Eagles, page 15
“We’d start off singing a couple of verses and a chorus and then have a free-form section in the middle that could be anywhere from a minute to five minutes long,” he said. “It was really quite innovative for its time, and the best part was that every time you played, you were thrown naked out on the floor, figuratively speaking.”
By the fall of 1968, the Young Rascals’ road managers, John Calagna and Andy Leo, had set up a coming-out gig for the band, now officially known as Flow, at the Fillmore East in Manhattan. The band traveled up from Florida, but it wasn’t well prepared. Felder said their set was mechanical and that they played uptight, but the performance was still good enough to impress jazz producer Creed Taylor, who came there just to hear them. He offered them a $5,000 recording contract on the spot, which they immediately signed.
Taylor’s studio was in New Jersey, so it meant the band would leave the warm confines of Florida. They would settle into a run-down apartment in New York and begin preparing material for their first album. In some ways it was a dream come true for Felder, but the realities of living in New York and depending on less-than-reliable bandmates would bring more challenges. 1
1 [218] Felder, D. (2008). Heaven and Hell : My Life in the Eagles, Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons
[1198] Smith, B. (June 25, 2004). A Mood That Flows, The Gainesville (Fla.) Sun
[1265] Jourard, M. (2016). Music Everywhere: The Rock and Roll Roots of a Southern Town, Gainesville, FL: University Press of Florida
David Geffen was a rising star in spring 1968. Working both the television and music sides of the business for the William Morris Agency, he had a growing stable of clients and was attracting the attention of rival talent firms.
Before Geffen applied to work in the mailroom at WMA, he had applied at its rival New York talent firm, Ashley Famous. Openly admitting he had no degree, he was laughed out of Ashley’s offices. It was a valuable lesson for him. He famously lied about his lack of college credentials to WMA, and parlayed his career from the mailroom to an executive in less than four years.
With his reputation growing, Ashley Famous was now wooing Geffen, and he loved it. Making a little less than $500 a week for WMA, Ashley offered to double his salary. WMA couldn’t match the offer, so just six weeks shy of his fourth anniversary, Geffen moved to the rival company. His role was exclusively within the music business with Ashley, so he set out to bring in new talent. He first started by trying to woo folk artist impresario Albert Grossman and his large stable of talent that included Bob Dylan, Janis Joplin, and Peter, Paul & Mary.
Grossman’s artists were stabled at the Agency for Performing Artists, an Ashley rival, and Grossman was happy with the work APA was doing for his performers. Geffen took note of a young APA manager who came up during the conversation. Todd Schiffman was overseeing the accounts for Grossman, including the management of all concert tours with a meager staff of three.
Geffen saw an opportunity. He and Ashley’s president, Ted Ashley, pitched Schiffman hard. They offered him Ashley’s West Coast division, with a staff of 25, plus hooks for his artists into Ashley’s TV and film operations. Like Geffen, Schiffman also was working a questionable artist-management arrangement with one of his most successful bands, Iron Butterfly.
Geffen, now the head of the Ashley division that would care about the arrangement, looked the other way. Schiffman signed, and Goldman followed him to Ashley along with virtually all of their acts. The move instantly transformed Ashley Famous into the upper stratosphere of New York’s talent management elite. Geffen’s reputation as an elite negotiator was again ascending, and that cache put him in a solid negotiating position when the biggest band on the West Coast, Buffalo Springfield, decided to break up at the end of 1968. 1
1 [1] King, T. (2000). The Operator, New York, NY: Broadway Books
[3] Singular, S. (1997). The Rise and Rise of David Geffen, Secaucus, NJ: Birch Lane Press
[1286] Hilburn, R. (September 2, 1972). A Rise from Mailroom to Record Asylum, Los Angeles Times
[1287] Lacey, S. (2012). American Masters: Inventing David Geffen, (Film/Video), Public Broadcasting System
Glad, with Timothy B. Schmit, “A New Tomorrow” (single)
Glenn Frey produced The Bottle Company’s single "Lives for No One” on their album, Lives for No One.
Glenn Frey played acoustic guitar and provided backing vocals on The Bob Seger System’s single “Ramblin Gamblin’ Man,” on the album Ramblin’ Gamblin’ Man.
