A Texan, a Michiganian, a Nebraskan and a Minnesotan who got together in California to form a country-rock band write a concept album about the exploits of a wild west gang from Oklahoma, and record the music in the city of London, England, with an English producer famed for engineering rock albums? Yes, truth is stranger than fiction!
By 1973, Glyn Johns had a wondrously impressive CV, having produced and/or engineered albums by the cream of rock royalty – The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, The Small Faces, Procol Harum, Joe Cocker, Led Zeppelin, The Steve Miller Band, The Band, The Who and Neil Young to name a few of the big names. Johns had produced the Eagles self-titled first album in 1972, having been chosen by Glenn Frey because of his rock’n’roll pedigree. Ironically, Johns favoured emphasising the country elements of the band and tried to bring these to the fore, later leading to conflict between him, Henley and Frey, who wanted the Eagles to have a rockier sound.
Top producer Glyn Johns (centre) with Paul McCartney and Mick Jagger – rock royalty!
In his excellent biography of the Eagles ‘To The Limit’, Marc Elliot poetically places the original band in the context of the time:
”Like the prospectors of the California gold rush a hundred years earlier, most hopefuls would soon return home in disappointment, their vein of gold records unrecorded. Some would stay a while longer before giving up, and a few would actually get to spend fifteen minutes playing out their fevered dreams. Fewer still would find glory. Four who did were Don Henley from Texas, Glenn Frey from Michigan, Randy Meisner from Nebraska, and Bernie Leadon from Minnesota.”
The original band line-up, destined to last for only two albums before lead guitarist Don Henley joined, was:
Donald Hugh Henley – b. 22nd July 1947 – Gilmer, Texas
Glenn Lewis Frey – b. 6th November 1948 – Detroit, Michigan (a ‘Detroiter’)
Randy Herman Meisner – b. 8th March 1946 – Scottsbluff, Nebraska
Bernard Mathew Leadon III – b. 19th July 1947 – Minneapolis, Minnesota
Friends J.D. Souther and Jackson Browne, although not official members, contributed to the songwriting and the ‘vibe’.
If you were to travel from Detroit to Gilmer, to Scottsbluff, on to Minneapolis then back to Detroit, you would cover some 3500 miles in your round trip, longer than the journey from east to west coasts and about the same as the distance from New York, USA, to London, England! The Eagles’ music always smacks of serious road miles and is particularly evocative of the wide open expanses in North America. The band’s debut LP, ‘Eagles’, released on 1st June 1972, set out their musical stall – country rock with hints of rhythm and blues and bar-room rock, all laced with great vocal harmonies.
Texas, Michigan, Nebraska and Minnesota – separated by 1000s of road miles…
‘Desperado’ the Eagles, second album, is based around the Doolin-Dalton Gang (aka ‘Oklahombres’ and ‘The Wild Bunch’), formed by William ‘Bill’ Doolin in 1893 after his compadres in the famous Dalton Gang were killed in a raid on Coffeeyville, Kansas on 5th October 1892.
Bill Doolin
The Dalton Gang had the sheer audacity to attempt a ‘daylight robbery’ of two banks, the First National and The Condon, in Coffeyville at the same time, splitting into two groups to carry out the raids, having tied up their horses to a fence in a nearby alley. Unfortunately for the outlaws, one of the townspeople recognised them and quietly spread the word, mustering a large group who surrounded the banks and fired on the gang when they emerged, forcing them back inside. Their rear exit was also blocked by the locals and every gang member was killed, with the exception of Emmett Dalton, who was sentenced to life in prison, released on parole after fourteen years, and then, bizarrely, became a screen writer in Hollywood, dying in 1937!
Artwork for the album was designed by Gary Burden (May 23, 1933 – March 7, 2018), one of the pioneers of the concept of album cover art. By 1973, covers that Gary had designed included the self-titled debut by Crosby, Stills & Nash, ‘Blue’ by Joni Mitchell, ‘Morrison Hotel’ by The Doors and ‘After The Gold Rush’ by Neil Young, an artist with whom he would develop a career-long relationship. Photographs were taken by Henry Diltz, with whom Burden had worked with successfully on the Eagles self-titled first album cover.
Gary Burden, artist
Burden described the development of the cover:
“I wanted to make a dramatic visual image that would fit the conceptual music they had put together, drawing a comparison between the guitar player in the ’70s and the gunslinger in the 1870s. It was a story of four guys who come to town, decide to stop working, and take the easy way by becoming outlaws. They rob the bank but are killed in the process. The band’s roadies, their manager, and their record producer were playing the posse coming after these outlaws. Boyd Elder, a friend of ours and an artist from Texas, was riding through the scene, galloping on a horse. Everybody was shouting.”
