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The Eagles Pt. 1: International Drug Smuggling, Endless Cocaine, and California Excess · DISGRACELAND

0:00
Speaker 1: Disgraceland is a production of Double Elvis. Just a quick
0:06
Speaker 1: note to my beloved music nerd listeners out there.
0:09
Speaker 2: I'm quite aware of the fact that.
0:10
Speaker 1: The name of the Eagles isn't the Eagles, and that
0:13
Speaker 1: it is officially just Eagles, no the But you know what,
0:18
Speaker 1: I can't do it. I can't go an entire episode
0:20
Speaker 1: referring to the band. I and everyone else Jeff Lebowski included,
0:23
Speaker 1: have Slash has forever referred.
0:25
Speaker 2: To as the Eagles.
0:27
Speaker 1: It just sounds too fucking weird to just constantly refer
0:30
Speaker 1: to them as Eagles. So, even though it's wrong, because
0:34
Speaker 1: it just feels right for me, Don Hemley, Glenn Fry
0:37
Speaker 1: and company are forever the Eagles. Melo Dron, the stories
0:53
Speaker 1: about the Eagles are insane. Upon their ascent, the band
0:57
Speaker 1: narrowly avoided arrest from smuggling drugs. One member on the
1:01
Speaker 1: eve of the band's breakup, skirted potentially devastating legal ramifications
1:06
Speaker 1: from the discovery of an overdosed underage sex worker in
1:09
Speaker 1: his home. During their early days, the Eagles dosed out
1:13
Speaker 1: on peyote and reimagined and reconfigured a new FM sound
1:17
Speaker 1: for the ages that would result in unimaginable success and
1:21
Speaker 1: excess private planes, games of Chicken on private planes, and
1:25
Speaker 1: one member surviving a private plane crash. The Eagles as
1:28
Speaker 1: a group very narrowly survived themselves decades after the seventy superstardom.
1:34
Speaker 1: The band's status as one of the best selling artists
1:37
Speaker 1: of all time remains untouchable, with two hundred million global
1:41
Speaker 1: record sales. And the Eagles are untouchable because the Eagles
1:45
Speaker 1: made great music. Unlike that music. I played few at
1:49
Speaker 1: the top of the show that wasn't great music. That
1:52
Speaker 1: was a preset loop from my melotron called Chuck Wagon
1:55
Speaker 1: Chowdown MK.
1:57
Speaker 2: Two.
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Speaker 1: I played you that loop because I can't afford the
2:00
Speaker 1: rights to Oh Girl by the Shylights. And why would
2:03
Speaker 1: I play you that specific slice of right on Time Cheese?
2:07
Speaker 1: Could I afford it? Because that was the number one
2:10
Speaker 1: song in America on June first, nineteen seventy two, and
2:14
Speaker 1: that was the day that Eagles released their self titled
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Speaker 1: debut album, an album that would begin the band's ascent
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Speaker 1: to iconic status, an attempt to restore America's innocence with peaceful,
2:26
Speaker 1: easy feelings. On this part one of a special two
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Speaker 1: part episode, international drug smuggling, a dead sex worker, a
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Speaker 1: plane crash, and innocence lost at what cost courtesy.
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Speaker 2: Of the Eagles.
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Speaker 1: I'm Jake Brennan, and this is Disgraceland. The dead don't laugh.
3:13
Speaker 1: They don't cry either. They don't dance, they don't smile.
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Speaker 1: They don't succeed, fail, fuck or fight. They don't do
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Speaker 1: much of anything. They're dead, gone over. In nineteen eighty
3:25
Speaker 1: the Eagles were dead, but they were far from God.
3:29
Speaker 1: They were everywhere, despite the fact that by the beginning
3:35
Speaker 1: of the decade, the individual members of one of the
3:37
Speaker 1: biggest selling bands in the nineteen seventies, Don Henley, Glenn Frye,
3:42
Speaker 1: Don Felder, Joe Walsh and Timothy B. Schmidt had disbanded.
3:46
Speaker 1: But you wouldn't know it from listening to FM radio
3:48
Speaker 1: in the early eighties. And that's because in nineteen eighty,
3:51
Speaker 1: as fortunate an event as any Eagle could have imagined, happened,
3:55
Speaker 1: the classic rock radio format was invented. It made ubiquitous
3:59
Speaker 1: on FM radio dials around the country. For this format,
4:03
Speaker 1: radio station execs needed reliable programming, i e. Music that
4:07
Speaker 1: post dated rock and roll's early oldies era of Elvis
4:10
Speaker 1: Presley and Little Richard in pre dated rock's current new
4:14
Speaker 1: wave video era of talking heads in Devo, so classic
4:17
Speaker 1: rock radio programmers turned to the peaceful, easy sounds of
4:21
Speaker 1: Southern California's Eagles. Born in the seventies and dead in
4:25
Speaker 1: the water in the eighties, the band's proven hits Hotel, California,
4:29
Speaker 1: one of these nights already gone, Lie in eye and
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Speaker 1: take it to the limit, among what seemed to be
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Speaker 1: an endless.