James Gang, with Joe Walsh: Cream, Blue Cheer, MC5, Spirit, Fever Tree
Bob Seger, Capitol Records, February 1968
Glenn Frey’s friendship with Detroit rocker Bob Seger began when Seger’s manager, Punch Andrews, offered to produce Frey’s then-band The Mushrooms. The eventual Eagles co-founder was certainly aware of Seger, who by the mid-1960s had become a well-known artist in Michigan.
At Andrew’s behest, Seger wrote two songs for The Mushrooms, and even though they didn’t get any significant airplay on Detroit AM radio, it lit a fuse of sorts. It gave the aspiring Frey a start. After that, he and Seger started hanging out.
“We’d drive around all night and smoke dope and listen to the radio,” Frey told the Detroit Free Press in 2003. “We’d drive to Ann Arbor and hang with [musician] Scott Richardson at his house, go to the Fifth Dimension club and see The Who and Jimi Hendrix there. We were all trying to scratch the puzzle: how to make it in the music business.”
Another benefit of the friendship was that Seger invited Frey into the recording studio. It started small, with Frey working in percussion overdubs on Seger’s “Heavy Music,” and eventually he was playing acoustic guitar and singing background vocals for Seger’s breakthrough hit “Ramblin’ Gamblin’ Man.”
Seger remembered the session fondly. “I knew Glenn was going to be something. We recorded [the song and] his voice on the first chorus—that says it all. He blurts out above everybody, just wailing. ‘Ramblin’ man!’—it’s louder than shit.” Frey remembered the session fondly as well. “It was my first professional recording experience, where things were miked and rehearsed,” he said. “I was impressed. He was like my big brother for those couple of years before I left for California.”
By the winter of 1968, the song was surging up the charts; it crested at #17 on Billboard’s Hot 100 and made it as high as #16 on Record World’s Top 100 in February 1969. Things slowed down for Seger after that landmark first single, and he wouldn’t see another Top 40 hit for seven long years.Meanwhile, Seger and Frey’s girlfriends were in a band, the Mama Cats, and by the end of 1968, they had gone to Los Angeles is search of a recording deal. Seger stayed in Michigan nurturing his renamed band, The Bob Seger System, but Frey would follow the girl west and his first day in L.A. would change his fortunes forever. 1
* * *
Cashbox, October 5, 1968
Bob Seger started to happen the hard way with a progressive hit, but the “2+2=?” single fell just a bit short of the final break. Now, Seger drives back with rhythmic session aimed at establishing his reputation. Pulsing bass and drumming highlights the dance appeal of this new outing and Seger’s power should do the rest. Exciting teen track.
Newark (Ohio) Advocate, October 10, 1968
“Ramblin’ Gamblin’ Man” is a new song by Bob Seger, and it is great. He is a singer way ahead of his time. He has a talent of recording a trend in music before anyone else starts groovin’ on it. His “sound” is evident in this new one, but it is also original. I want him to come to Newark. I’m working on it. – Johnny Buck
Patinson (N.J.) News, January 17, 1969
Here’s a disc that’s been around a while. It has probably been some months now that it has been getting attention and public acceptance in one area after another. Finally, it is climbing the national hit ladder, and Bob’s driving, energetic vocal will keep it moving for sure. – Charles Schreiber
1 [345] Johnson, G. (January 1, 2009). MRRL Hall of Fame: GLENN FREY, Michigan Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Retrieved from https://www.michiganrockandrolllegends.com/mrrl-hall-of-fame/105-glenn-frey
[392] McCollum, B. (January 19, 2016). Glenn Frey details Detroit days in Free Press interview, Detroit Free Press
[1204] Weschler, T. (2010). Travelin' Man: On the Road and Behind the Scenes with Bob Seger, Detroit, MI: Wayne State University Press
[1205] Graff, G. (October 31, 2017). Bob Seger: the legend of the Ramblin' Gamblin' Man, Louder
[1224] Seger, B. (January 14, 2019). Glenn Frey fondly remembered by Bob Seger, In the Studio with Redbeard
[1226] Browne, D. (January 28, 2016). Glenn Frey: An Oral History, Rolling Stone
In the ruins of the short-lived steamroller that was Buffalo Springfield, the players of the now-defunct band were left with record label obligations that didn’t quite align with the musicians’ creative directions.