Henry Diltz said, “It was really like being there, like being back there in the old west, except, instead of the old Matthew Brady box-camera I had my Nikon motor drive and my Minolta super-8 camera.”
“like being back there in the old west”
’Desperado’ was recorded at Island Studios, London, England and released on 17th April 1973. It clocks in at a very compact 35 minutes and 40 seconds. The album contains two of the Eagles ‘signature’ songs, ‘Desperado’ and ‘Tequila Sunrise’, and some of their most introspective lesser-known songs. The music flows beautifully, perhaps more like a ‘bitter creek’ than a mountain stream, lyrics full of heartache and pain delivered by heavenly harmonies.
The title track introduces the gang:
”They were doolin’, doolin’-dalton
High or low, it was the same
Easy money, and faithless women
Red eye whiskey for the pain.
Go down little dalton, it must be God’s will
Two brothers lyin’ dead in Coffeeville.
Two voices call to you from where they stood,
“Lay down your law books now, they’re no damn good.”
The description of the landscape in the bridge conjures up the atmosphere of the mid-west brilliantly:
”Well, the towns lay out across the dusty plains
Like graveyards filled with tombstones, waitin’ for the names”
Bernie Leadon’s bluegrass ‘Twenty-One’ captures the bravado of the wild west gang, and maybe also the Eagles themselves, then in their mid-twenties:
”Twenty-one and strong as I can be
I know what freedom means to me
And I can’t give the reason why
I should ever want to die
Got no cause to be afraid
Or fear that life will ever fade
‘Cause as I watch the rising sun
I know that we have just begun”
The rocky, almost punky ‘Out Of Control’ was co-written by Henley and Frey with Tom Nixon, who had met Don Henley back in Texas when he was playing parties with previous bands, roadied for the Eagles when they first started touring and subsequently became their road manager, calling himself Tommy “Life Is One Fuckin’ Thing after Another” Nixon!
”Oh, my, don’t the sky look spacious
With the stars all shinin’ down
Well, I can hear the night wind howlin’
It’s a high and lonesome sound
And I ain’t had a woman in so long
I can’t feed my starvin soul
Come on, saddle up, boys, we’re gonna ride into town
We’re gonna get a little out of control”
Tommy “Life Is One Fuckin’ Thing after Another” Nixon
Evocative of an expansive landscape and wistful in its contemplation of life as a ‘hired hand’, ‘Tequila Sunrise’ describes the transitory nature of the outlaw, perhaps a longing for a more sedentary existence, as the narrator has to say goodbye to yet another love…
”It’s another tequila sunrise
Starin’ slowly ‘cross the sky, said goodbye
He was just a hired hand
Workin’ on the dreams he planned to try
The days go by”
The title track is a masterpiece, a piano-driven ballad depicting the vagaries of the rambling outlaw life, conveyed through Don Henley’s husky dulcet tones:
”Desperado, oh, you ain’t gettin’ no younger
Your pain and your hunger, they’re drivin’ you home
And freedom, oh freedom well, that’s just some people talkin’
Your prison is walking through this world all alone”
The only cover version on the album, David Blue’s ‘Outlaw Man’ fits into the wild west concept incredibly well and blends seamlessly with the Eagles’ compositions:
“I am an outlaw, I was born an outlaw’s son
The highway is my legacy
On the highway I will run
In one hand I’ve a Bible
In the other I’ve got a gun
Well, don’ you know me
I’m the man who won”
outlaw men
‘Saturday Night’ is a beautiful waltz-time ballad, with Henley and Meisner on fine form for this wistful reflective song:
“The years brought the railroad
It ran by my door
Now there’s boards on the windows
And dust on the floor
And she passes the time at another man’s side
And I pass the time with my pride…”
’Bitter Creek’, written and sung by Bernie Leadon, is one of the Eagles’ hidden gems, a beautiful song which transports the listener back to days past In the days when the Doolin-Dalton Gang operated out of ‘Indian Territory’ (Oklahoma), one of their members was George “Bitter Creek” Newcomb – perhaps an inspiration for the song…But did the gang members get stoned on the natural highs out in the desert?!
”Out where the desert meets the sky
Is where I go when I wanna hide
Oh, peyote (oh,peyote,mm)
She tried to show me (tried to show me)
You know there ain’t no cause to weep
at Bitter Creek”
Closing medley ‘Doolin-Dalton (reprise)/Desperado (reprise)’ expresses the ‘sundown’, the sad end to an old black-and -white wild-west movie? Maybe recalling the demise of Bill Dalton who, after successfully evading the lawmen for some time, was finally tracked down and shot to pieces by a posse led by Heck Thomas in Oklahoma Territory on 25th August 1896, signalling the passing of ‘The Wild Bunch’…
“Well the stage was set the sun was sinkin’ low down
As they came to town to face another showdown
The lawmen cleared the people from the streets
“All you blood-thirsty bystanders, will you try to find your seats?”
