the denigration of California and the exaltation of Texas and Florida. Disinformation rules. People just deny the truth and make up their own facts, so most people are misinformed. And they’ve never been anywhere else so they don’t know what they’re missing. If you came to L.A. from out of state today you’d probably never go back, you’d be dying to move here. Which is why these problems in the Golden State were created in the first place!

But it’s fine with me if you want to live in a backwater alone where there are few services and corporations rule. Just don’t tell me it’s better, especially when you confront the vagaries of life, the natural disasters that occur in every state these days. Then again, as long as you keep denying climate change it’s gonna get worse. And if you’re waiting for God to save you, you probably believe Hillary Clinton is running a child sex ring in the basement of a pizza parlor, you’re awaiting your instructions from Q, who so far has not been right about anything.

But Californians must bow and pay fealty to the right. We live in a scumbag state that is so oppressive you can’t start a business and can’t make a living. Funny, I don’t see a lack of establishments as I drive down the street. Hell, the more people you’ve got the more business thrives. And every action has a concomitant reaction, but the savvy suss the future out and adjust for it, the ignorant just bury their heads, saying it’s all right now and never think about tomorrow. Even Fleetwood Mac faced the future, adjusted its lineup, but no, things have to stay the same in these southern states to protect people’s FREEDOM!

Hogwash.

Don’t rejoice. This is not about any one individual, this is a movement.

We thought the problem was Bill O’Reilly, but Tucker Carlson is even worse, with even a higher profile.

As for Trump himself…it was never about the man, he tapped into a vein of anger that had been stoked for decades. That has now flourished to the point that many believe the new president is illegitimate, but even worse they believe that government itself is at fault for all of their and America’s problems, then again, the red states are the first to clamor for relief in the wake of a natural disaster, never mind that Trump played favorites.

It’s about income inequality. Plain and simple. Oh sure, there’s more than a dash of white nationalism involved, but truthfully it all comes down to money. Too many people don’t have enough of it. Doubt me? Then read this:

“A majority of the people arrested for Capitol riot had a history of financial trouble”: https://wapo.st/3s6gGam

Maybe some people overextended, maybe some people never had it, but when you’ve got economic instability in a nation where no one cares about their brother you can get damn frustrated. As James Carville claimed thirty years ago, IT’S THE ECONOMY STUPID!

What you don’t understand is the right is a club, it’s not broad and multifarious. They circle the wagons and take care of each other, to a degree anyway. At churches. Via favors. There’s an infrastructure that’s been built over decades, and the left is mostly unaware of it, if for no other reason than the left is made up of, or at least led by, elites on the coast. THOSE PEOPLE live in the south, the midwest, in rural areas. Some talk differently. And they know that the northerners and coastal dwellers have contempt for them. And that’s when you dig in your heels, seeing as you have no easy alternatives yourself. It’s not like you are educated, it’s not like you can get on the gravy train of good jobs, and the truth is the blue state denizens don’t want you to get them. Everybody in America who has got something refuses to sacrifice, refuses to go to the back of the line. There is a very thin layer of people who control not only the government, but the economy. And you can’t touch them, they’re protected, they’re essentially judgment-proof. Can you say WALL STREET?

I still haven’t gotten over Timothy Geithner and what he did for the banks in 2008. Wall Street blew up the economy, and it not only got rescued, it was given additional monies, when those it preyed upon lost their houses, their jobs… Actions are supposed to have consequences, but not in America, where you can rig the system in your favor, where you can skate until judgment day. Which is occurring right now.

Of course we can criticize the right for voting against its own interests. People with nothing supporting corporations and other rich people who are actually working against them. But the truth is a lot of those people lost control of the Republican party anyway, that’s how Trump got elected. As for Trump supporting his cronies, that’s what happens in bankrupt oligarchies. That’s who we have to compare Trump to, Eastern European dictators, not what has come before in America.

Inflation reigned during the Carter years and Reagan got elected and it’s never been the same since. The gap between rich and poor has gotten bigger as the middle class has evaporated and you can work forty hours a week and still not be able to put a roof over your head, never mind food on the table. Furthermore, the work is akin to being a slave. Not only are you dashing through the Amazon warehouse, you’re monitored by computers, and if you don’t execute perfectly, you’re history. And then what?