Neil Young wanted a solo career. Stephen Stills found an unexpected vocal harmony with ex-Byrd David Crosby and soon-to-be ex-Hollie Graham Nash. Richie Furay and Jim Messina were planning out their musical futures for a band that would become Poco. It was a tangled mess, and some of the artists were looking for help from their manager, Elliot Roberts. Elliot was on the hook for setting up a recording deal for Stills, Nash and Crosby, but didn’t feel quite up to the challenge. The three all had separate deals with different recording companies, and unwinding those contractual obligations would be complicated.
He turned to his new partner, David Geffen, to help untangle the mess. Roberts explained to Geffen that through his association with Joni Mitchell, who Roberts managed, he had gotten involved with the three. They were all signed to different record companies, but they wanted to be in a band together. “[Elliot] needed my help,” Geffen said in the PBS American Masters series on his life. “He needed me to get them out of their contracts so they could get together and make a record deal.”
Crosby specifically wanted Geffen because of the reputation he had developed over the last year in the recording industry. He sensed that Geffen would fight for the best money deal available, and he felt that he had a necessary level of ruthlessness needed to land the best deal. He was right, and when Roberts brought him in, Geffen set right to work.
Crosby and Nash had contracts with Columbia, and Stills was obligated to Atlantic. Geffen knew Columbia legend Clive Davis well from his negotiations representing Laura Nyro, so he felt like he had strong inroads there. He didn’t have those same contacts at Atlantic though, but worked out a deal with Atlantic Chairman Ahmet Ertegun. In the deal, Atlantic would surrender the rights to Furay and Messina’s Poco project, and Columbia would give Atlantic both Crosby and Nash, but would keep Stills. Davis believed that Poco, which was already developing a strong following, would mature into a profitable act. Crosby and Stills, who perceived as more mercurial, posed more risk for Atlantic, so those involved believed the trade as equitable.
In the end the arrangement served Ertegun best, as Crosby, Stills & Nash became rock legends. Poco also achieved recognition, but never achieved the level of fame as CSN, and certainly not the profitability. And perhaps the biggest winner in the deal was David Geffen, who rescued eventual partner Roberts and built valuable credibility for orchestrating the deal. Geffen’s next challenge would put him back into negotiations with Ertegun, and on the path to Asylum. 1
1 [1] King, T. (2000). The Operator, New York, NY: Broadway Books
[231] Einarson, J. (2001). Desperados: The Roots of Country Rock, New York, NY: Cooper Square Press
[393] Gilbert, M. (November 20, 2012). ‘American Masters’ profiles mogul David Geffen, Boston Globe
Joe Walsh was still finding his way as a musician in the summer of 1968. After working the club circuits in Cleveland and Kent, Ohio, he had joined a new band, the James Gang. On August 4, 1968, at Meyers Lake Park, a small amusement park in Canton, Ohio, a young high school drummer, Joe Vitale, attended a concert there and took note of the flamboyant Walsh.
Vitale would go from band to band over the next year, including the Echoes and The Chylds. In a twist, even though Vitale and Walsh weren’t yet friends, they had already played for the same band, The Measles. Vitale, an Ohio native, was kicking around with an Akron band called The Lime, but left them to join The Measles when he moved to Kent in summer 1969. Walsh had already left The Measles to join James Gang, but the two would see each other around the clubs.
“I knew Joey because he was in a rival band in Ohio in pre-James Gang days,” Walsh said. “We hadn’t paid a whole lot of attention to each other, but we’d been kinda friendly all the time.” Walsh followed Vitale’s progress and invited him to join his new band, Barnstorm, when he decided to leave James Gang in 1971. Vitale, then playing a tour with Ted Nugent and the Amboy Dukes, politely asked and received permission from Nugent to leave and took off for Boulder, Colorado, to join Walsh.