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Speaker 2: Parade of other chart toppers.
4:36
Speaker 1: For the Eagles, decade defining studio albums proved easy fodder
4:40
Speaker 1: for unimaginative radio programmers and thus filled the airwaves. After
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Speaker 1: nearly a solid decade of stadium sellouts, number one singles,
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Speaker 1: top selling albums, and enough cocaine sex intention to make
4:52
Speaker 1: even the hardest, wildest seventies rock and rollers cry uncle,
4:57
Speaker 1: the Eagles Glen Fry called his co leader in the band, Henley,
5:00
Speaker 1: on the telephone.
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Speaker 2: It was over.
5:02
Speaker 1: Glenn was out, no mos Henley didn't argue. What could
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Speaker 1: he say? Things would get better, easier, They wouldn't. Don
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Speaker 1: Henley was too practical to not know that writing hit
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Speaker 1: songs was tough sledding Under the best of circumstances, never
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Speaker 1: mind under constant burnout from the grind of the road,
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Speaker 1: under the distrustful eyes of creatively jealous band members, romantically
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Speaker 1: jealous lovers, or under the gaze of over demanding, insensitive
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Speaker 1: record label suits whose.
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Speaker 2: Entire financial quarters could turn on.
5:33
Speaker 1: The release of a long awaited Eagles album, all of
5:36
Speaker 1: whom were ghacked to the gills, lovers and band members included,
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Speaker 1: unable to see their way through any challenge with clarity,
5:43
Speaker 1: hazed by paranoia and exhaustion, two constants that were as
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Speaker 1: omnipresent as the bands of irrepressible hooks and inimitable harmonies.
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Speaker 1: No Glenn was right. Henley knew it. The Eagles were dead,
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Speaker 1: but even so classic rock radio kept the band and
6:00
Speaker 1: still heart beating strong, unlike the heart of the sixteen
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Speaker 1: year old sex worker in Don Henley's bathroom. At the moment,
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Speaker 1: her heart was another story. The paramedics moved with the
6:13
Speaker 1: quickness the young girl had stopped breathing. Voices from the
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Speaker 1: end of the car or confirmed it. Fear pressed itself
6:20
Speaker 1: hard against the Texas singer's chest. His Mulhallan drive home
6:24
Speaker 1: was quickly transformed from idyllic West coast party scene to
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Speaker 1: crime scene, and there was nothing he or his high
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Speaker 1: powered representatives could do about it. If the girl was dead,
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Speaker 1: there would likely be no coming back from it. What
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Speaker 1: happened next isn't entirely clear. The only person who's ever
6:41
Speaker 1: told the story is Don Henley himself, and he hasn't
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Speaker 1: said much. Henley claimed he called the paramedics out of
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Speaker 1: a sense of decency. Henley claimed he didn't know she
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Speaker 1: was sixteen. Henley claimed he didn't have sex with her.
6:54
Speaker 1: Henley admitted he'd solicited the girl from a trusted madam
6:58
Speaker 1: as a gift for his hard working road crew, a
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Speaker 1: going away gift to make tonight's going away party go
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Speaker 1: off with a little Lextra oomph. November twenty one, nineteen eighty,
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Speaker 1: the Eagles were over. Don Hemley's road crew were out
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Speaker 1: on their asses. Unlike the thirty three year old rock
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Speaker 1: star who could fall back on what would be a
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Speaker 1: tsunami of royalties from his band's hits, his roadies faced
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Speaker 1: a much less certain financial future. A party with some
7:26
Speaker 1: girls and some blow was the least mister Hemley could
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Speaker 1: do for them, or so went thinking. The girl was
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Speaker 1: naked and there was another girl too, even younger fifteen,
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Speaker 1: and the drugs were everywhere, coke, ludes, grass, relax. The
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Speaker 1: nightmare was calm, unlike the rock star, but then again,
7:45
Speaker 1: the nightman was always calm. A near dead girl on
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Speaker 1: the little dope wasn't going to rattle. He'd seen worse,
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Speaker 1: but Don Hemley was tense. How could he not be.