The first person I knew who adored Rush Limbaugh, who spouted his hated and fantasies, was a highly educated man who declared bankruptcy two times. He felt that he was entitled to a certain lifestyle, a certain level of opportunity. And he lived off the household names who gave him money to further his cause until they shut off the tap, and then he went under. And then he repeated the process. And then the government tightened the bankruptcy rules, but that didn’t change his beliefs, because he needed something to believe in, it had to be somebody’s fault that he wasn’t where he wanted to be in life, and Rush gave him scapegoats. Oh, and when he was really down and out, it was very simple, he clung to his religion. And all this started after he lost his job with a corporation, he couldn’t find a replacement. All the good jobs went away. As corporations demanded quarterly profits to line the pockets of investors, which most of America are not. As for pensions, those have been eviscerated too, never mind state governments robbing the accounts to balance their budgets and then failing to refill the coffers. And it’s beyond mismanagement. You see taxes are bad, and every elected official and the bureaucracy itself are no match for private industry, never mind the for-profit prison system and…

America’s problems cannot be fixed with a snap of the fingers. They’ve gone deep, they’re embedded. And then there’s the insane Supreme Court that allowed 3,000 worshippers in California last weekend to gather in a raging pandemic. If they’re hoping God will save them, they’ve got another think coming. But, they’ve got to believe in something. As for expertise, when you’re dumb you have contempt for those who know. Come on, if you had a brain in public school you were a pariah, you were bullied and beaten up, you couldn’t wait to graduate and go to college, to escape. But your tormentors never did escape. They worked with their hands, and then those jobs were shipped overseas and now drunk and high they’re disillusioned and it’s got to be somebody’s fault.

But gradual change is all we can have. When sometimes you need to take giant steps, like Biden with Covid relief. Yes, most of America, by a large margin, supports a big relief plan, but Republican congresspeople paint it as financially imprudent, talking about a wasteful hole, hewing to a philosophy that’s been proven wrong over and over over the last half century. But that doesn’t make any difference. Truth is now irrelevant.

Credit Rush for opening the door on this. Telling lies and being divisive. But he’s not the only one. Ben Shapiro’s podcast is always in the top ten, and once again, those on the left don’t even know who he is, never mind Mark Levin. No, rust never sleeps.

So, it’s incumbent upon you not to sleep either. The election of Biden is only a step in the right direction. As for the states? Many are ruled by Republicans. Just like with abortion, when they couldn’t win on a national level they went grass roots, and they’ve made giant inroads. Hell, there are many states where it’s essentially impossible for women to get an abortion. And if you’re waiting for constituents of these states to wake up…it’s you who are asleep.

We are not only fighting for the soul of America, but America itself! We came very close to losing our democracy. Trump said he won when he didn’t and then his minions attacked the Capitol. And you just say those people will be penalized and it won’t happen again. But did you notice that 74 million Americans voted for Trump? Support is deep. And it’s not only white people, but minorities too.

This is a fight to the finish. This is the story of our age. This is no different from McCarthyism and Nazism, yes Nazism. Germany lost the war and couldn’t get over it. Just like the losing right. And the country was economically challenged. So someone had to pay, they had to seize the economies of other countries, and they needed a scapegoat, the Jews.

Now if you’re a Jew, like me, you’re confronted with two choices, consistently. You can either shut up and try to fly under the radar, or you can stand up and own your religion, call out anti-Semitism when you see it, ruffling feathers and possibly losing your station in the process. The so-called “Greatest Generation” told us we must draw the line, and stand up. But too many Jews have become assimilated and complacent. They believe, unlike the Blacks, that people can’t see who they are. But this is patently untrue, and anti-Semitism is raging, not only in America, but all over the world.

It’s the left that must take up arms. As for guns… Those on the left know that odds are you’ll kill a family member as opposed to an intruder, and that wars are fought via computers, but…we are in a war.

This war is being fought every damn day. Every hour and every minute. By provocateurs like Rush Limbaugh and Tucker Carlson and Laura Ingraham. And anybody can be sacrificed for the cause, can you say “Lou Dobbs”? Because the cause is paramount. The left thinks it’s cult of personality, but it’s wrong. The right is much bigger and much stronger than Rush Limbaugh. Just you wait and see.

The king has died. But if you know your history, constituents mourn for a bit and then a new king is installed, with the same power. Until the public ultimately rebels and gets rid of the monarchy all together. Right now the rebellion is on the right, never forget it.

1

There’s a giant hole in my life where Trump and his attendant news used to fit. I’m glad it’s gone, but I’m not quite sure what to fill it with. I still read the newspapers cover to cover, but all those news podcasts… That’s a funny thing about news outlets, they function every day, they keep on publishing whether the world blew up or the president got a hangnail. Don’t get me wrong, I like it this way, but what am I going to do with all the time I now have?

