R.I.P. Glenn Frey

Just a week after David Bowie's death, another of my musical heroes has passed on. The name Glenn Frey may not mean much by itself to some younger readers, but I guarantee everyone will have heard of his band, the Eagles, and their biggest hit, 'Hotel California', as they are among the greatest of all on the American country-rock scene and have sold simply vast quantities of music over a period of almost 45 years. Even more so than Bowie, the Eagles, both as a band and as solo artists, have had a profound influence on me: they rank among my all-time favourite musicians and have provided the soundtrack to my life through good times and bad ever since I discovered them in my early teens, so Frey's death came as a great shock and I couldn't let it pass unmarked.


It was confirmed on the Eagles website late on Monday evening that Frey had died at the age of 67 from complications of rheumatoid arthritis, acute ulcerative colitis and pneumonia, making him the first of the Eagles to leave this world. Along with Don Henley, Bernie Leadon and Randy Meisner, he was one of the band's founding members, and through the various line-up changes over the years Henley and Frey would remain constant. They were the principal songwriters of the band and made a formidable partnership, between them coming up with some brilliantly profound and thought-provoking lyrics; 'Lyin' Eyes', sung by Frey, is in my view one of the finest compositions ever created, with its sad tale of a young woman trapped in a loveless relationship, wealthy but unhappy.

Standin' on a corner in Winslow, Arizona...

Frey was partly responsible for the band's breakthrough hit, 'Take It Easy', which he sang and co-wrote with his then housemate Jackson Browne. This song did wonders for the town of Winslow, sadly not Winslow, Buckinghamshire, just a few miles from my own home town, but Winslow, Arizona, where the lyrics famously claim he was standing on a corner and saw "a girl, my lord, in a flatbed Ford, slowin' down to take a look at me", and the corner in question has become a significant tourist attraction. He also seemed to be the voice of the Eagles at their live shows and was the one who spent most time addressing the audience while the others principally let their music do the talking.

The Eagles didn't have a single lead vocalist, sharing the vocals between them, and Frey's distinctive voice features on such other hits as 'Peaceful Easy Feeling', 'Heartache Tonight', 'Tequila Sunrise' and 'New Kid In Town'. He was an accomplished guitar player and regularly appeared in countdowns of the world's greatest rock guitarists, but also played keyboards and was responsible for the arrangement of many Eagles songs when performed live, being nicknamed the 'Lone Arranger' by his bandmates. As a band, the Eagles have achieved massive success, selling over 100 million records in the US alone; 'Hotel California' may be the best known, but their Greatest Hits Volume 1 of 1976 vies with Michael Jackson's Thriller to be the world's best-selling album of all time. They had surprisingly few hit singles in the UK though and were principally known for the huge sales of their albums.

Tours and tantrums

For all their musical brilliance, Henley and Frey could be very difficult to live with. In the band's heyday they often behaved like spoilt children, throwing tantrums over the pettiest of things and sometimes even refusing to acknowledge each other's existence. They could be vindictive too, as evidenced by the hugely acrimonious sacking of former bandmate Don Felder, which was allegedly orchestrated primarily by Frey. It is often said by fans and critics though that it was this conflict between them that sparked their creativity as songwriters, and some memorable works certainly resulted. Of course, there were lots of drugs too as was the norm at the time, and Frey reportedly had to have the lining of his nose reconstructed from Teflon after destroying the original through his drug use.

Frey and Henley themselves became estranged for a long period during the eighties, with Henley famously claiming the band would never reform until "hell freezes over" - this is technically true as that was the title of their 1994 reunion show and album that no one ever expected to happen. It has been said that their initial meeting regarding the possibility of a reunion was the first time in many years that the two of them had actually sat down like adults and discussed things without arguing or shouting at each other! Following that album, the band, now consisting of Henley, Frey, Joe Walsh and Timothy B. Schmit, plus Felder until his unhappy departure, became one of the world's most popular and critically-acclaimed live acts and toured regularly, playing to huge audiences. Their most recent album, Long Road Out Of Eden, was released in 2007, and they were touring just last year ahead of a possible new album; several dates on this tour were however cancelled without explanation, and in hindsight Frey's illness was the most likely reason.

Going solo...

Following the original breakup of the Eagles in 1980, Frey continued to record as a solo artist with a good deal of success, although in the UK at least he seems to have been eclipsed by Henley and his work with the band is better known than his solo songs. Like Bowie, he also became involved in TV and film, contributing 'The Heat Is On' to the soundtrack of the 1984 movie Beverley Hills Cop, and what in my opinion are his two best solo compositions, 'Smuggler's Blues' and 'You Belong To The City', appeared in Miami Vice. It wasn't just his music that featured though as Frey himself turned his hand to acting, and his best known role to UK audiences was a guest appearance in the Miami Vice episode 'Smuggler's Blues' that also included his song of that name; this fitted the theme of the series perfectly despite not being written specifically for it. His latest solo album and the only one since the Eagles reunited, After Hours, appeared in 2012 after a twenty-year gap, and sadly this has become his final release.

It's too early to say what will happen to the Eagles, but Glenn Frey was a cornerstone of the group who will be impossible to replace and very hard to continue without, and the surviving members all have established solo careers alongside the band. Whatever happens, things will never be the same without Glenn, but he will live on through the superb music he made.

R.I.P. Glenn Frey, 1948-2016. Take it easy.