by Don Felder
Most of all, I’m looking forward to getting back out on the road and playing music again, promoting the new album and working on other, similar projects in the coming years. There are other singer/songwriters besides Don Henley and Glenn Frey. All I ever wanted to do, and what I came to California for, was to make music. Music is in my blood. My father first fostered it in the days when I used to plug my guitar into the television set and make up the soundtrack for Mighty Mouse cartoons, and with his encouragement, I’ve never lost the passion. I’m not exactly sure which direction I’m going to point the compass on the bow of my boat after this, but it will undoubtedly involve music. It’s not as if I have a choice.
Although I didn’t realize it at the time, my last performance with the Eagles was on December 31, 1999, at the Staples Center in Los Angeles as part of the Millennium celebrations. It truly was the eve of a new dawn.
I didn’t give my finest performance. We’d all played a lot better at various times over the past three decades. Despite my ill health and the divisions that were tearing us apart, we put on a show that seemed to satisfy those who’d paid so much money to hear us play. Glenn was right. Bringing our unique mix of country, bluegrass, rock and roll, rhythm and blues, soul, Dixieland, and folk to the band from all parts of America, we somehow came up with the cinematic soundtrack to a generation. Sonic wallpaper, someone once called it. More than that, the music we’d played had been the soundtrack of our own lives. Every song we’d worked so slavishly over had its own secret story. Every guitar riff, drum track, and vocal had been agonized over. We all had our own favorites, songs that struck a chord with us as well as the fans. For me, “Hotel California” represents the pinnacle of my musical career.
As I stood on that stage beneath those crystal chandeliers and heard the roar of the crowd as I played the opening bars of the song I’d made my own, I knew that, whatever else happened in my life, this was as good as it gets. In my fevered brain, I closed my eyes and swayed in time to the chords I’d written that golden day in Malibu. For a moment, I was back in my childhood bedroom, standing alone under a single red lightbulb, playing for all I was worth. Or on the stage of the State Theater, my shirt sticking to my back with fear, as I hammered out a Ventures classic. Mine had been a remarkable journey. All of ours had. Here we were, the most successful American band of the century, televised to the world, for thousands of people who, like us, wondered what the new millennium would bring.
Behind me, the hands of the giant clock moved inexorably toward midnight. My fingers straining under the pressure of the complicated chords, I belted out the music I loved and allowed my mind to drift momentarily beyond all the petty bickering and the jealousy and the rivalry which had, in its own way, I knew, helped to make us great. It was a blessing and a curse, the price we had to pay for our genius. For now, I wanted to forget all that, to soar away on that dark desert highway. Against all odds, we’d made it. At the start of the twenty-first century, we were still together and still in California, taking it to the limit, one last time.
In March 2007, my mother passed away. She was ninety-one years old, and on her way home from church on a beautiful Florida morning. I went home to Gainesville to help Jerry bury her. The entire family flew in for the service and we had a wonderful get-together, recounting her life in photographs and sharing stories of our childhood. Walking around in my past filled me with a childish sense of wonder. I went to the palm meadows where Leonard Gideon and I used to play forts, and I found the swamp pond where I was nearly bitten by a water moccasin. I searched in vain for Irene Cooter’s chinaberry tree, which must have been cut down long before. I took some photographs of the house I grew up in. It’s still standing, a testament to my father’s remarkable building skills. I couldn’t believe how small it was. Two bedrooms with a bathroom in between, and two rooms downstairs. The jalousie windows have long since been replaced.
A battered Dodge was parked in the driveway instead of Dad’s old Chevy. Some other young family lives in it now, and I wondered, as I watched their kids playing noisily in the backyard that my mother had us grade so painstakingly, if they had air-conditioning for the sweltering summer nights, or something better than the kerosene heater in the winter.
I like to think I made my peace with my father before he died. I might not have become a lawyer like my brother Jerry, but being in one of the most successful rock groups in the world proved to him, I hope, that I’d done something valid with my life after all. He might never have acknowledged it with me, but he knew from my mom and Jerry how well I had done. The older I get, the more I appreciate just how much of an influence Dad was, from the first time he plugged me into his Voice of Music machine or bought me the gold Fender Musicmaker from the daughter of a guy at the plant. I know now how much we really meant to one another, even if we never got around to telling each other. I have come to realize that, despite all the fighting we did for all those years, it was never really wasted time.
Turning to leave and heading back to the brand-new car I’d rented to drive out to our old house, I caught sight of my own reflection in the glass of the driver’s window. Staring back at me was a smiling, tanned, middle-aged man in sunglasses, standing in the dappled sunlight in front of a small and unremarkable building. I wasn’t much younger than my father was when he died, and yet I was glowing with good health, having avoided a life of hard labor fixing machinery at the local plant.
My hand went instinctively to my hair. It wasn’t as short as he might have wanted it to be, but it was cotton-white, well groomed, and a few inches above the collar line. I think Dad would have been pleased.
