How The Eagles Mistreated Randy Meisner

Alright music fans, welcome back to the harmless guy here talking about real music in real time for real people like you and me. Well, then the Eagles in 1977 parted ways with Randy Meisner and to this day I think, from a publicity standpoint, the band. still has a problem with Randy Meisner, they never made peace with Randy, they didn't invite him back at the right time when there was an opportunity to do so, yes they all went on stage together at the rock and roll hall of fame years ago , but a lot of fans who like Randy Meisner, okay, and who have followed the Eagles over the years, probably think they could have treated Randy a little better, which is what this video is about.

Now you may disagree, you may think he hears, you know Randy. It was his song, he should have gone out happily and sang it and not been afraid, but he was a little more shy. Don Henley said Randy Meisner didn't adjust to fame very well, that's a narrative, right? And I'm talking about narratives that are created even in rock bands, it's interesting, so Fry Henley's version of what happened is that here's a guy who's not a team player

randy

meisner

randy

meisner

is saying look, I've always been a little shy, yeah, I wrote this great song, no I don't mind singing it, I don't want to be in the middle of the stage, right, he has a very difficult note to say.

You know I've been there. It's like when you sit in the corner office, you know? and you want to be away from all the activity, you just want to do your job, you don't want people to notice you, you know, because you're afraid of making a mistake, so Randy Meisner has this difficult note to sing and take it to the limit that by the way it became one of the band's most iconic songs and you know, I can't prove it but I would say that maybe Henley and Fry were a little, I don't want to use the word jealous but maybe surprised by how well it did for the band. song and what a great song it ended up being.

These were just great lyrics and by the way, no, all apologies to Vince Gill. Nobody should sing this song. This song should have been removed. uh Randy obviously can't come back and sing it and uh I just don't and you know they gave Randy some opportunities to get back into the band but they were a little bit after the fact and Randy hasn't aged well. I've done a couple of videos about that and he's had some personal issues that are pretty interesting and very separate from, you know, the pampered world of rock stars. Randy Meisner should still be compensated, hopefully, from the publication and dissemination of his The Music, which again will mostly be pushed to the limit, but I think you know there was a fist fight that happened one night, I think in Tennessee, I think that the concert was in Tennessee, Knoxville, where Fry was. saying you have to sing it and Meisner didn't really feel like singing it, he wasn't feeling good that day and he showed up, I think in the Eagles documentary, but the way it was done was good, the reason why he doesn't feel good It's because he doesn't want to sing the song and Meisner said he felt physically sick, now it could have been a psychosomatic illness.

I don't know, I wasn't there and you know it again. This is how you create a narrative where you know Meisner is not there. a team player, not willing to sing the song, this is what Meisner has going for him, other members of the band are fine, who have had similar reactions to the Fry and Henley duopoly and again my apologies to the late great Glenn Frye I'm just talking about. the politics of this band and that maybe it wasn't the best work environment, but you had bernie leaden, who i think poured glen frye a beer because Fry was giving his opinion about conquering the world and had all these big plans, and here There's a guy who was in Flying Burrito Brothers who was a great string instrument player.

I'll say it that way because he could play a number of really cool instruments that have strings. Steel guitar, um, banjo, um, you know, lead guitar, I mean, he, he. he was another great player in the bluegrass family uh don felder has talked a lot about how those two were friends and had completely different guitar styles, but you have to give bernie credit because he created a lot of the music that he was a part of. from the early history of the

eagles

, in fact, volume one's greatest hits should give him a lot of credit because he's already done, his guitar work is done, so bernie leaves because he can't deal with those guys anymore and they bring a Joe Walsh because they wanted to improve their sound, supposedly they wanted to strengthen it, make it stronger, make it more rock.