Watch ’em duelin’ (duelin’)
Doolin-Dalton (Dalton)
High or low, (high, low), it’s all the same
Easy money and faithless women
You will never kill the pain
Go down, Bill Doolin, don’t you wonder why
Sooner or later we all have to die?
Sooner or later, that’s a stone-cold fact,
Four men ride out and only three ride back”
The dead bodies of The Dalton Gang
Initial critical reception for ‘Desperado’ was mixed, the commercial response lukewarm and the band were restless, some members eager to pursue a rockier sound. This led to the recruitment of Don Felder, who featured on their next long-player ’On The Border’, released on 22nd March 1974. The initial sessions for the album with Glyn Johns in the UK had been abandoned (called by some members a ‘disaster’) and the record was finished with producer Bill Szymczyk, who was to develop a long working relationship with the Eagles. It was all-change on the management front too, with Irving Azoff replacing Elliot Roberts. Change become the only constant for the Eagles, as they became more and more popular. The five-piece line-up on ‘Border’ lasted through one more album, the eclectic ‘One Of These Nights’, before Bernie Leadon left/was ousted, unhappy with the musical direction and falling out with Henley and Frey. Leadon was replaced with successful solo artist Joe Walsh and the Eagles recorded ‘Hotel California’, which would send them into the stratosphere and increase their reputation as drug-fuelled playboys with too much money and too much time on their hands! It was Randy Meisner who fell victim after that album was released, to be replaced by the man who had replaced him on bass in Poco, Timothy B. Schmidt, harmony vocalist extraordinaire. Their swansong, in 1979, was ‘The Long Run’, a darker, funkier, in some ways more bitter album, with some fantastic performances. Then, after much falling out, particularly between Felder and Henley/Frey (detailed extensively in Felder’s book ‘Heaven and Hell’), the Eagles merry-go-round froze, not to thaw again until 1994 when they toured and captured the live set on the aptly-titled ‘Hell Freezes Over’ album, complete with four new studio recordings, to huge acclaim. Of course it didn’t last and the members went back to their various solo projects until a new double-CD studio album, ‘Long Road Out Of Eden’ (six years in the making) surfaced, without the talents of Don Felder – wounds too deep to heal. Glenn Frey passed away in 2016 but there is still a version of the band touring to this day, with Don Henley the only original member and only the title track from ‘Desperado’ surviving in recent setlists…
References, quotes and photos:
Eliot, Marc (2005). ‘To The Limit – The Untold Story Of The Eagles’. New York: Da Capo Publishing.
Felder, Don (2008). ‘Heaven And Hell – My Life In The Eagles 1974-2001’. Hoboken John Wiley & Sons
https://www.legendsofamerica.com/doolin-dalton-gang/
http://www.eyewitnesstohistory.com/daltons.htm
https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/the-dalton-gang-is-wiped-out-in-coffeyville-kansas
http://garyburdenforrtwerk.com/2009/09/desperado/
The Eagles ‘Desperado’ – from LP cover and sleeve (author’s own collection)
Eagles central
Lyrics and music:
The Eagles ‘Desperado’
tracklisting:
Side One
- Doolin-Dalton (Don Henley/Glenn Frey/J.D. Souther/Jackson Browne), lead vocals: Don Henley and Glenn Frey (3:26)
- Twenty-One (Bernie Leadon), lead vocals: Bernie Leadon (2:11)
- Out of Control (Henley/Frey/Tom Nixon), lead vocals: Frey (3:04)
- Tequila Sunrise (Henley/Frey), lead vocals: Frey (2:52)
- Desperado (Henley/Frey), lead vocals: Henley (3:36)
Side Two
- Certain Kind of Fool (Henley/Frey/Randy Meisner) lead vocals: Randy Meisner (3:02)
- Doolin-Dalton (Instrumental) (Henley/Frey/Souther/Browne) (0:48)
- Outlaw Man (David Blue ) lead vocals: Frey (3:34)
- Saturday Night (Henley/Frey/Meisner/Leadon) lead vocals: Henley with Meisner (3:20)
- Bitter Creek (Leadon) lead vocals: Leadon (5:00)
- Doolin-Dalton/Desperado (Reprise) (Henley/Frey/Souther/Browne), lead vocals: Henley (4:50)
Where it all began, out in the desert…cover by Gary Burden and Henry Diltz
Eddie's Rock Music A-Z 