7:55
Speaker 1: Henley claimed he'd took the heat in the moment when
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Speaker 1: the girl turned up, naked, convulsing, and near dead. He
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Speaker 1: didn't panic the fear pulse. Though his head was heavy,
8:05
Speaker 1: his sight dim, he managed to hold tight and grasp
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Speaker 1: control of the moment. Henley claimed he didn't dart about
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Speaker 1: his house to flush the drugs. He focused on helping
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Speaker 1: the girl. He called the paramedics, and the paramedics called
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Speaker 1: the cops, and the cops called the Department Sexually Exploited
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Speaker 1: Child Unit, and Don Henley, co founder of the Eagles,
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Speaker 1: called his lawyer, for he was under arrest and the
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Speaker 1: fear was now enough to make his chest explode. The
8:34
Speaker 1: fear was always there, in some way or another, going
8:37
Speaker 1: as far back as his days in Lynton, Texas as
8:39
Speaker 1: a boy. Sure is upbringing hadham high on the sounds
8:42
Speaker 1: of t Bone Walker and Hank Williams. But down in
8:45
Speaker 1: the dust was that lingering fear of where his future
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Speaker 1: would take him, or more specifically, if his future would
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Speaker 1: take him anywhere at all. His father owned an autoparts store,
8:55
Speaker 1: and he saved pennies, and then nichols, and then dimes
8:58
Speaker 1: and eventually enough quarters when coupled with whatever savings teenage
9:02
Speaker 1: Don Henley himself scrapped together from gigging around Northern Texas
9:05
Speaker 1: in his high school. Bands amounted to enough to cover
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Speaker 1: the tuition at North Texas State University, but college didn't
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Speaker 1: hold His English late classes interested him. However, college presented
9:16
Speaker 1: a new kind of fear, fear of becoming something. You
9:19
Speaker 1: weren't a jag, just another guy. Don Henley was not
9:24
Speaker 1: just another guy. There was greatness in him.
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Speaker 2: He knew this.
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Speaker 1: Henley was more than just college, or at least he
9:31
Speaker 1: sensed that the world held more for him than the
9:33
Speaker 1: boredom and straitness of academia. He buttonholed another Texan, Kenny Rogers.
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Speaker 1: Rogers had success with his group the first edition. Kenny
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Speaker 1: Rogers recognized something in Don Henley. Call it game recognizing game,
9:46
Speaker 1: call it just dropping in to see what condition the
9:49
Speaker 1: kid's condition was in. Call it whatever you want. For
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Speaker 1: Don Hemley his group Shiloh was the play they called.
9:55
Speaker 1: Kenny Rogers as producer was the coach. In Los Angeles,
9:58
Speaker 1: California was Field of opportunity. Go West, Go West, Go est,
10:03
Speaker 1: young man, and see what the sun is set in motion,
10:07
Speaker 1: manifest destiny Los Angeles, Sunny southern California. It was a
10:15
Speaker 1: rock and roll gold rush in nineteen seventy. The Beach
10:18
Speaker 1: Boys had established the California sound in the mid sixties,
10:21
Speaker 1: but it had evolved from sonny and surfey to electric
10:24
Speaker 1: folk psychedelia, and each evolution struck.
10:27
Speaker 2: Another mother road of pop hits.
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Speaker 1: Now nestled in the dust and black top ribbons of
10:32
Speaker 1: Laurel Canyon, just north of Hollywood, was one of the
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Speaker 1: most fertile artistic communities in the world, cross pollinating musical
10:39
Speaker 1: ideas and band members The Birds, The Mamas, and the Papas,
10:43
Speaker 1: Buffalo Springfield, all culminating in the Crosby Stills, Nash and
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Speaker 1: Young supergroup of the late sixties, with their honeyed vocal harmonies,
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Speaker 1: thick acoustic bliss, and massive success. On any given night
10:56
Speaker 1: in the city music legends in the Laurel Canyon scenesters
10:59
Speaker 1: were crowd Doug Weston's Troubadour in Santa Monica, where Buffalo
11:03
Speaker 1: Springfield had debuted in sixty six and where in nineteen
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Speaker 1: seventy Elton John had made his thunderous Us debut. The
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Speaker 1: Troubadour in nineteen seventy was something else. It was where
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Speaker 1: careers were made, where low key folksters made it with
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Speaker 1: bronze dimespot California girls on the make, and where rock
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Speaker 1: and roll dreams came to life in a Hollywood technicolor.
11:25
Speaker 1: It was where greatness actually seemed possible to a starry
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Speaker 1: eyed musician from a one stop town in Nowhere, Texas.
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Speaker 1: It was where Don Henley met j D and where
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Speaker 1: he met Jackson, and most importantly, where he met Glen.
12:04
Speaker 1: Glenn Fry was in Mexico, twenty years old, confidence radiating
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Speaker 1: off of his young, toned, tanned body. Quickly, he loaded
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Speaker 1: the contraband tightly packed bags of cheap acapoca gold marijuana
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Speaker 1: onto his pickup American maid born in Detroit, just like him.
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Speaker 1: The pickup was solid, reliable, capable of making the one
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Speaker 1: hundred plus mile trip himself. Of the border to Los
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Speaker 1: Angeles without breaking down and getting flagged by the customs man.
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Speaker 2: The desert highway was.
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Speaker 1: Dark, the wind cool, blowing through Glenn's long, dark hair.