Joe Biden is better than anticipated, but the Republicans are worse. Did you hear about Pennsylvania, where they’re trying to have judges elected by gerrymandered districts? Rust never sleeps, nor do the Republicans. The best thing I’ve seen on this is the first five minutes of Sunday’s “Last Week Tonight.” The Republicans lose and are gung ho. The Democrats rest on their laurels and are still afraid of their shadows. Check it out here: https://bit.ly/3aquFlG John Oliver is a master.

So, it seems like I’ve contradicted myself, but not really. I go hiking and I’m starved for entertainment. Sounds antithetical, I know, but… We are not in the golden age of podcasts. We are in the golden age of podcast PRODUCTION, but not podcast content. What we’ve got is a pale imitation of thirties and forties radio. Mostly crime stories. Sort of a bad “Dateline” ad infinitum. And too many of the interview podcasts have bad interviewers. Let the damn guest talk, they’re who we want to hear.

As for music…

Playlists, the scourge of the music business. The hit to crap ratio is so bad… They’ve got to fire all the curators, they’re TERRIBLE! Just because they put out new music every week doesn’t mean it’s good, does not mean we need to hear any of it. A curator should be just that, someone who separates the wheat from the chaff, serves the listener not the label, who creates an intriguing list of songs that take the listener on a journey. Instead, all we’ve got is an ode to the skip button. They make new music look bad. I don’t want to hear a pale imitation of Joni Mitchell, I want to hear Joni Mitchell! But no one is that good anymore. I think about it all the time. They’re imitators instead of innovators. And they haven’t practiced enough, haven’t paid enough dues. And they don’t know about hooks and they don’t know how to finish a song. They’ll write a good verse and then a lousy chorus, or vice versa. And there’s rarely a bridge. There, did I put everybody in the ground, are you happy? Are you mad at me? And while I’m at it, what’s wrong with melody? To paraphrase Robert Plant, does anybody remember melody?

So I decide to go back to the oldies. I’m hiking last night and I pull up Simon & Garfunkel’s “Bookends,” one of the best albums ever made. Quick, name me something comparable today! Absolutely impossible. Forget “Mrs. Robinson,” how about the innovation of “Save the Life of My Child,” never mind the encapsulation of sixties wanderlust in “America,” Paul Simon channeled the zeitgeist.

And my plan, when it was over, was to call out to Siri to play “Parsley Sage, Rosemary and Thyme” But before I could do this, Apple Music slid into “Rocket Man.”

Yes, that’s a new feature of streaming services. If you don’t shut them off, they go on their merry way, providing songs in the genre of those you picked previously. Actually, I normally have repeat checked, and this does not occur, but last night I did not, and I heard Elton’s “Rocket Man.” Do I ever need to hear “Rocket Man” ever again? Not really. But I love the synths, so I stayed with it. That’s another thing, once you start fast-forwarding you lose the plot. It needs to be like radio, where you’ve got no choice, where you endure, waiting for the next song to appear.

And then a few songs later, I realize I’m going to hit a dead zone. Either I needed to pull up “Parsley, Sage…” right away or stick with Siri’s suggestions. What the hell, I decided to stay with the latter, for the sake of surprise, and that’s when I heard “The Best of My Love.”

2

The second Eagles album was a stiff. Which was quite surprising because the first one was such a success. There was a ton of ink, about the plot line, the photo shoot, but the album came out and…nothing. Now almost fifty years later, one can argue quite strongly that “Desperado” is the best pre-Joe Walsh Eagles album. As a matter of fact, it contains the second most legendary Eagles song, the one that was not a single, but is the encore for every concert, “Desperado.” Come on, you can hear those intro piano notes in your head right now, right?

Well, maybe you hate the Eagles. Fine, they don’t need you. That’s what people don’t realize, you can be hated by some and still have a huge, significant career. Then again, unless you’re mega-successful, people don’t really bother hating you anyway.

So, the first Eagles album was a triumph. It was led by the single “Take It Easy,” which was made for AM in an era where FM was everything, but not everybody owned an FM radio. As for the album, it was equally satisfying. “Witchy Woman” was haunting, “Earlybird” uplifting and unique, and “Peaceful Easy Feeling” another smash.

But as time was passing, tastes were changing, FM started to get harder. Whereas the Eagles were seen as somewhat soft, they were not a natural fit. Which contributed to the lack of success of the “Desperado” album. As for “Tequila Sunrise”… You might know it by heart, but it was not a big hit in ’73, it only made it to #64 on the Hot 100. Only #26 on AC. No, that track got traction when the Eagles became everything, after the triumph of 1975’s “One of These Nights” album, when the Eagles legend was cemented, when they owned both radio bands, when the album sold and sold, when it was ubiquitous, after the band started working with Bill Szymczyk, and the music had a harder edge.

