Glenn Frey's death in January 2016 marked the end of an era. Here was a guy who fronted one of my favorite bands, a man who wrote and performed some of the greatest songs of the time that coincided with my own coming of age. The Eagles song Take It Easy held a strong personal connection for me, as mentioned in my book The Toughest Hundred Dollars & Other Rock & Roll Stories in the chapter Eleven Exceptional Albums.In 1971, Jackson Browne and Frey, both at the beginning of their musical careers, were neighbors in a Los Angeles apartment complex. Browne was working on songs for his first album. Frey especially liked one song, but Browne had been unable to complete it and, after some prodding, Browne gave the song to his friend to finish. Frey added a few words to the second verse:
"It's a girl my Lord in a flatbed Ford, slowing down to take a look at me."And so was born a classic song that helped to kick-start the Eagles, who became one of the biggest bands on the planet.
As I wrote in the above-mentioned chapter, I first heard Take It Easy on a long-ago hot June night in 1972 as I was driving down the road, with my first paycheck in my pocket. I was driving my first car, enjoying a first moment of freedom, when from my radio speaker came that memorable song opening: the acoustic guitar strumming the chords while a jangly electric guitar accented the changes. I knew immediately that this was going to be a great song, and it perfectly fit the moment.
Take It Easy underlined and underscored that memorable moment in that unique set of circumstances. It could have been any number of great songs, but that one was perfect for that moment. After that, it was the first song I learned to play start to finish when learning to play guitar, and it continued to have meaning for me over the decades.
It was important enough that in the Summer of 2002, when the kids were small, while driving east on Interstate 40 in Arizona that Tiffany and I realized we could not in good conscience, ignore the highway sign announcing the next exit – Winslow, Arizona.We drove into town, looking for an appropriate corner on which to stand, when we discovered there was just such a place at the intersection of Old Highway 66 and North Kinsley Ave. On the northwest corner of that intersection stands a bronze statue of Jackson Browne, and behind him is a mural depicting a large window with the reflection of, yup, you guessed it – a girl in a flatbed Ford (with an eagle perched on an upstairs window sill.)
Just across the street was a record/cd store (apparently gone now). In another one of those perfect moments, there it was - 2002, the 40th anniversary of the release of Take It Easy and the album, and the store was playing at loud volume through outside speakers, the album over and over. There we were, "Standin' on a corner in Winslow, Arizona…," taking photos with that very song wafting over us on a hot summer day.
"I wrote this song with Glenn Frey," Browne told a concert audience days after Frey's death, according to a story on Billboard Magazine online. "It’s a song that I started, but I didn’t finish it. Even if I had finished it by myself, it wouldn’t be the song that it is and it wouldn’t be the song that we all love."It is a timeless song, and hearing it always evokes those memories. It made me smile the first time I heard it, again on that hot day in 2002 on that corner, and it makes me smile every time I hear it.
Without what became the Eagles signature song, Frey may never have emerged from that small apartment to become a musical force, and the Eagles might not have happened at all. And so it follows that what became several memorable moments for me, might have passed by unnoticed.
Such is the power of music.
Larry Manch is an
author, teacher, guitar player, freelance writer, and columnist. His books
include: 'Twisted
Logic: 50 Edgy Flash Fiction Stories', 'The
Toughest Hundred Dollars & Other Rock & Roll Stories', 'A Sports
Junkie', 'The Avery
Appointment', 'Between
the Fuzzy Parts', and 'Jonathan Stephens Is Just A Kid'. His books are available in
paperback and e-book.
He writes about sports
for Season
Tickets, food and travel on Miles & Meals, and
music/guitars on The Backbeat.
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