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Speaker 1: Light in the distance, shimmering, beckoning, the Kalida and the
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Speaker 1: ash tray burned sweetly. Innocence shadowed his big, round almond
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Speaker 1: colored eyes. He could feel it in his chest. Excitement, anticipation.
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Speaker 1: Los Angeles, California. There was nowhere in the world like it,
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Speaker 1: at least not in Glenn Fry's young world, which at
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Speaker 1: the time consisted of just Detroit, Michigan, San Francisco and
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Speaker 1: some drug dealers den on the border. La came as
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Speaker 1: advertised girls that were somehow more beautiful than the weather.
13:08
Speaker 1: Music on every stage, opportunity, it seemed, on every corner. Hell,
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Speaker 1: David Crosby was right there, man on sunset, just walking
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Speaker 1: down the street in his flat brimmed hat like everyone else. Detroit,
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Speaker 1: Glenn's hometown, was a different trip entirely. Music didn't surround
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Speaker 1: you in the motor city so much as it punched
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Speaker 1: you in the face. It was ubiquitous, but the barrier
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Speaker 1: for entry was steeper. Barry Gordy wasn't banging down Glenn
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Speaker 1: Fry's door anytime soon to sign them to Detroit's Motown Records.
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Speaker 1: But another Michigan native was more welcoming, Bob Seeker. Beginning
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Speaker 1: in the early nineteen sixties. As incredible as it might
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Speaker 1: sound today, it was hard to find another musician anywhere,
13:48
Speaker 1: never minded Detroit who better embodied the rock and roll
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Speaker 1: spirit than Bob Seeker. He and his bands, first the
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Speaker 1: Bob Seegar System, then Bob Seger In The Last Heard,
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Speaker 1: and later the Silver Bullet and were live forces of nature,
14:02
Speaker 1: putting in work night after night on the Midwest circuit
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Speaker 1: with a mix of traditional blue eyed R and B
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Speaker 1: and mid sixties frat rock energy in a way that
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Speaker 1: would help solidify what true classic rock would become. Bob
14:14
Speaker 1: Seeker brought it night after night, and as he experienced
14:17
Speaker 1: local rocker with a steady lineup of shows in a
14:19
Speaker 1: record contract to Boop, he brought a young, ambitious, irrepressible
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Speaker 1: local kid named Glenn Fry under his wing. In a
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Speaker 1: half ast sort of mentor slash protegee kind of way,
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Speaker 1: Glenn made the most of his opportunity.
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Speaker 2: Music was his.
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Speaker 1: Ticket out from where or what He didn't really know
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Speaker 1: just out out of teen gangland, out of Detroit, out
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Speaker 1: of going nowhere fast, a chance at becoming somebody, something,
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Speaker 1: something more, something great. He made the most of his
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Speaker 1: first opportunity when asked to sit in on backing vocals
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Speaker 1: for Bob Seeker's second major label single, nineteen sixty nine's
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Speaker 1: Rambling gambling Man, and Glenn Fry came in hot on
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Speaker 1: the first chorus. You could hear the ambition in his
15:00
Speaker 1: voice as he shadows Seeker. It's a pronouncement of someone
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Speaker 1: new hitting the scene, someone not likes some other guys,
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Speaker 1: someone not content with the shadows of the stage, someone
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Speaker 1: destined for greatness.
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Speaker 2: Rambling gambling Man hit.
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Speaker 1: Number sixty two on the pop charts and gave young
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Speaker 1: Glen Fry a taste music was away. It was possible.
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Speaker 1: He loaded up his pickup and split for the coast.
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Speaker 1: No job, no band, no plan, just confidence in himself.
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Speaker 1: He'd figure it out. That's what the Acapoca gold was
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Speaker 1: all about. He'd break it off in smaller bags for
15:32
Speaker 1: the heads down on sunset and walk away with some
15:35
Speaker 1: walking around money to get him started, enough to drink
15:38
Speaker 1: down at the famous Troubadour on a weeknight and see
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Speaker 1: what kind of trouble he could get himself into. Glenn
15:45
Speaker 1: quickly connected with the troubadour's local athario, j D. Souther,
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Speaker 1: an Amarillo stick man who knew his way around not
15:52
Speaker 1: only the local scene, but around a country chord progression
15:55
Speaker 1: as well. JD met Glenn through one of Glenn's exes.
15:59
Speaker 1: Quickly the two men developed a bond around music. Glenn
16:02
Speaker 1: brought a street smart R and B toughness to JD's
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Speaker 1: natural country roots. They took up under the name Long
16:08
Speaker 1: Branch Pennywhistle as a duo and settled into a cheap
16:11
Speaker 1: apartment in Echo Park to woodshead some original songs. In
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Speaker 1: the one room apartment downstairs, another local songwriter was putting
16:22
Speaker 1: on a masterclass and songwriting. Every morning, Glenn could hear
16:26
Speaker 1: him through the floorboards up at nine am straight to
16:29
Speaker 1: a pit stop at the stove, where the songwriter would
16:32
Speaker 1: set a tea kettle alight. Then he'd work out the
16:34
Speaker 1: first verse the chord progression on the keyboard with the
16:37
Speaker 1: vocal melody over and over again. The kettle would blow
16:41
Speaker 1: off steam, the songwriter would break, pour his cup, let
16:45
Speaker 1: it steep back to the bench, time for the chorus.
