Heaven and Hell

by Don Felder

  That MTV gig was truly a Hollywood version of a live concert. Everything was make-believe—the stage, the backdrop, the sound, and our happy smiling faces. The audience had been handpicked to show their appreciation. The critics had been schmoozed into believing that we were still valid and viable. After Glenn announced to the hopeful fans, “We didn’t break up. We just took a fourteen-year vacation,” we played ninety minutes of songs from our most enduring body of work, plus the four new tracks, to a rapturous reception.

  The Hell Freezes Over tour began on May 27, 1994. I thought ticket prices were set very high. Like me, Timothy and Joe had no say in the pricing. Irving claimed that others before us had set the precedent, and that this was the way to beat the ticket scalpers. Despite the exorbitant cost, the tickets sold within hours, and we played to sellout crowds, while the media went crazy and Eaglemania took off big-time. We suddenly realized what a remarkable phenomenon we’d become in our absence.

  Our first show was in Irvine Meadows Amphitheater (which Irving part-owned), south of L.A., near Newport Beach. We were driven out there in a convoy of limos to our hotel. Among our security staff, still working for Joe, was Smokey, who had supposedly been on the White House security staff through four presidents. He still had his Secret Service badge, and he would flip it out whenever we arrived somewhere, so that the local police and security people would goose-step to his marching orders. He was a very nice guy. On the way to the Four Seasons Hotel in Newport Beach on that first, tense evening, I suddenly had a prickling feeling in the back of my neck in the limo. Psycho Santa stole into my thoughts out of nowhere.

  “Hey, Smokey, do me a favor,” I said. “Phone the hotel and ask if there’s a guest booked in under the name of ___.” I gave him the guy’s name.

  Smokey called the front desk and, as he received the reply to his question, he looked at me with an expression on his face that said, “How did you know?”

  I explained about the restraining order and what Psycho Santa had been up to. “Now it looks like he might be waiting for me at check-in,” I added. “This is too freaky, man, notify security at the hotel, I want him out of the place, and I don’t want him at our shows either. If he has a ticket, tear it up. I don’t want that lunatic anywhere near me or my family.”

  If Psycho Santa had just sent me his stuff as I’d asked, none of this would have happened. He could have sent it by courier if he was worried about it being lost or stolen. I’d have happily signed everything and sent it back and been done with him. Instead, he was freaking me out, not to mention the rest of the band. Not since John Lennon had been shot dead had I felt so paranoid.

  We reached the hotel, checked in, and moved as one to the elevator, flanked by security. The doors opened and there, right in front of me, stood the man I knew as Psycho Santa, about to be thrown out of the hotel by two security guards. Our eyes met briefly, but nothing was said. In my mind, I wanted to say, “You’re not going to do this to my life. I’ll sign your damn stuff; just send it like everyone else.” Instead, I silently stepped aside to let him pass and watched as he was marched out. That was the last time I ever saw him.

  I got the band to hire me a security guard after that, from a company called The Purple Gang, out of Detroit. His name was Johnny Sampson, and he became a dear friend. Not only could I sleep easy at night, but having him with me all the time diminished a great deal of the boredom of being on the road. I had a suite, and he’d be right next door, ready to protect me if necessary. It was intensely reassuring. In the end, everyone hired bodyguards. We were getting much more exposure than we had in the seventies, what with DVDs, live simulcasts, MTV, and the sheer size of the shows we were doing. None of us knew what might be waiting around the corner.

  Even with Psycho Santa out of the equation, the professional autograph hunters continued to hound me. There’d be droves of people waiting outside venues, gigs, and hotels, with stacks of stuff for me to sign. At first, I thought, “Hey this is cool. I must be really popular. They’re calling for me by name. Now I know how Elvis felt.” I soon realized that it had nothing to do with my popularity. These weren’t genuine fans; they were businessmen, and I was the missing link. Their stuff wasn’t worth nearly as much unless they had my signature, too.

