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Legendary rock outfit the Eagles played Singapore for the first time on Monday night, and it was truly a massive evening to take home as ONG SOH CHIN discovered.
It lasted seven minutes and 36 seconds, about a minute and a half longer than the original album version. These facts may mean nothing to the average reader. But to the 11,300 avid fans at the Singapore Indoor Stadium, it was a moment worth waiting a lifetime for, hyperbole be damned.
One of the classic rock anthems of all time, Hotel California can be heard anywhere on the planet, from Bedouin camps in the Middle East desert to thatched huts in remotest Africa. As such, it has also become the stuff of bloated cliche – an embarrassing mainstay of too many two-bit cover bands in too many skanky gin joints around the world.
Don Henley (left) and Joe Walsh giving their all at the Eagles concert in Singapore.
But hearing Don Henley, Glenn Frey, Joe Walsh, Timothy B. Schmit and Don Felder replacement Steuart Smith sounding those familiar notes live is an experience that has to be lived to be believed. Felder, for those not in the know, is the ex-Eagles member who co-wrote the song. He was ostensibly fired from the group in February 2001 and his lawsuit against Henley and Frey for wrongful termination and breach of contract is currently in settlement stages.
A sinister mythical paean to the soulless entrapment of a life of excess, Hotel California marked the first of the Eagles’ three encores of the evening. By this time, the crowd, which packed the stadium to the rafters all around the stage, was up on its feet and singing along to every word – prisoners there of their own device, you could say. Never mind that Henley’s vocal chords were no longer as elastic as they once were. So what if he strained a little on the high notes? It was still unmistakeably Henley.
No other rock voice boasts that distinctive power-packed rasp which is the vocal equivalent of tarnished silver – a precious metal tainted to yield its own unique beauty. Just to hear that legendary instrument sing about that infamous dark desert highway was a journey of light in itself.
The evening had begun at 8.30pm with The Long Run. With an eight-piece back-up band that included guitarist Smith as well as Loggins & Messina alumnus Al Garth on saxophone, the Eagles sailed through the song off their 1979 album of the same name.
The crowd, made up of three generations of people of all races, was ecstatic right from the beginning. They would sing along to familiar choruses unprompted, burst out into spontaneous clapping and even erupt into catcalls and cries of “Yeah baby!’’ and “I love you!’’
Indeed, the band didn’t have to do much. Compared to other bands like The Rolling Stones, for example, the Eagles looked positively staid onstage, probably because they’re known for their musicianship, not their showmanship.
It’s hard to prance about on stage when you’re singing and switching between guitars, as well as doubling up on drums or keyboards, as Henley, 57, and Frey, 55, did. The twice-married Frey, however, did inject some wry humour in his banter.
“I dedicate this song to my first wife, Plaintiff,’’ he said, before launching into Lyin’ Eyes. Later on, he pipped: “My wife calls this the credit card song. Here’s Take It To the Limit.’’ The audience, which had paid between S$99 (RM217.80) and S$499 (RM1,097.80) for tickets – the same amount of money Stones fans paid – arguably got more value for their money. The Eagles played 27 songs in a concert that lasted three hours, including a 15-minute intermission. It was a repertoire that was truly impressive.
As the band rolled out hit after hit, it was almost easy to switch off and imagine one tuning in to an easy-listening radio station doing an Eagles special.
Every song was as familiar as a nursery rhyme. Understandably so, seeing as their Greatest Hits: 1971-1975 album remains the world’s best-selling album of all time, with sales of 28 million copies.
In 2001, the Recording Industry Association of America also proclaimed the Eagles the third best-selling band of all time, after the Beatles and Led Zeppelin. To date, they have sold more than 120 million albums worldwide, scoring four American No.1 singles and four Grammy awards.
While Henley’s and Frey’s voices may have seen better days, Schmit and Walsh, both 56, showed they could still hit the high notes with ease. Walsh, the “Ordinary Average Guy’’ of the band, belted out his solo hits like Rocky Mountain Way and Life’s Been Good with all the blustery power of a feisty warhorse let loose in a bar room.
The long-haired Schmit, Walsh’s polar opposite in many ways, delivered the ballads I Can’t Tell You Why and Love Will Keep Us Alive like a rock choirboy, scaling the high (someone once called them “nut-busting’’) notes with effortless aplomb. Together, the band’s harmonies were faultless, especially on numbers like Take It To the Limit and New Kid In Town. Their instrumentation was also tight, proof of which could be heard on Funk #49, a rollicking showcase jam of a track made famous by Walsh’s old band The James Gang.
It was, however, in the slow songs that the band truly shone. Wasted Time, for example, was a stunner, with Henley making the song as poignant and intimate as a confession, even though he was singing to more than 11,000 people.
The most exquisite moment, however, was saved for the last, when the band ended off the evening with what many consider to be its best song. Desperado, an Eagles favourite that was ironically never released as a single, had the darkened stadium awash in twinkling lights created by cigarette lighters and backlit mobile phones held aloft. With 11,000 people singing that plaintive penultimate arpeggio, “let somebody love you’’, the stadium resonated in a truly magical moment that was beyond hyperbole itself. – The Straits Times Singapore / Asia News Network
Sunday, November 14, 2004 at 10:32AM 