16:48
Speaker 1: The chord progression on keyboard with the vocal melody on top,
16:51
Speaker 1: just like the first verse, over and over again. Then
16:55
Speaker 1: he'd retrieve his tea, settle sip onto the second verse,
16:58
Speaker 1: same as the first. Over he'd break for a sip
17:01
Speaker 1: here and there to Grease's vocal chords, and then straight
17:03
Speaker 1: back at it from the second verse to the second
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Speaker 1: chorus to the middle eighth the final verse in the outro.
17:09
Speaker 1: When all was said and done, it would be lunch
17:11
Speaker 1: and the song would be not only worked out, but
17:13
Speaker 1: fused by muscle memory. Glenn fry knew the dude downstairs
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Speaker 1: was on to something, and the dude downstairs was Jackson Brown.
17:22
Speaker 1: Blessed with the good looks of everybody's favorite little brother.
17:25
Speaker 1: Jackson Brown was at an early age already an experience
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Speaker 1: not to mention naturally gifted singer songwriter. He'd grown up
17:33
Speaker 1: in la but by the time he'd crossed paths with
17:36
Speaker 1: Glenn fry he'd already been around the block, having completed
17:39
Speaker 1: a songwriter's pilgrimage to New York City's Greenwich Village, where
17:42
Speaker 1: he'd witnessed first hand the culture defining a rattle of
17:45
Speaker 1: the velvet underground wound up backing their singer Nico on
17:49
Speaker 1: stage and personally fallen in and out of bed with
17:51
Speaker 1: her in the process. Neco's Iconic World Where resignature ballad
17:56
Speaker 1: These Days.
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Speaker 2: Jackson Brown wrote that when he.
17:59
Speaker 1: Was sixteen, after New York, Jackson Brown wound up back
18:02
Speaker 1: in Los Angeles at the turn of the decade with
18:04
Speaker 1: a head full of inspiration and just enough experience to
18:08
Speaker 1: turn that inspiration into a coveted record contract. None of
18:12
Speaker 1: it surprised the blue collar Glen Fry, who could hear
18:15
Speaker 1: Jackson Brown's discipline emanate through his kitchen floor every morning.
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Speaker 1: This was how the greats did it, through hard work.
18:22
Speaker 1: It wasn't just fast cars, grass and bronzed babes.
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Speaker 2: It was putting in work.
18:26
Speaker 1: It was hustle, and in Los Angeles in nineteen seventy
18:30
Speaker 1: when it came to the folk scene, anyway, no one
18:33
Speaker 1: had more hustle or was more of a hustler than
18:36
Speaker 1: David Geffen.
18:40
Speaker 2: We'll be right back after this word word word.
18:46
Speaker 1: David Geffen believed in Jackson Brown before anyone else believed
18:49
Speaker 1: in Jackson Brown. Because David Geffen believed in himself, or
18:53
Speaker 1: perhaps because David Geffen had what traders of any commodity
18:56
Speaker 1: covet most inside knowledge. How he got that was anyone's
19:01
Speaker 1: guests When he was coming up in the mailroom at
19:03
Speaker 1: the William Morris Agency, he simply took it, steaming open
19:07
Speaker 1: letters to agency executives to gain inside information on what
19:10
Speaker 1: opportunities were available for him to pounce upon. But when
19:14
Speaker 1: it came to Jackson Brown, David Geffen didn't need anyone
19:17
Speaker 1: to tell him about Jackson's talent, not his clients Crosby
19:21
Speaker 1: Stills or Nash or Laura Nero. Geffen just knew it
19:25
Speaker 1: was obvious Jackson Brown was going to write hits and
19:27
Speaker 1: become a star. He wasn't like the other artists in
19:29
Speaker 1: Geffen's circle. Jackson had it all talent, drive and good looks.
19:34
Speaker 1: How no one else in the music industry besides David
19:37
Speaker 1: Geffen saw that only reinforced Geffen's belief in himself that
19:40
Speaker 1: he alone had a special understanding of talent and thus success.