  In Berlin, we were en route to our next gig in a convoy of limousines early one morning, when the driver of our car suddenly stood on the brakes. A driver had overtaken the convoy along a freeway and pulled in front of us before jamming on his own brakes, forcing us to stop. We screeched to a halt, very nearly rear-ending them. Two guys jumped out of the car and ran back toward us.

  “Get down! Get down!” Johnny Sampson screamed at me, pushing my head to the floor with one hand while he reached for a weapon with the other. We didn’t know what was happening. Was I being kidnapped? Or assassinated? I lay on the floor, terrified, as these two guys ran to the locked car doors and yanked fruitlessly on them.

  Looking up, I suddenly recognized them as a couple of professional autograph hunters who’d been waiting outside our hotel for days and had already been shooed away by Johnny after I’d signed one item each for them. Realizing we were leaving town, they’d come up with their daring plan to get to me before it was too late. They each carried, not weapons, but stacks of photos for me to sign, which they waved hopefully through the windows. Johnny, as angry as I was, told the German driver, “Drive! Drive! Schnell, Schnell!” To the two guys’ dismay, we backed up at speed and took off. They totally freaked me out.

  The opening number of each performance on that tour was still “Hotel California.” On the first few gigs, we’d tried to sing “Seven Bridges Road” in the shower room again, in a nostalgic attempt to re-create our magical early days, but our voices simply weren’t up to the task. The magic was no longer there. We never tried again. Instead, we’d walk straight up onto the stage, take our places in the semidarkness and await our cue. I’d be standing at the front, my Gibson in my hands, waiting to play the opening bars, the rest of the band behind me watching, waiting to launch themselves with me down that dark, desert highway.

  Only this time, it was different. Thanks to the input of Don and Glenn working with a stage designer, pyrotechnics and lighting had transformed our set. Instead of us silhouetted against the photo of the Beverly Hills Hotel as of old, we were silhouetted by strobe lights while rolling thunder crashed overhead. It was a dramatic attempt to drag us into the nineties and silence the many critics who’d accused us of being boring in the past. My cue to start the show was taken from a guy in the pits who wore a special glow-in-the-dark glove and a headset. He’d hold up his luminous fingers one by one, counting us in—five, four, three, two, one—and as soon as a big clap of thunder had died away, I’d play the distinctive opening chords, timing them perfectly with a massive flash of lightning. It was all very impressive, and the crowds were instantly energized.

  Even after our long absence, or perhaps because of it, the fans went wild. Just as it had always been, as we walked onstage, the place would be lit with candles and lighters, and there’d be this whistling and humming and an overwhelming buzz of expectancy. Waves of energy, excitement, and sheer adoration washed over us from the auditorium and made us temporarily forget the rifts that still tore us apart. The music was what it was all about. Night after night, we played to capacity crowds who only wanted to hear our songs. By the time all the thunder and lightning had finished and we played the first notes of “Hotel” in a dispersing cloud of cordite smoke and blue light, the place would come unglued.

  We were on the road that November, doing four gigs a week, when we learned that Hell Freezes Over had opened at number one on Billboard’s album chart. It ended up being certified six times platinum, with sales of more than six million. Even we had to admit that it was a remarkable achievement in an era of Oasis, R.E.M., and Nirvana. The tour expanded accordingly.

  My concern over the sharing of profits had still not, in my opinion, been properly addressed, and every time I s
poke to Irving about it, he tried to deflect me. “When are we going to revisit this one seventh/two seventh deal as you promised?” I’d ask him.

  “I know, I know,” he’d say, busying himself with something else. “Well, Don’s happy to talk about it, but Glenn still has some issues. I’ll get back to you.”

  Nothing more was ever said or done until I finally dropped in on Irving in his hotel suite halfway through one leg of the tour. Angry at being blown off with excuses, bitter at the unfairness of the deal, and sick and tired of endlessly waiting for answers, I walked in, bristling, and said, “Hey, Irv, when are we gonna address this?”