INDEX
“After the Thrill Is Gone”
Airborne
Alexander, David
Allman, Duane
Allman, Gregg
Almost Famous
“Already Gone”
Anaheim Stadium
Anderson, Jon
Asylum/Elektra
Asylum Records
Atkins, Chet
Aykroyd, Dan
Azoff, Irving
Eagles reunion and
Felder’s firing and
Felder’s lawsuit and
at Hall of Fame induction
“Bad Girls”
Band, the
Barnett, Mike
Bayshore Recording Studio
Beach Boys
Beatles
Bee Gees
Belushi, John
Berry, Chuck
“Best of My Love, The”
Beverly Hills Cop
Black, Ed
Blue, David
Blues Brothers
Bohn, Isa
Booty, Jan
Boylan, John
“Boys of Summer, The”
Bramlett, Delaney and Bonnie
Breslauer, Gerry
Brigman, Grandpa
Brown, Charles
Brown, Jerry
Browne, Jackson
Buckingham, Lindsey
Buffalo Springfield
Buffett, Jimmy
Building the Perfect Beast
Busey, Gary
Butterfield, Paul
Byrds
Calagna, John
California Jam
Canned Heat
Capaldi, Jim
Carl, Max
Carrack, Paul
Carter, Ron
Castaneda, Carlos
Cavaliere, Felix
Cetera, Peter
charities and benefits
Charles, Ray
Chicago
Chipley, Lee
Chong, Tommy
Clapton, Eric
Clark, Gene
Clarke, Allan
Clinton, Bill and Hillary
Cohen, Leonard
Collins, Jimmy
Coltrane, John
Common Thread: The Songs of the Eagles
Continentals
Cooper, Alice
Cooter, Irene
Corey
, John
Cornish, Gene
Corvettes
Crago, Scott
Cranston, Alan
Criteria Studios
Crosby, David
Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young
Crosby, Stills & Nash
Crosby & Nash
Crowe, Cameron
Cyrkle
Dacus, Donnie
Danelli, Dino
Davidson, Gordon
Davis, Miles
Davis, Patti
Delaney & Bonnie
Derek and the Dominoes
Desperado
“Desperado”
Dillard, Doug
“Dirty Laundry”
“Disco Strangler, The”
Dog House
drinking
drugs
cocaine
heroin
marijuana
peyote
Quaaludes
Drury, Timothy
Dunn, Sam
Dylan, Bob
Eagles:
breakup of
Felder fired by
Felder joins
formation of
Hall of Fame induction of
Leadon quits
Meisner quits
Millennium concerts of
resumption of
Schmit joins
Walsh joins
Eagles
Eagles—Their Greatest Hits 1971-1975,
Eagles’ Greatest Hits Volume 2,
Eagles Limited
Felder’s lawsuit against
Eagles Live
Elder, Boyd
Elektra/Asylum
End of the Innocence, The
Erwin, Richard
Evers, Rick
Faltermeyer, Harold
Fast Times at Ridgemont High
Feiten, Buzzy
Felder, Charles “Nolan” (father)
Felder, Cody (son)
Felder, Don:
autograph seekers and
birth of
boating of
childhood of
Eagles’ firing of
Eagles Ltd. and
first band of
first public performances of
guitars of
infidelity of
intruder incident and
joins Eagles
Kathrin and
lawsuit of
marital problems and divorce of
moves to Boston
moves to California
polio of
real estate ventures of
solo projects of
as teenager
in therapy
wedding of
Felder, Doris Brigman (mother)
death of
remarriage of
Felder, Grandpa
Felder, Jerry (brother)
Felder, Jesse (son)
guitar playing of
marriage of
saxophone playing of
Felder, Jesse “Buck” (uncle)
Felder, Kurt (grandson)
Felder, Leah (daughter)
Felder, Marnie (sister-in-law)
Felder, Rebecca (daughter)
Felder, Susan Pickersgill (wife)
Felder’s firing and
jewelry business of
marital problems and divorce of
marries Don
moves to California
pregnancies of
thyroid problems of
Fernandez, Richie
Fleetwood Mac
Flow
Flow
Flying Burrito Brothers
Fogelberg, Dan
Forsey, Keith
Frey, Glenn
in Eagles breakup
in Eagles formation
Eagles Ltd. and
in Eagles resumption
Felder’s fight with
Felder’s firing and
Felder’s lawsuit and
fiftieth birthday party of
fund-raising and
at Hall of Fame induction
“Hotel California” and
“Life in the Fast Lane” and
marriage of
Selected Works and
solo career of
studio of
Takamine guitars and
victimization by
“Victim of Love” and
Front Line Management
Full Moon
“Funky New Year”
Fun TV
Furay, Richie
Galaxy High
Galuten, Albhy
Gaye, Marvin
Geer, Will
Geffen, David
Geffen-Roberts Management
Getz, Stan
Gibb, Barry
Gibbs, Kenny
Gideon, Leonard
Goldberg, Danny
“Good Day in Hell”
Green, Peter
groupies
Guitar
Guthrie, Arlo
Hancock, Herbie
“Heartache Tonight”
Hearts Flowers
“Heat Is On, The”
Heavy Metal
Hell Freezes Over
Helms, Levon
Hendrix, Jimi
Henley, Don
arrest of
Clinton and
in Eagles breakup
in Eagles formation
Eagles Ltd. and
in Eagles resumption
Felder’s firing and
Felder’s lawsuit and
fund-raising and
at Hall of Fame induction
health problems of
“Hotel California” and
letter writing of
“Life in the Fast Lane” and
marriage of
Selected Works and
solo career of
studio of
women and
Hilburn, Robert
Hillis, Paul
Hillman, Chris
Hollies
Hotel California
“Hotel California,”
writing credits for
Hough, Wayne “Boomer”
Howe, Steve
Hubley, Season
Hunt, Helen
I Can’t Stand Still