Actually, that edge started to display itself in “On the Border,” the band’s third album, but that album started off slowly, whereas “One of These Nights” jumped straight out of the box with the title track, it was undeniable.

So the first two singles from “On the Border” were Glenn Frey songs. It was his voice that was emblematic of the Eagles for those listening to singles, as opposed to those who might have purchased the albums. I don’t think, and didn’t think, either “Already Gone” or “James Dean” were natural singles. To make an impact you need a 9, something that is not fodder for the airwaves, but something different, something outstanding. And if you can provide a 10, then you have a recurrent, a song everybody knows and never forgets that never ever really leaves the public consciousness, like “The Best of My Love.”

“Already Gone” made it to #32 on the Hot 100. And unless you made it to #20, maybe #15, that meant most stations in America were not playing it. There were a hundred songs on the chart, but big stations played maybe fifteen.

As for “James Dean,” that did even worse, it got to #77. Once again, the Eagles had whiffed. It looked like they could not ever match their first album’s commercial success. But then they brought out their secret weapon, Don Henley.

The Eagles were seen as Frey’s band. Henley was the drummer. How many drummers even sang lead? Well, there was that guy in Rare Earth…

As for Eagles photographs, it was hard to tell the members apart, they were all long-haired hippies, and their pictures weren’t even on the cover of the first and third albums.

Now the truth is the first and second albums were produced by Glyn Johns. And the Eagles chafed under his direction. They wanted to rock harder. And they were right, ergo the success of what came after, most especially “Hotel California.” So, fearful of another stiff album, they swiched horses to Szymczyk in the middle of recording “On the Border,” but two songs remained from the Johns sessions, one of those was “The Best of My Love.” And after the first two Frey singles didn’t break the bank, six months after “On the Border” had been released, the label put out “The Best of My Love.” And it went all the way to #1.

3

“The Best of My Love” was not jaunty like what had come before. Not upbeat and optimistic, not macho. Rather “The Best of My Love” was heartfelt. It was open and honest, women could relate.

“Every night I’m lying in bed

Holding you close in my dreams

Thinking about all the things that we said

And coming apart at the seams”

Don Henley was evidencing VULNERABILITY! There’s nothing a woman wants more in a relationship. Henley was on his way to idol status. But also it was his voice, smooth yet with a rough element, a bit of sandpaper that gave it an element of distinction, this was just not some studio singer, a guy singing somebody else’s song, this guy felt it, he lived it.

So I’m just at the verge of the dead zone. It’s my last chance to switch to “Parsley, Sage…” And I can’t fast-forward in the dead zone. There’s not enough of a buffer. I’ve got to live with what’s coming down the pike, like it or not. And I hear that acoustic guitar intro and…do I want to hear “The Best of My Love”?

I know what it is instantly. God, there’s not a baby boomer alive who doesn’t know that intro.

But now it’s dark. And I’m disconnected from the pinball machine of life. It’s just me and the trail and the sky. So I decide to let it play. And “The Best of My Love” reveals itself in a way it never has previously.

That’s the funny thing about songs. You can hear them to the point of intolerance and then decades later they come up and you gain new insights. You’ve got a few more miles on you, you’ve had more experiences, you can suddenly see what the writers saw. And that’s another thing, how did these songwriters know so much at such a young age?

“We try to talk it over

But the words come out too rough”

You know that moment… You’re lying in bed, or sitting in the living room. The yelling has stopped. And then, just when it appears that calmness will reign…someone says something and the yelling starts once again, and that’s when you say something you cannot take back, something that hurts, something that sticks with the other person.

“Beautiful faces

And loud empty places

Look at the way that we live

Wasting our time on cheap talk and wine

Left us so little to give”

The rock star lifestyle. It sounds good to many. Then again, everybody in America seems to think they’re a rock star anyway. They go to the bar to have a good time and… Bottom line, you have experiences but little intimacy. You’re together but you’re not. You’ve got history, but little personal story.

“That same old crowd

Was like a cold dark cloud

That we could never rise above”

You can get caught up in your group, especially when you’re young. It’s a roving party. And this was before everybody became Alex P. Keaton, went straight, put on a suit and tried to get rich. The early seventies were a laid back version of the sixties. No one was going anywhere fast, it was about life, experience. The hang was everything.

And then there’s a bridge, a lost formula that today’s acts are seemingly unaware of, never mind don’t employ.