  Irving sat behind his desk and glared at me through his oversized spectacles. With a deep sigh, he said, in words delivered with slow deliberation, “Don Henley will never give you a dime more than a seventh.” He made it clear that he was not able to renegotiate on my behalf. Even though Irving was my manager, it felt to me he was Don Henley’s man first, and always had been. He’d allied himself to the one he believed was the cash cow, and there was no budging him. Furthermore, he warned me that if I even spoke to “The Gods” about this, especially Glenn, he could explode, and the whole tour might be cancelled.

  I was sorely tempted to quit right there, even knowing that I’d almost certainly be sued for breach of contract. I knew I’d get no support from the others, although I felt like I was fighting for their interests too. Timothy was making more money than he’d ever made in his entire life. Though getting stronger every day, Joe was still on shaky ground. He was unable to walk out of his hotel room without holding on to Smokey at his side. The machine was already up and running, and the message from “The Gods” was clear: It was “their way” or “the highway.” I had no choice but to swallow my pride and move on.

  SEVENTEEN

  We toured for more than two and a half years. We quickly topped the earnings charts for U.S. entertainers, generating an estimated income of $75 million in ticket sales alone. We won three notable American Music Awards that year—Favorite Pop Group, Favorite Adult Contemporary Artist, and Favorite Rock Album for Hell Freezes Over. We were also nominated for four Grammys, including Best Pop Album. Not bad for a band of wrinkly senior citizens competing against the likes of Oasis and Michael Jackson.

  The media control was now all-consuming, and, realizing that many reporters asked the same questions, we developed formulaic answers, knowing exactly what to say, or rather what not to say. For live interviews, reporters were told to submit their questions in advance, making it even simpler. We knew what was coming and could play with it a little to make it look like off-the-cuff improvisation, when it was actually meticulously rehearsed. Sorry: We weren’t the Beatles; they were funny.

  Some reporters insisted on group interviews, instead of speaking only to Don and Glenn, so we’d all sit around trying to look comfortable with each other until we were asked a “sensitive” question, like how we were getting along or why we were charging more than a hundred dollars per ticket. If the reporter tried to direct such a question to the rest of us, “The Gods” would immediately interrupt or deflect. Joe, Tim, and I would sit there like ventriloquist’s dummies, opening and closing our mouths without words of our own to speak.

  Now that Don and Glenn were both in long-term relationships, the nature of the tour changed dramatically. Suddenly girlfriends, wives, and children were in tow, along with nannies, personal trainers, Pilates instructors, hairdressers, and tutors, all filling their plush suites. My children were that much older and in school, so if I wanted to spend time with them, I’d have to bring them out for brief visits or fly home to see them, which wasn’t always easy. Worst of all, Cody was back in trouble, expelled in his second semester at the San Diego University for poor grades. Susan now had to cope alone with a rebellious teenager who seemed to hate us both.

  I came home whenever I could and tried my hardest to make Cody realize the mistakes he was making, but I again found myself echoing my father. “What are you doing with your life, son?” I’d ask him. “Don’t you know where all this is heading?” He’d look at me the way I’d looked at Dad, and I knew that I wasn’t getting through.

  “How can I make him see?” I’d ask Susan, as we both lay awake night after night, worrying about our son. “What can I tell him that’s any different from what my father and Jerry tried to tell me?”

  “Maybe you can’t,” Susan said. Her attitude was to let him get through this wild period in the hope that he’d emerge from it eventually, as I had. Not a day went by when I didn’t think of my young son or worry desperately for his future.

  Jesse, at nineteen, had rarely, if ever, strayed off the straight and narrow path, but I fought not to make constant comparisons between him and Cody, as my father had done between my brother Jerry and me. Each of my boys was a unique individual, coping with life in his own way.