I maintain that he didn't become much rockier when you look at what the band had done. until one of these nights, which was more rockin' like life on the fast lane, maybe victim of love, by the way, um felder and walsh contributed, but you know, you could argue that they still had quite a bit of music on these albums that was it's still considered adult contemporary, not necessarily country rock, they had softened the country a little bit, obviously, when when they got to the long run there was no trace of it. Hotel California, there were little traces of it but really nothing once Going Long becomes just a generic rock band, at that point Glen Frye is pursuing his love of R B music at that point, so of all Anyway, going back to Meisner, Meisner was the guy who again was kind of the strange man trying to do. what his bosses wanted him to do, but he was feeling a little reluctant and the fans were apparently demanding that Randy come out and sing, but I think it was more like Henley wanted to run a very tight ship and you had to deal with the image you had to do. deal with um putting on a really good show and I think you could have had Meisner stay on the sidelines when he finished the tour, Meisner leaves the band and told a biographer named Mark Elliott that the last few days on the road.

They were the worst, no one talked to me or went out after the shows or did anything. They made me a pariah of the band I helped found, that's Randy Meisner, so that's why the Eagles have a problem with Randy Meisner and then you move on fast. I know the Eagles make this big comeback, everyone knows hell froze over later, they had this millennial concert. Many people were wondering. You know, even Bernie Leaden came back to perform with the Eagles. We all know what happened with Don Felder and that again. It added to this idea that this work environment was a little bit toxic, just a little bit, and a lot of people were like, hey, why don't you bring Randy back?

You know again, the

eagles

were there, look at me, look. I'm the big star of the show, whether it's Fryer Henley or Joe Walsh, they really like to hog the spotlight and I think you know in a band like Chicago, obviously Randy Meisner wouldn't fit in well in Chicago, his philosophy was always we're banned. there is no real leader there is no such thing, we are all working together just because you are the lead vocalist doesn't mean you are the star of the show, although maybe chicago needed that and they had it with saterra and that and that ended up breaking up that band but you would think that they would bring Randy back for some of this stuff.

I guess they offered him a spot later after the fans really complained a little at the time Randy um, his health wasn't great and he wasn't willing to come back to the Eagles, but he should have been a part of that hell that happened. freezes. He certainly could have done it. At that point in his life, he was still performing and being there and contributing to the band, and even if he wasn't. But don't hang around, you know he could have retired after a few tours or made some appearances where, again, maybe they could have tuned things up, plugged in some acoustic guitars and he could have performed a nice unplugged rendition of take it to. the limit, which would have been interesting because that's what happened in the early and mid '90s, a lot of bands went offline and it worked really well, but they didn't even think about the eagles, they didn't even try to get horny.

Before they were more concerned with getting Joe Walsh back on his feet and apparently that was Don Felder's job and what Don Felder got for his good deed. He got kicked out of the band because he was trying to see how sausage was made in eaglesville and go through those books to see maybe there's some cheating, it doesn't matter at this point, I'm still under the impression that randy meisner deserved better, he deserved better with the eagles um obviously he wanted to get out of the toxic environment like Bernie Leaden did the same way Felder did but he held on and he drove them crazy by holding on because I think you know he was next obviously him and Fry they had words and that's what supposedly separated the eagles but they were all pretty much at each other's throats um there's a story to tell too about Fry and Henley how they obviously didn't get along towards the end and that story is rarely told and it should be told because it's a true story um maybe in and another one of those unauthorized biographies that will come out one day but in any case that's my opinion on randy meisner the eagles are still suffering from it but a lot of casual fans already They don't even care. you know who randy meisner is at this point you see vince gill up there and you say hey vince gill i know who this is it's really smart marketing it's smart marketing because it makes people think the marquee is more important than who's on it In the band, you put enough. uh names on that marquee and people will show up even if it doesn't even sound like the original band that the Eagles are slowly, you know, not really slowly, but it's actually pretty close to being a band that doesn't sound like what they used to . to sound again, apologies to Deacon Fry, apologies to Don Henley, he still sounds pretty good for his age, but in recent years there has been a big change in his voice, if you hear the same with Joe Walsh, Tim Schmidt sounds the same . but he only sings one song so anyway that's my video thanks for watching don't forget to subscribe to the channel hit the bell if you want to get notified about new videos and yes you can join on patreon for just a dollar a month.

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