History of the Eagles Part One Page #15

---

You know, life is about improvement,

whether it's as a musician or as

a singer or as a songwriter or

just, you know, all the other

different hats we all wear.

So, hopefully, we're just getting better.

We've been doing this quite

a long time now on and off,

and we feel like we've

got it down pretty good.

And, in fact, we've had five days

off, and we're ready to go now.

When the Eagles first broke up,

I wasn't quite sure what I

was going to do with myself.

So I just hustled.

I went just as a singer with Toto,

I played bass for Jimmy Buffett,

I went out with Warren Zevon

and Dan Fogelberg, and stuff I

wouldn't have necessarily done.

I sang on Poison records

and Twisted Sister,

although you'll never see my name.

They never gave me credit.

That was more like yelling.

It's not all going to be the

greatest thing in the world.

But if you can work and support

yourself and your family, it's good.

WOMAN:
OK, next question. Gentleman

in the front here, Richard.

What position do you think

rock'n'roll takes now about drugs?

Oooh.

SCATTERED TITTERS

We came from a generation that

experimented with all kinds

of substances, of course.

I think our message is that...

you can be a damn good rock band

without all that stuff.

I'd like to propose a toast to

dedicate this song to you, to us.

The drinking man's musician, Joe Walsh!

CHEERING:

I ended up an alcoholic.

And very fond of cocaine.

If I was awake, I was...

I was doing that stuff.

Good morning, rock fans.

'In the very early years,

it had briefly worked. '

And then you chase it when

it doesn't work anymore.

And I chased it for years and years.

If you look at your reflection

In the bottom of the well

What you see is only on the surface...

"Could Hemingway have written

like that if he was sober,

"or could Hendrix have played like that

"if he didn't experiment

with hallucinogenics?

"Well, probably not. "

I used that one for years and

years, and it never occurred to me

that all those people are dead.

They got further and

further away from reality.

- Should I look at you or the camera?

- Look at me.

I ended up... in bad shape.

I wanna live with a cinnamon girl

I could be happy the rest of my life

With a cinnamon girl

A dreamer of pictures

I run in the night...

'I had hit bottom. '

And I knew that I was done and that...

.. I would probably die if I kept going.

Mom, send me money right now

I'm gonna make it somehow

I need another chance...

Joe was a mess.

He was around a bunch of people

that were really just enablers.

Nobody wanted to intervene.

Nobody wanted to tell him he had a

drug problem or a drinking problem.

Everybody was just going along with Joe.

I remember what we all did when

it was an art form, you know?

And I'd like to fight

to get it back to that.

And I was very, very happy in the Eagles.

I was just going to say I'm sorry we

broke up, but we didn't break up.

We just stopped, I think.

We just said, you know,

"The heck with the '80s. "

Song three, take six.

In 1990, we tried to get

together to refuel it.

Everybody was in on that, but

Glenn wasn't involved yet.

Irving got us together

- Timothy, Joe, myself, and Don Henley.

Glenn was supposed to

join us in the studio,

and he was going to bring some songs in,

and we were going to start

making another record.

So, we started rehearsing, the

four of us, then we got a call,

I think about the third or fourth

day in the studio, saying that

Glenn had refused to come be

part of it, to join the party.

So we just stopped.

He was still, "I'm not doing this. "

Well, you know, to tell you the truth,

I was having a fine time

doing what I was doing.

I mean, there's more to life

than being in the Eagles.

The moment was always going to be kind of

when Glenn was ready to do it again.

I think Henley would have

been more willing than Glenn.

For me, personally, I think

that I had proved pretty much

everything that I needed to

prove in my solo career.

I had won a couple of

Grammys and had a few hits

and some successful tours.

And I had founded the Walden Woods Project.

When you're a solo artist, you

have to take responsibility

for everything - every mistake,

every bad record, every sour note.

But when you're in a band,

you get to share the praise and

the blame with your bandmates.

So, I was OK with the

notion of maybe going back

and being in a band again.

The thing that sort of turned my head

was the release of the Common Thread album.

Irving and Don went to Nashville

and they talked a bunch of people

into recording some Eagles songs,

with the royalties going to

the Walden Woods Project.

Well, I'm a-running down the

road trying to loosen my load...

I don't know who asked me, but they said,

"Travis Tritt's going to

do a video of Take It Easy

"and he wants to know if you

guys will be in the video. "

I said, "Well, OK."

Take it easy

Take it easy...

Never really talked to Travis

about whose idea it was.

I think Irving probably had

a hand in that whole thing.

Was I trying to put the band back

together by doing Common Thread?

No.

Was I waiting for the moment? Yeah.

.. Understand, just find a

place to make your stand

Take it easy...

In the Travis Tritt video, there

was a little bandstand scene

and we all picked up our

instruments and started playing.

I was thinking, "Guys, come on!" You know?

'You know, it's interesting -

after years pass, you know,

'you really sort of remember

that you were friends first.

'You have a lot of common history together

'and a lot of shared experiences. '

I remembered mostly the good stuff.

I didn't really think about the bad stuff.

I just remembered how much we

genuinely had liked each other

and how much fun we'd had.

We realised, after the success

of the Common Thread album

that there were still a

lot of people out there -

a whole lot of people - who

wanted to see us play again.

You know, sometimes there's

a little bit of serendipity

involved in this, and I think

what happened is everybody's life

started to line up in a way that

now it made sense for all of us.

And we discussed it.

Joe and Don came up and sat in at

a benefit that I did in Aspen.

'We had a meeting in Aspen. '

I was one of the first guys that

they wanted to try it out on.

You know, Joe was buzzed. It

was 1.00 in the afternoon.

You know, and he would say,

"Hey, I'm there, man. I'm fine.

"Don't worry about me. "

But Don and I could both tell that

he wasn't fine, and we were worried.

They said what they wanted to do.

They wanted to try it,

get back together again.

They didn't know what I

would say, but I said,

"I understand, and, yeah, I can get sober. "

Somewhere along the

way I found the meaning

Woke up dreaming

Along the way

Never quite seems the

same when you awaken

And making up for the

time is such a price to pay

Then they take the dream away

and it just ain't fair...

We had to get Joe into some sort of rehab,

Rate this script:0.0 / 0 votes