19:45
Speaker 1: I'm at Erdigan, founder of Atlantic Records, believed in David Geffen,
19:48
Speaker 1: even if he didn't believe in Jackson Brown. When Geffen
19:51
Speaker 1: went to Ertigon for a record contract for Jackson Brown,
19:54
Speaker 1: who Geffen was now managing Erdigon told Geffen that if
19:57
Speaker 1: he believed so strongly in his artist that he he
20:00
Speaker 1: then should start his own record label in Atlantic would
20:03
Speaker 1: distribute the records. David Geffen took to the challenge and
20:06
Speaker 1: with his managing partner Elliott Roberts, Geffen founded the artist
20:10
Speaker 1: friendly Asylum Records. And that's artist friendly, as in the
20:14
Speaker 1: artists or the inmates were running the Asylum. It was
20:17
Speaker 1: the spirit of the early seventies, when musical artistry trumped
20:21
Speaker 1: everything in the folk inspired pop scene. In nineteen seventy
20:25
Speaker 1: one in the record business, to be for the artist
20:28
Speaker 1: was to be at the vanguard of hypnos. It was
20:30
Speaker 1: who David Geffen was. It was why Asylum was perfect
20:33
Speaker 1: for a song focused to artists like Jackson Brown and
20:37
Speaker 1: Jackson Brown had friends, talented friends, friends who hung out
20:41
Speaker 1: nightly at the Troubadour. Don Hemley made the scene immediately
20:46
Speaker 1: upon arriving in La the Troubadour's doors swung open, and
20:49
Speaker 1: so too did the doors to his own slice of
20:51
Speaker 1: Heaven on Earth. On his first night inside the club,
20:55
Speaker 1: he saw Neil Young and Linda Ronstack just hanging out,
20:58
Speaker 1: and they were both already firmly established as stars. Don
21:01
Speaker 1: Henley couldn't believe his newfound lot in life. His band Shiloh,
21:06
Speaker 1: booked a gig, but it was clear quickly that Shiloh
21:09
Speaker 1: was going nowhere. Henley fell in with Glenn Frye, who
21:12
Speaker 1: had already firmly made the scene. Glenn and Henley sat
21:15
Speaker 1: in with J. D. Souther in the front room at
21:17
Speaker 1: the Troubadoor and traded songs with Jackson Brown. Don Hemley
21:21
Speaker 1: Texas boy that he was vibed on the laid back
21:24
Speaker 1: country stylings that came naturally to all involved, even for
21:27
Speaker 1: Glenn Frye, the boy from Detroit. Glenn's hard R and
21:31
Speaker 1: B influence tempered the dusty honky tonk swinging from Henley's
21:34
Speaker 1: Styx and snare together amalgamated with J. D. Souther's direct
21:39
Speaker 1: country tape on Jackson Brown's breezy Southern California songwriting. Something
21:44
Speaker 1: special started to happen, and Linda Ronstadd took note, recruiting
21:48
Speaker 1: Glen fry and Don Henley to become part of her
21:50
Speaker 1: live band.
21:51
Speaker 2: She recruited JD.
21:52
Speaker 1: Souther for something else her bedroom in Anaheim in nineteen
21:56
Speaker 1: seventy one, Glenn and Henley back for Linda Ronstadt, alongside
22:00
Speaker 1: two other musicians, Poco's Randy Meisner on bass and the
22:04
Speaker 1: Flying Burrito Brothers Bernie Leaden on guitar and banjo. The
22:08
Speaker 1: four backing musicians felt it, and Linda Ronstadt did too,
22:12
Speaker 1: especially when they sang in harmony voices rushing up from
22:16
Speaker 1: far away, snapping you to attention enough to wake you up,
22:20
Speaker 1: no matter the time of day. Dan Tana's nineteen seventy
22:26
Speaker 1: two Santa Monica Boulevard. If the Troubadour was the place
22:29
Speaker 1: to be, Dan Tana's was the place next to the
22:32
Speaker 1: place to be in old school red and white checkered
22:35
Speaker 1: Italian restaurant that served as a pre and post haang
22:38
Speaker 1: for Troubadour regulars, not to mention an old school Hollywood
22:41
Speaker 1: power player clubhouse where attendees got up to all manner
22:45
Speaker 1: of no good on a regular basis. David Geffen sat
22:48
Speaker 1: in a corner booth surrounded by Southern California folk rock royalty,
22:53
Speaker 1: Jackson Brown, Joni Mitchell, among them, a pregame of sorts
22:57
Speaker 1: before a party later that night at the Laurel Canyon
22:59
Speaker 1: home of Geffen's business partner Elliott Roberts, where the guest
23:03
Speaker 1: list would include Hollywood's young elite, Jack Nicholson, Peter Fonda,
23:07
Speaker 1: and Dennis Hopper, among more rock royals Michelle Phillips, Cass Elliot,
23:11
Speaker 1: Neil Young, and John Sebastian. But back at Dan Tana's
23:15
Speaker 1: gathered for their pre party feast, David Geffen stabbed at
23:19
Speaker 1: his broiled swordfish with his steely knife and called for
23:22
Speaker 1: more wine. Jackson Brown was unusually uncool in Geffen's ear,
23:27
Speaker 1: constantly about putting his friend Glen Frye under contract with
23:30
Speaker 1: him in Asylum Records. Geffen was aware of fry whose
23:34
