No Peaceful, Easy Feelings for Henley
Author: Jefferson Graham
Publication: USA Today
Date: August 15, 1989
Abstract: A brief interview where Henley talks about his current discontent but willingness to indulge audiences in nostalgia.
In a small rehearsal studio not far from the Sunset Grill, Don Henley and band are getting ready to take their show on the road, with a set that the former Eagles singer/drummer calls ''post-holocaust.''
His I Will Not Go Quietly tour will spotlight Henley's weighty The End of the Innocence (Geffen), his third solo outing and highest-charting album to date - No. 12 and climbing on Billboard's pop chart. It deals with his thoughts on life in the USA, the Reagan administration, televangelists, the Iran-contra scandal, greed and forgiveness.
''I am not the answer man,'' he says, ''I am the question man. I try to write about what concerns me. I'm a news junkie. I watch CNN, network TV news, read newsmagazines, read the papers, and it just comes out.
''I'm busy living my life,'' he says. ''The well gets empty, and you have to let the well fill up again.''
Henley has a big enough name to stake a claim as laid-back observer. The Eagles were California rock in the '70s, and they're classic-radio staples today.
With their countrified harmony, hard-rock guitars and at first carefree, later world-weary lyrics, they racked up a series of hits (Desperado, The Best of My Love) topped by Hotel California, their third No. 1 LP in a row, whose title song and Life in the Fast Lane sped it to sales of 11 million copies worldwide.
Of all the Eagles, who split in 1981, Henley has fared best commercially and critically as a solo act. Among his top 20 hits was 1984's top five The Boys of Summer, which won him a male rock vocal Grammy the following year.
The focus of his tour is the new album, but he promises a few Eagles tunes too, not saying which ones. ''I don't want to dwell too much on the Eagles material because I'm trying to be me,'' says Henley, 42, whose hair is longer now, his voice a soft, raspy Texas twang.
''I'm on my own now, and I want to be perceived that way. But I'll give it to them. If they want to walk down memory lane, I'll walk down it with them.''
For the past 2 1/2 years, though, he's been immersed in making Innocence, with guest artists including Axl Rose of Guns N' Roses, Bruce Hornsby, Edie Brickell, Take 6 and Melissa Etheridge.
The title song (No. 11 in Billboard), a collaboration with Hornsby, has a theme similar to The Boys of Summer - life not turning out as we thought it would when we were young. But there's more to it than that, Henley says.
''It's about the transition of childhood to adolescence for an individual, father figures and heroes not being all they seem, America as a broken home, the Iran-contra scandals, Reagan as a father figure, and betraying our image of him.''
Is this a happy man?
''I'm not content, but I'm happy,'' says the never-married Henley, who recently broke up with a longtime girlfriend.
''I get misread a lot of times. The ultimate goal in life is peace of mind, but I'm too young for that. I'll be content later.
''People miss the humor on my records sometimes because it is very dry, very tongue-in-cheek, and delivered very sarcastically.''
Henley says people missed the humor on Eagles tunes as well, songs like The Greeks Don't Want No Freaks, Teenage Jail and On the Border.
In this summer of rock re-unions - the Who, the Rolling Stones, the Jefferson Airplane, the Bee Gees - Henley is adamant that an Eagles reunion ''would be completely pointless.''
Henley now looks back at the soft ''California Sound'' the Eagles pioneered with mixed emotions. He calls one hit, Peaceful Easy Feeling, ''pretty vapid.''
''We were very young,'' he says. ''We were just learning. Sometimes you become a rock star before you learn to write.''