“I’m going back in time

And it’s a sweet dream

It was a quiet night

And I would be all right

If I could go on sleeping”

Henley becomes even MORE intimate. His voice rises, he’s testifying, he’s reflecting, something too many males do not. It was great, but then too much happened, true identities came out, there was no way to put it back together again.

“But every morning

I wake up and worry

What’s gonna happen today

You see it your way

And I see it mine

But we both see it slippin’ away”

You’ve been there. You’re still together, but you’re pullling apart. If you just stay quiet and go through the motions, everything’s okay. But people didn’t do this in the seventies, the goal was to be your fully realized self and find your soulmate, desperation never figured in.

“You know we always had each other baby

I guess that wasn’t enough”

Not enough. When you realize that… You don’t want to, you want to continue blindly, but you can’t. Oftentimes both people know it’s impossible, sometimes only one. But when you see the future as fraught if you remain a couple, you know it’s just a matter of when it ends.

“Oh, but here in my heart

I give you the best of my love”

Well, maybe Don Henley can do this. Maybe some men can do this. But the truth is someone always gets the short end of the stick, breakups are never mutual, one of the partners always wants to give it another chance. But after all the fights, after the history, it’s too late. And the leaver might be able to be generous, but the left usually is not sanguine, there’s a heavy dose of resentment, which often goes on for far too long.

Then again, a song is a fantasy. You can plug it into your own life and dream. Maybe that’s the way they really feel about you.

“Oh, sweet darling…”

Henley’s gentle. Too many men are physical, nonverbal. But here’s this guy who’s cracked open his heart, who’s telling his story honestly, as if it’s the most important thing to him…and you know it’s the most important thing to her.

4

“The Best of My Love” changed everything for the Eagles. “On the Border” sold two million copies. The album wove its way into the fabric of America. It sustained.

And then came “One of These Nights.”

Now the first single was a Henley song, the title track, dark and edgy, this was a rock song by a band too often seen as soft country rock.

“One of these nights

One of these crazy old nights

We’re gonna find out pretty mama

What turns on your lights”

This is the flip side. Sure, women want men who are open, honest and forthright, but they also want to be taken on an adventure, especially when their needs are catered to, when the man does his best to penetrate her identity, discover what makes her tick, push the button and deliver what she desires.

But the chorus…

“Ooh, someone to be kind to

In between the dark and the light”

There was that sweet vocal sensibility from “The Best of My Love.” “One of These Nights” was both hard and soft.

“I’ve been searching for the daughter of the devil himself

I’ve been searching for an angel in white

I’ve been waiting for a woman who’s a little of both

And I can feel her but she’s nowhere in sight”

HERE I AM! Millions of women were now ready to volunteer, they wanted to join Don Henley and the Eagles on this ride, they were primed and ready. And confident. Henley was speaking to them as an adult, which is how they saw themselves, WHAT MORE COULD YOU WANT?

Turns out not much. “One of These Nights” sold and sold and sold. Then a greatest hits album compiled from the first four LPs was released and it became the best selling album of ALL TIME!

But then there was a complete surprise.

Sure, the Eagles had gotten rockier, with more punch and more edge. But the country element was still there, on a long continuum from Gram Parsons to Poco to…

There were great expectations. And as a result, the first single went all the way to #1. But “New Kid in Town” was more of a Glenn Frey song. Frey was the lead singer, but as the song wore on you heard Don Henley in the background vocals, and you also heard Don Felder’s biting guitar. “New Kid in Town” was a blend between the old and the new. The Eagles of the greatest hits album and…an underlying rock element.

And then came…

Many people bought the new album without hearing it first, and when they dropped the needle…

This was the era of big rig stereos, you needed to get closer to the sound. And the intro was delectable, and then the drum hit and it was HOTEL CALIFORNIA!

Ultimately the Eagles most famous song. Don Henley’s songwriting and singing chops were now fully developed, and rather than resting on his laurels, he pushed the envelope, both lyrically and vocally, and the guitar playing and…sometimes you only need to hear a song once, and then you need to hear it immediately once again, and again and again and again. That was “Hotel California.” Mix in “Life in the Fast Lane” and “Victim of Love” and Don Henley was the sound of the radio, his voice emanated from speakers for a year straight. And “Wasted Time” was “The Best of My Love” on steroids, anything but wimpy, maybe one of the best songs reflecting on a breakup ever.

But it all started with “The Best of My Love,” that was the turning point.

And I liked it when I bought the album, and I know it by heart, but I never really understood it until last night. Because in 1974 I had not lived with a girl. I had not had a serious breakup. I thought I knew what life was about, but I didn’t.

Don Henley knew more.

He gave us the best of his love.