Over the years, Vitale became to Walsh what David Lindley has been to Jackson Browne, more than a just a versatile sideman, he was a talented collaborator and close personal friend. Together they collaborated on Walsh and Eagles songs like “Pretty Maids All in a Row” and “In the City.” Long before Walsh left for Colorado, he still had growing to do with James Gang. And because that personal growth included new friendships with The Who’s Keith Moon and Pete Townshend, it meant hotel rooms would be perpetually in danger. 1
1 [361] Charlesworth, C. (September 29, 1973). Joe Walsh: Barnstorming the USA, Melody Maker
[1308] Amendola, B. (October 1, 2015). Features: Joe Vitale, Modern Drummer
[1309] Konczak, H. (). Joe Vitale - Drummer for Joe Walsh, (Film/Video),
[1310] Kurtz, W. (October 24, 2017). The days of Joe Walsh’s ‘Barnstorm’, Goldmine
[1345] Vitale, J. (2008). Joe Vitale: Backstage Pass, Ashland, OH: Hit Records LLC
[1365] Vitale, J. (August 4, 2018). Joe Vitale/Joe Walsh Post, Retrieved from https://www.facebook.com/joe.vitale.395/posts/2113783515354681?__xts__[0]=68.ARAemvEBdex1tr7M5JZo-uteH943m1rU_D0FNbgB_iyTPOhPVFLlvA7oAl2x03YJ82dW-wE_AcWuodAnsRLqUBnpr89Sf2zmzyuUVZkRf--DhTlK-WsXvT18G7uILi8eXSBCK4LdDTOI4WfGwicBbF8NKP9NMdtwq-DNkYAtDydhP6mzITaU8wbvHSMOw395MQ6FHnnbSrtsu-pbJmW7wBYvZwJsORu0xwFtD5LDD2Sx6e13fsT6HFzlHIaD-9FJW-Tv8k3803PCUXkOAzZcqXn5GB3re5U0eaaWT7TgqwtAAU-ifuqm0s2ZJvNcNiSWOPvCFaZL5HYVjg5mm82rJVR2cg&__tn__=C-R
Jimmy Bowen helped resurrect the careers of performers like Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin and Sammy Davis Jr., and signed Glenn Frey, Don Henley and J.D. Souther to recording deals. Beth Gwinn/Redferns/Getty Images.
Amos Records is a bit of an afterthought as a foundational element for the country-rock movement of the late 1960s and early 1970s. The company knew talent and had the foresight to sign the early bands of both Glenn Frey and Don Henley, but it was never able to tap the creativity that would eventually blossom into the machine that became the Eagles. But by the spring of 1969, James Albert Bowen, better known in the recording industry as Jimmy Bowen, had already established his name as a record producer who could reclaim careers.
Born in Santa Rita, New Mexico, in 1937, he got his first guitar in junior high school and started a band with his boyhood friend Donnie “Dirt” Lanier called The Orchids. After graduation in 1956, Bowen and Lanier enrolled in college at West Texas State in Canyon, Texas, where they met another musician, Buddy Knox, a graduation-averse, folk-singing student who was four years older than them.
Knox had an appealing twangy voice and a gift for writing songs, so he was invited to join The Orchids. The three eventually cut a few acetate records with Bowen playing a stand-up bass, Lanier on electric guitar, and Knox playing rhythm with an acoustic guitar. Elvis Presley and Roy Orbison had taken the country by storm in the late 1950s. A fan or Orbison’s, Bowen had heard that the crooner had recorded his songs like “Ooby Dooby” with Norman Petty in his Clovis, New Mexico, studio. With that landmark studio just two short hours from West Texas State, Bowen took a chance and reached out to Petty and he agreed to book the group studio time.
In his book Rough Mix, Bowen remembered the studio as “warm” and “tight.” The tiny one-room box had a studio and control room set up at one end of an apartment complex, and if a big train or truck rolled by, it would blow a take. Likewise, if Norman’s mechanic father was banging on cars outside, they would have to stop recording. Despite these distractions the group spent an entire day recording an up-tempo Knox-authored, too-long-for-radio song called “Party Doll” and “I’m Stickin’ With You,” a shorter, more radio-friendly cut.
“It took a day or so and we were done,” Bowen said. “I handed Norman $300 cash for studio time and for his extraordinary patience as engineer and producer. He had needed eight hours to get a two-and-a-half-minute A-side out of four half-assed musicians. And we walked out of Clovis with our master tapes—probably the last group to ever leave Clovis with their masters.”
That was likely true, since Petty also later recorded Buddy Holly and the Crickets in Clovis and he owned all the band’s records and publishing rights. The experience with The Orchids introduced Bowen to the music industry, but he knew he would be a better fit on the management side of the business. He soon built a career as a producer and engineer and guided artists to the studio. In 1963, a mutual friend connected him with Frank Sinatra, who was looking to elevate his label, Reprise Records, with an infusion of youth. Bowen got the job.
Reprise was a struggling subsidiary of Warner Records majority owned by Sinatra, and with Bowen producing, he helped return the label to profitability and resurrected the careers of Sinatra, Dean Martin, and even briefly put Bing Crosby back on the map with talented engineers and songwriters like Mike Post.