  Jesse was a student at San Diego University, dating a lovely girl named Erin, whom he’d met in his first week at school. He was eager to carve out a career for himself in the financial business although he’d learned how to play saxophone in high school, having added it to his guitar talents. When I heard him on that thing, I wondered if he’d made the right choice. Man, he could play.

  The previous summer, I’d asked Fred Walecki at Westwood Music if he could use Jesse’s help around his store. Fred had become something of a legend in L.A., yet he was still lending out free instruments to struggling hopefuls, as he had once done for me, Bernie, and so many others. Fred put Jesse to work. He was remodeling the store and employed Jesse as a junior laborer to the builders. I loved the idea of my son helping out in a music store, just like I had at Lipham’s in Gainesville.

  Knowing that I was going back on the road, Jesse asked if he could come with me in some capacity with the crew. My guitar techs were delighted to have a new rookie as their slave. “Work him as hard as you would anyone else,” I told them, “and offer him no privileges.” He put in the long hours in tough conditions without complaint, traveling and sleeping on the crew bus.

  One day during rehearsals, we were practicing Glenn’s song “The Heat Is On” with a saxophonist and a keyboard player, who were trying their best make up a horn section. It sounded a little wimpy.

  “Hey, Glenn,” I suggested, “since Jesse’s gonna be on the road with us anyway, why not let him play sax on that part too? It won’t cost you a cent.”

  Glenn jumped at the chance, and the next day, Jesse arrived with his instrument. He was so nervous, I thought he might pass out. His eyes were huge and his hands so sweaty they left imprints on the sax, but within a few days, he’d learned the parts for five songs in the show and was playing them like a professional.

  On the very first show, he walked up behind the guitar section and stood a few feet away from me, playing his saxophone. I still savor that moment. All those years of lessons, of driving him to and from band practice, the times when the hair on my neck stood on end while he learned how to play in tune, and now here he was, my own son playing in the Eagles with me. I was so proud I almost forgot what I was supposed to be playing.

  His girlfriend, Erin, waited in the wings for him when he came offstage each night and nearly sucked the skin right off his lips. Ah, that first taste of stardom. After a few weeks, Jesse definitely gained a slight swagger. The confidence he gained from being with the Eagles for a while was worth more than any salary he could have earned.

  When summer ended, though, and he had to return to college, his golden carriage turned back into a pumpkin. “Dad, I’ve learned something very important from this,” he told me on the last day. “The people with the greatest skills make the most money, and the people with the fewest skills make the least.” When he returned to campus that fall, his grades jumped from C’s to straight A’s. I guess sometimes the best lessons aren’t learned in the classroom.

  Later in the tour, my daughter Leah came out with us as well. She and Joe Walsh’s daughter Lucy had become inseparable. She and Leah loo
ked like sisters, little blonde bookends, and they had a gas on the road together, shopping, surfing in Hawaii, taking helicopter rides over London, or just standing at the side of the stage during shows, watching their dads strut their stuff. Leah loved to have her own hotel room and order room service and be the daughter of someone famous, not just the offspring of some sweaty old guy in jeans and a checked shirt who was home all the time, tinkering with his old Chevy.

  I made a personal commitment while we toured that I’d try to do something for a charity in some of the towns we were in, to give something back instead of just taking all the time. My chosen charities usually involved sick children or centers specializing in kids with drug problems. Leah was with Susan and me on the day when we arrived in Toronto, Canada, and were driving from the airport to the Four Seasons Hotel. On our way downtown, we drove by a large building. “Hey,” I asked the driver. “What’s that?”

  “Oh, that’s a hospital for terminally ill children,” he replied.

  Turning to my daughter, I told her, “Tomorrow, Leah, I want you to go to the mall and fill this car with toys. You choose which toys you think the sick kids would like, and you take them to that hospital and give them to them.” With her mom, she did just as I said and had one of the most meaningful afternoons of her life.