Speaker 1: reputation as a singer, songwriter and a potential frontman was beginning
23:37
Speaker 1: to make the rounds due to his stint on the
23:39
Speaker 1: road and then in the studio with Linda Ronstadt. Fry's
23:43
Speaker 1: reputation was growing quickly, so much so that Columbia Records
23:47
Speaker 1: Clad Davis was circling and ready to sign him right
23:49
Speaker 1: out from under Geffen. What innocent as Glen fry was
23:54
Speaker 1: he understood what most artists often failed to understand, and
23:58
Speaker 1: what David Geffen sure as shit never failed to understand,
24:01
Speaker 1: and that is that artists, at least, the ones who
24:04
Speaker 1: can create and perform at a high level, are the
24:07
Speaker 1: rarest of commodities. Like professional athletes, there are only so
24:11
Speaker 1: many people in the world who can do what they do,
24:14
Speaker 1: and for record label owners and music managers, those artists,
24:17
Speaker 1: those rare few, are all they got. Their business is
24:21
Speaker 1: entirely dependent on them, on the artist. The rub is
24:24
Speaker 1: that artists are naturally insecure. They operate from a position
24:27
Speaker 1: of fear and too often lose sight of the power
24:30
Speaker 1: they actually possess when it comes to business, and therefore
24:33
Speaker 1: allow themselves to be taken by the businessmen. Glenn Fry
24:37
Speaker 1: was not naturally insecure, quite the opposite. He was brimming
24:41
Speaker 1: with confidence, even at a young age. Jackson Brown saw it.
24:45
Speaker 1: Everyone on the scene saw it, and it would be
24:46
Speaker 1: David Geffen's great loss if he too didn't see it soon.
24:51
Speaker 1: But David Geffen wasn't used to losing, and he was
24:53
Speaker 1: clearly no dummy. He got the message, and despite Clive
24:56
Speaker 1: Davis's aggressive stab at Glenn frye Geffen was able to
25:00
Speaker 1: preempt Columbia Records. David Geffen went on a shopping spree
25:04
Speaker 1: long in the process of signing Linda Ronstadt away from
25:06
Speaker 1: her existing record contract. He moved quickly to secure the
25:09
Speaker 1: rights to her backing band, and that meant purchasing the
25:12
Speaker 1: existing small time record contract for Long Branch Pennywhistle, Glenn
25:16
Speaker 1: Fry's band with J. D. Souther, as well as the
25:18
Speaker 1: small time record contract for Shiloh Don Hemley's band. David
25:23
Speaker 1: Geffen's Asylum Records now not only owned Jackson Brown, but
25:27
Speaker 1: Linda Ronstack, Glen Frye and Don Henley, as well as
25:30
Speaker 1: other solo artists Tom Waite's, Joni Mitchell and of course JD.
25:33
Speaker 2: Souther.
25:35
Speaker 1: Glenn Frye corralled the players behind that magic on stage
25:38
Speaker 1: in Anaheim with Linda Don Henley on drums, Bernie Ledden
25:41
Speaker 1: on banjo and guitar, and Randy Meisner on bass, Together
25:45
Speaker 1: with JD. Souther and Jackson Brown informally contributing bits of songs,
25:49
Speaker 1: they set about to become, like so many before them,
25:52
Speaker 1: America's next great rock and roll band. To become just that,
25:57
Speaker 1: there was only one name possible for the band, only
25:59
Speaker 1: one name that contained the requisite combination of inspiration and aspiration,
26:04
Speaker 1: only one name capable of representing the greatness. Glen Fry
26:08
Speaker 1: and Don Henley sought only one name, American enough the Eagles.
26:34
Speaker 1: The late nineteen sixties, America torn apart, Vietnam fast approaching,
26:40
Speaker 1: fifty thousand soldiers dead, Martin Luther King Junior dead, Robert F.
26:44
Speaker 1: Kennedy dead, Riots in the streets Detroit, D. C. Watts
26:49
Speaker 1: the early seventies, more dead in Vietnam, crossing the fifty
26:52
Speaker 1: thousand milestone, like nothing, Cambodia Agent Orange Watergate, and then
26:58
Speaker 1: finally arrest, A crack in the chaos, the California Sunshine,
27:04
Speaker 1: sneaking through something approaching hope, a new decade, a chance
27:08
Speaker 1: at no more war, no more death, a fucking break
27:12
Speaker 1: of peaceful, easy feeling. By the time The Eagle's self
27:17
Speaker 1: titled debut record was released on Geffen Records in nineteen
27:21
Speaker 1: seventy two, the America couldn't have been more ready for
27:24
Speaker 1: the breezy, countrified, Southern California sound of the Eagles. A
27:28
Speaker 1: decade of discord and this this sounded like harmony. Glen Fry,
27:33
Speaker 1: Don Henley, Bernie Leedten and Randy Meisner's self titled debut
27:37
Speaker 1: album was a smash, just like David Geffen, Jackson Brown
27:41
Speaker 1: and anyone with ears who heard and saw the Eagles
27:44
Speaker 1: come together knew would be the case. Everyone except their
27:47
Speaker 1: chosen producer, the renowned Glenn Johns. He couldn't hear it,
27:51
Speaker 1: so the.
