Handfuls of hits taken to the limit (The Australian)

Link: The Australian: Handfuls of hits taken to the limit [ 15nov04 ].

The Eagles. Subiaco Oval, Perth, November 11. Melbourne tonight then touring nationally.

"NICE gettin' wet with ya," said Eagle Joe Walsh before his solo hit Life's Been Good. Indeed it has been good for Walsh and his three fellow principals, Glenn Frey, Don Henley and Timothy B.Schmit.

Despite persistent rain and in front of 30,000 fans, the increasingly soggy birds played a full three-hour set that went back as far as their first single Take it Easy and was as fresh as two new songs given their world premiere in Perth, a city the band hadn't played since January 1976.

One of those new songs, Walsh's One Day at a Time, speaks of his quarter-century drinking binge. The frank song didn't stand out among its more illustrious company, but it did suggest that even while the band is in the midst of a "farewell" tour, there is a Plan B in the wings.

New songs schmoo songs, this crowd was here to hear the hits, and the band, which made only six albums of new material in their recording lifetime, did not disappoint. Beginning with The Long Run they played all their hit singles, apart from Witchy Woman, with an impressive attention to detail made possible by the assistance of an eight-man band. As their voices warmed in the chilly air, the singing became stronger both on stage and off.

This band was triggering some important memories and during the ballads, particularly, the show ascended – or descended, depending on your point of view -- into a mass singalong. It can't be denied the band gave value for money, but it was painfully obvious during the middle stretch that there is a gaping distance between their best and worst material.

After a touching unplugged set that began with Tequila Sunrise and concluded with Take It to the Limit, solo songs such as Frey's You Belong to the City, Henley's Sunset Grill and Dirty Laundry, and Walsh's Walk Away and Funk #49 dragged interminably.

It was as though they had gone from serving top-shelf beverages to passing around home brew.

The patient crowd hung in, waiting for the aces, which came in the form of Hotel California, Take It Easy and Desperado, allowing the night to end on a decidedly high note. Sometimes you can have too much of a good thing.

Comments

[Chris]

This critic exemplifies everything wrong in the world today. "Hung in for the aces" after an "interminably" long set of solo material. First, "the aces", aka the Eagles songs he knows from Melbourne FM - there is no doubt these songs are great, but to deal with Funk #49 in a cursory manner begs for a slap. Actually now that I think about it, this guy problably thought he was at a Kenny Rogers concert with all this talk about hanging in and aces. Send this guy to see some "stage performance" fronted by any one of the queens of modern-pop-corporate-bubble gum and he'll claim it was a dazzling spectacle that could only be equalled by the second coming (there will be no talk of "too much of a good thing"). Send a real music lover to see the Eagles.

Sorry had to get that out.