Has Anyone Ever Written Anything...

[cliffdweller]

Originally Posted by David

Not at all. The song was recorded & released in 1976, which is the year Stevie & Don dated.

Personally, I don't see much connection between those lyrics & Stevie or Lindsey. Thematically, it's sort of a precursor to Lindsey's Mary Lee Jones.

Yeah, and Henley seems the type to write about himself as "brutally handsome."

[Kelly]

Walter Egan's.."Magnet and Steel" was written about Stevie.

[cliffdweller]

Originally Posted by Kelly

Walter Egan's.."Magnet and Steel" was written about Stevie.

Really? I knew that she sang back-up on it, but I didn't know that song was about her. Were they involved or something?

[The Tower]

Originally Posted by cliffdweller

Which makes me wonder, how would Henley know that Lindsey is good in bed?

1977 Lindsey in the sack with 1977 Don Henley would be some of the hottest gay porn to ever hit the sheets!!

Well, one can dream.....

[jwd]

Prince lent Stevie two fingers one time.....errrrrrrr, to "Stand Back" that is.

[EnchantedSLN]

Don't forget "It's Only Love" by Sheryl Crow.

I don't know about "Life In The Fast Lane," but Don Henley said "Those Shoes" is about Stevie. Unfortunately I've looked for the article I read that in several times and have never been able to find it online.

This one is pure speculation, but I think "Dear John," the closing song to The Confessor by Joe Walsh, is also about Stevie. He thanks her in the liner notes to the album, which was released the same time as RAL.

“Dear John” by Joe Walsh

I started out to write you this letter,
But it ended up another song.
I am sorry that the news can’t be better, dear John.

When we started out I thought we were different,
We ended up exactly the same.
So in order to protect the innocent,
The names have been changed.

I just got to get back to my music (to my music).
And I know that we both promised forever,
Forever didn’t last that long.
Maybe someday I will write you a letter,
Until then at least I wrote you this song, dear John.

I just got to get back my music,
And all the things that go along with the job.
And lying in bed with the room spinning round,
It’s the price that you pay when you’re on the way down,
It’s the price that you pay.

Sincerely yours...

[cliffdweller]

Originally Posted by EnchantedSLN

Don't forget "It's Only Love" by Sheryl Crow.

I don't know about "Life In The Fast Lane," but Don Henley said "Those Shoes" is about Stevie. Unfortunately I've looked for the article I read that in several times and have never been able to find it online.

I forgot about IOL. Wow, I'm going to look up the lyrics to Those Shoes right now... Thanks!

[EnchantedSLN]

Originally Posted by cliffdweller

I forgot about IOL. Wow, I'm going to look up the lyrics to Those Shoes right now... Thanks!

For anyone else wondering

The Eagles - "Those Shoes"

Tell us what you're gonna do tonight, Mama.
There must be someplace you can go
In the middle of the tall drinks and the drama,
There must be someone you know.

God knows, you're lookin' good enough,
But you're so smooth and the world's so rough.
You might have somethin' to lose.
Oh, no, pretty mama, what you gonna do in those shoes?

Got those pretty little straps around your ankles
Got those shiny little chains around your heart.
You go to have your independence
But you don't know just where to start.

Desperation in the singles bars
An' all those jerkoffs in their fancy cars.
You can't believe your reviews.

Oh, no, you can't do that,
Once you started wearin' those shoes.

They're lookin' at you, leanin' on you
Tell you anything you want to hear
They give you tablets of love
They're waiting for you
Got to score you
Handy with a shovel and so sincere
Ooh, they got the kid gloves

You just want someone to talk to
They just wanna get their hands on you
You get whatever you choose
Oh, no, you can't do that,
Once you started wearin' those shoes.

[strandinthewind]

Originally Posted by The Tower

1977 Lindsey in the sack with 1977 Don Henley would be some of the hottest gay porn to ever hit the sheets!!

Well, one can dream.....

That would be a whole lot of skinny and a whole lot of hair

Also, the title "Magnet and Steel" just conjures up porn to me. PPHHEEWW!!!!

[cliffdweller]

Originally Posted by strandinthewind

That would be a whole lot of skinny and a whole lot of hair

ROTFLMAO!!!!

[amber]

Originally Posted by jadegypsy

actuallyI always thought Life in The Fast Lane sounded more like Stevie and DON but I guess the timing is off.

That's what I thought too.
I love that song..."He was too tired to make it she was..too tired to fight about it"
AMber

[amber]

Originally Posted by GardenStateGirlie

I think there's a quote out there from one of her former boyfriends (can't remember if it was Henley..I don't think it was) that Stevie had a habit of comparing her relationships to the one she had with Lindsey. Of course, even thought they "broke up" or were "dating other people," my spidey sense tells me that the physical relationship probably didn't end right away. They were familiar with one another so hey...they kept going back to one another. Of course, I could be totally wrong

My spidey sense said the same thing...
AMber

[amber]

Originally Posted by EnchantedSLN

Don't forget "It's Only Love" by Sheryl Crow.

