Pop Music Review : Eagles Regain Peaceful, Easy Feeling

Fourteen years between shows?

Remarkably, it’s no problem for the Eagles.

In the quintet’s first concert performance since a savage 1980 breakup, the Eagles demonstrated Monday night in Burbank the conviction and craft that originally made it one of the all-time great American rock groups.

But the Los Angeles-based band had to get over its nervousness before it showed those characteristics.

Yes, even the Eagles, often described in the ‘70s as icy performers, showed evidence of the jitters in the opening minutes of its two-hour set before 800 fans and guests on a sound stage at Warner Bros. Studios.

In a show that was taped for an MTV special scheduled to air in late summer, the band members--Don Henley, Glenn Frey, Don Felder, Timothy B. Schmit and Joe Walsh--hardly acknowledged the audience as they walked from the shadows to the stools that would be their home for the opening acoustic set.

Dressed casually in T-shirt and jeans, Frey began things, predictably, with “Peaceful Easy Feeling,” one of the first in a series of hits that made the Eagles the biggest-selling band in the ‘70s.

But his vocal and the band’s playing and backing harmonies hardly reflected the comforting, relaxed aura of the lyrics. Instead, the band seemed cautious through the early numbers--more concerned with avoiding mistakes than opening up emotionally.

The anxiousness wasn’t broken until seven numbers into the set when Henley, wearing a flannel shirt and jeans, flubbed the words to one of four new songs--the ballad “Learn to Be Still.”

For longtime Eagles watchers, it was a key moment. One of the factors that contributed to the breakup of the band in 1980 was the tension growing out of the high standards and perfectionism demanded, in large part, by Henley and Frey, the band’s primary songwriters.

Rather than get more uptight, Henley simply laughed as he acknowledged his error and started again--and the nervousness evaporated for everyone on stage.

When the group followed with Felder’s classy new guitar introduction to “Hotel California,” the music felt more effortless and free.

After the acoustic set, the band was joined by an orchestra and up to five backing musicians for seven songs. Schmit contributed the lead vocal on “I Can’t Tell You Why,” and Walsh sang “Pretty Maids All in a Row.”

For the closing segment, the Eagles turned up the volume and rocked, moving from “One of These Nights” through “Life in the Fast Lane” and “Heartache Tonight.”

The encore consisted of the biting new “Get Over It,” which Henley describes as the band’s new “anti-politically correct” song, and “Desperado,” the Eagles’ signature song from the early ‘70s.

Throughout, the singing sounded as inviting and tailored as if the band had never taken the winter off--much less 14 years.

But the question surrounding the regrouping of the Eagles wasn’t whether the harmonies would still be there--just as, given the continued popularity of Eagles songs, there was no worry about selling tickets for their upcoming tour, even at a top price in Southern California of $115.

The question for the tour, which begins May 27 at Irvine Meadows Amphitheatre and ends Oct. 8 at the Rose Bowl, was whether the songs would still be relevant.

The answer: absolutely.

In the ‘70s, the Eagles chronicled the contradictions and tensions of a generation caught between the idealism of the ‘60s and the encroaching greed of the ‘80s--and those issues remain part of the national agenda.

The band’s best songs, from “Hotel California” to “The Last Resort,” deal with everything from innocence to cynicism, personal ethics to governmental corruption.

The continued relevance of these songs--along with the introduction of new material and the inclusion of some of Henley’s solo material--is important because the Eagles are speaking about this tour as being a “resumption,” not just a one-time reunion.

“Band morale is high,” Frey said backstage after the taping. “Everybody is upbeat. We are having a good time. I couldn’t be happier.”

Henley, seated next to him, said he also would like to see the Eagles continue as a recording and touring unit.

“We have grown up some,” he said. “Doing the solo thing was nice, but there is something about being in a band that is magic.”