Eagles Debut Album Turns 50

Eagles debut album ‘Eagles’ was released in 1 June 1972, 50 years ago today.

‘Eagles’ was recorded in London with producer Glyn Johns, who had just finished up work on The Who ‘Who’s Next’ and The Rolling Stones ‘Sticky Fingers’. His next job was engineer for The Stones ‘Exile On Main Street’ and Neil Young’s ‘Harvest’.

Glenn Frey chose Johns because he liked the sound of the Stones, The Who and Led Zeppelin albums he had worked on. Johns flew to Boulder, Colorado to watch the band in December 1971 but wasn’t sold on the sound. Frey wanted Eagles to be a rock band, Bernie Leadon thought they should be country. Eventually they became what was known as Country-Rock.

Nine of the 10 ‘Eagles’ songs were recorded at Olympic Studios in London. David Bowie, Barbra Streisand, The Cure and The Stones have used the studio. Don Henley only sang lead on one song but later manager Elliot Roberts decided it needed another Don song and so the Jackson Browne track ‘Nightingale’ was recorded in Los Angeles. Browne had also written ‘Take It Easy’ with Frey.

The best-known songs from the album were ‘Take It Easy’, ‘Witchy Woman’ and ‘Peaceful Easy Feeling’.

‘Eagles’ cost a reported $125,000 to make, an enormous amount of money for the time. It also didn’t pay dividends for the band, stalling at no 22 in the USA. However, it eventually went on to sell over 1million copies.

Eagles didn’t have a real hit until their fourth album ‘One Of These Nights’ went to number one in 1975.

Tracklist
1. Take It Easy
2. Witchy Woman
3. Chug All Night
4. Most of Us Are Sad
5. Nightingale
6. Train Leaves Here This Morning
7. Take the Devil
8. Earlybird
9. Peaceful Easy Feeling
10. Tryin’

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