I Saw The Eagles at Van Andel Arena in Grand Rapids MI Monday night. I know for many people here The Eagles are the anti-Christ of progressive rock, but I am one of those strange people who can within the same week see a band like Necromonkey at ProgDay and a band like The Eagles and enjoy them both for different reasons.
The current Eagles tour is being billed as “The History Of The Eagles” and that is pretty much how the show is preseented (especially the first half). The current lineup consists of Don Henley, Glenn Frey, Bernie Louden, Timothy B. Schmidt and Joe Walsh (along with several back up musicians). The show started with just Henley and Frey on acoustic guitars doing “Whatever Happened To Saturday Night” from the band’s first album. Louden joined next with Schmidt and Walsh coming out one by one for each subsequent song. Walsh got a huge ovation when he walked on stage as they did an updated funky version of “Witchy Woman”. From there they did tunes pretty much in chronological order up through the intermission. The second half of the show was pulled mostly from “Hotel California” and “The Long Run” with only one song post 1980 when Schmidt sang “Love Will Keep Us Alive” from “Hell Freezes Over”. They also let Walsh loose on a couple of his solo / James Gang hits which brought down the house. Vocally they sounded really good for the most part. Frey and Henley’s voices seemed a little bit strained at the beginning, but improved over the course of the night. Schmidt, Louden and Walsh sound like they always have. The 5 part vocal harmonies are still incredible and especially knocked it out of the park on the last song before the intermission “Take It To The Limit”. Instrumentally they were very tight, with Walsh as good as ever on guitar. The Don Felder parts were mostly handled by a sideman (can’t remember his name off the top of my head), and Bernie Louden got in some really impressive more country oriented licks as well. I was a little bit disappointed that they did not do anything from the “Long Road Out Of Eden” album, which I like, and they skipped my all-time favorite Eagles song “The Last Resort”, but overall the set list was pretty good. I especially enjoyed the tracks from “Desperado”. All in all it was a very enjoyable 3.5 hour show (with intermission).
Here is the set list:
SATURDAY NIGHT (Henley & Frey acoustic)
TRAIN LEAVES HERE THIS MORNING (Louden, Henley, Frey acoustic)
PEACEFULL EASY FEELING (Louden, Henley, Frey, Schmidt, acoustic)
WITCHY WOMAN (Louden, Henley, Frey, Schmidt, Walsh semi-acoustic)
TEQUILA SUNRISE (full band for the rest of the show)
DOOLIN DALTON
DESPERADO REPRISE
ALREADY GONE
BEST OF MY LOVE
LYIN EYES
ONE OF THESE NIGHTS
TAKE IT TO THE LIMIT
(INTERMISSION)
PRETTY MAIDS ALL IN A ROW
I CAN’T TELL YOU WHY
NEW KID IN TOWN
LOVE WILL KEEP US ALIVE
HEARTACHE TONIGHT
THOSE SHOES
IN THE CITY
LIFE’S BEEN GOOD
THE LONG RUN
FUNK 49
LIFE IN THE FAST LANE
ENCORE 1:
HOTEL CALIFORNIA
ENCORE 2:
TAKE IT EASY
ROCKY MOUNTAIN WAY
DESPERADO
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