27:52
Speaker 2: Record almost never happened.
27:54
Speaker 1: To John's, the Eagles were confused, one part country, one
27:57
Speaker 1: part rock, one part acoustic, one part of elect Sonically,
28:01
Speaker 1: Glenn John's believed the band didn't know who they were
28:03
Speaker 1: or what they wanted to be until they opened their
28:06
Speaker 1: mouths and started singing together and those beautiful vocal harmonies
28:09
Speaker 1: came out. They were somehow gritty and angelic at the
28:13
Speaker 1: same time, dusty like the desert floor, sublime like the
28:17
Speaker 1: desert sky. The Eagles were their own trip. After recording
28:23
Speaker 1: their debut, they shipped off to the desert to capture
28:25
Speaker 1: photographs for the cover of their album. Before making the
28:28
Speaker 1: one hundred and forty mile trip to Joshua Tree, they
28:31
Speaker 1: loaded up on tequila shots at the troubadour, closed the joint,
28:35
Speaker 1: then piled into a late model American sedan with room
28:38
Speaker 1: for the band, plustered photographers, A cooler of beer, more tequila,
28:41
Speaker 1: and a pouch of peyote squirreled away in the glove
28:44
Speaker 1: compartment and sped off to capture sunrise in the desert.
28:47
Speaker 1: Before it passed, the peote kicked in hard on his back.
28:52
Speaker 1: Glen Fry stared at the desert sky. The blinding sun
28:56
Speaker 1: turned the blue sky to silver glass, a mirror of
28:59
Speaker 1: us ceiling cutting through an actual eagle. Glenn would never
29:03
Speaker 1: forget this. It was so on the nose, but one
29:05
Speaker 1: of those things that actually happened. He would later tell
29:08
Speaker 1: the story over and over again, but now, in the moment,
29:12
Speaker 1: it freaked him the fuck out.
29:15
Speaker 2: It's all over.
29:16
Speaker 1: This was the moment, one of those points in your
29:20
Speaker 1: life where you can feel the punctuation happened, where you
29:23
Speaker 1: know life will never be the same, where you feel
29:25
Speaker 1: your past life compartmentalized into a mental archive.
29:29
Speaker 2: Right there in real time, You're.
29:31
Speaker 1: On the precipice of something There is only one direction forward,
29:35
Speaker 1: away from the past, where you can feel yourself being
29:38
Speaker 1: pulled back as you run for the door.
29:40
Speaker 2: That passage back is the wrong.
29:41
Speaker 1: Way, where so you think innocence can never be regained.
29:45
Speaker 1: What remains is only experience. You're shot at something big,
29:50
Speaker 1: at something grand, at something great. Life in the fast
29:55
Speaker 1: lane wouldn't truly present itself for a few years to come.
29:59
Speaker 1: But it began here in the desert, and then on
30:02
Speaker 1: the road and on the airwaves. Peaceful, Easy, feeling, witchy Woman.
30:07
Speaker 1: In the brilliant leadoff track Take It Easy, co written
30:10
Speaker 1: with Jackson Brown, the songs Hank Williams inspired lyrical simplicity,
30:15
Speaker 1: magical harmonies in perfect mix of banjo and driving rock
30:18
Speaker 1: rhythm resulted in a masterful work of pop Americana magic.
30:22
Speaker 1: Take It Easy does what the greatest pop songs throughout
30:25
Speaker 1: history have done, gives the masses what they don't even
30:28
Speaker 1: know they want. As with many turning points in history,
30:32
Speaker 1: music provided an alternative, a relief from the status quo,
30:36
Speaker 1: in relief from the turbulent sixties, just like the Beatles
30:39
Speaker 1: I Want to Hold Your Hand did in the aftermath
30:41
Speaker 1: of the Kennedy assassination, and just like Nirvana did with
30:44
Speaker 1: Smells Like Teen Spirit in the wake of the overtly
30:47
Speaker 1: commercial nineteen eighties. The Eagles had arrived with three bonafide
30:53
Speaker 1: smash hits off their debut album, and nothing for any
30:57
Speaker 1: member of the band would ever be the same. I'm
31:02
Speaker 1: Jake Brennan in this episode of Disgraceland.
31:05
Speaker 2: This to be.
31:06
Speaker 1: Continued Disgraceland was created by Yours Truly and is produced
31:27
Speaker 1: in partnership with Double Elvis. Credits for this episode can
31:31
Speaker 1: be found on the show notes page at disgracelampod dot com.
31:34
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Speaker 2: Rock a Roller, He's the bed Don Man