I don't know about "Life In The Fast Lane," but Don Henley said "Those Shoes" is about Stevie. Unfortunately I've looked for the article I read that in several times and have never been able to find it online.

That's so funny, cause when i recently heard that song on the radio, I surmised that it was about her, without knowing...
AMber "psychic" g.

[gypsygem81]

Wow, I had no idea that These Shoes was about Stevie. To be honest, I'd never really listened to the lyrics, but now that I read them you can see how it could be about Stevie. Thanks for posting the lyrics.

Love Gem

[Les]

Originally Posted by Tango

I don't think he would have offered up that info unless he was fairly certain of it.

Hoppy seemed like a nice fella, but I have my doubts about his story. It probably has something to do with him also thinking Stevie and Lindsey glow in the dark. But seriously, back when Hoppy first made his remark about Life In The Fast Lane, I read a comment from someone who said that Henley has spoken about the inspiration of the song and it was to do with him and his girlfriend at the time, and indiciting the lifestyles of all of the Eagles at the time, as well as the bigger "fast lane scene" in general. I just did a little looking around and found a few mentions of the inspiration to Life In The Fast Lane by Henley and Frey who co-wrote it with Joe Walsh.

I'm not exactly sure which publication this quote comes from, but Glenn Frey has the most humorous story --

Glenn: This began with a Joe Walsh riff—he had that signature guitar part. I had the title. The true story is: I was riding in a car with a drug dealer—a guy we used to call "The Count," because his count was never very good [laughs]. We were driving out to an Eagles poker game. I was in the passenger seat. He moved over to the left lane and started driving 75-80 miles per hour. I said, "Hey, man, slow down." He goes, "Hey, man, it’s life in the fast lane." And I thought, "Oh, my God, what a title." I didn’t write it down. I didn’t have to. Joe started playing a riff at rehearsal one day, and I said, "That’s ‘Life In The Fast Lane.’" So we started writing a song about the couple that had everything and did everything—and lost the meaning of everything. Lifestyles of the rich and miserable. I think the best line is "We’ve been up and down this highway, haven’t seen a God-damn thing."

From BAM, 1982 --

BAM: A major critic back East lambasted Hotel California because he felt that the Eagles were criticizing a lifestyle that you helped create.

Glenn: I think that's totally false. First of all, we put ourselves right in the middle of the fold-out picture inside the album--right in the middle of the crazy stuff around us. We always felt that when we wrote songs like "King of Hollywood" that we were in those songs too. We'd had our "King of Hollywood" experiences. We were never throwing stones at glass houses. We always felt we were busting ourselves when we wrote "Life in the Fast Lane." it wasn't just us pointing a finger at other people. We were living it.

From Rolling Stone, 1987 --

RS: 'Hotel California' was widely received as a sharp commentary on Southern California's penchant for superficiality and decadence. Was that your intention?

Henley: Actually, I was a little disappointed with how the record was taken, because I meant it in a much broader sense than a commentary about California. I was looking at American culture, and when I called that one song "Hotel California," I was simply using California as a microcosm for the rest of America and for the self-indulgence of our entire culture. It was, to a certain extent, about California, about the excesses out here. But in many instances, as California goes, so goes the nation. Things simply happen out here or in New York first, whether it's with drugs or fashion or artistic movements or economic trends, and then work their way toward the middle of America. And that's what I was trying to get at. With that record, we reached some sort of creative peak, as all bands do. You can go back and trace any band's career and find that one album that was the zenith of their productivity. That was ours, and we knew it.

RS: One of the songs on that album, "Life in the Fast Lane," seemed to be indicting the hedonistic use of drugs, particularly cocaine. Yet at the same time it was widely presumed that the Eagles weren't exactly innocents when it came to such problems.

Henley: I guess there was a brief period of time where I tried to put some kind of creative stock into drugs, but I realized pretty soon that you could get more work, and better work, done if you were straight. We did a lot of work on drugs in the Eagles. Our schedule was just so grueling; we didn't have the stamina otherwise. We'd do things like go out on tour, play a few gigs, then get on a Lear jet and fly to Miami and start recording at four o'clock in the morning, then get back on the Lear jet at three or four in the afternoon and go back to Cleveland and do a concert. And we'd do it all just to meet deadlines. So we took drugs. But from the beginning in the Eagles, I would get in fights with the other guys about smoking joints or doing coke before going onstage. Using drugs would screw up their voices, and they'd sing out of tune. So I got the nickname of Grandpa. I mean, drugs had their place, but I was never one of those guys to get up and roll a breakfast joint.
I think we reached our saturation point with drugs around '77 or '78. And, of course, now they're very unpopular. Now Alcoholics Anonymous is the addiction - people who want to sin and tell and confess in public. I'm sick of those people. Every week in People you read some crap about somebody who was on drugs. You know, keep it to yourself. Have some dignity, for chrissakes.

From GQ, 1991 --

In Henley’s view, the group reached its high point in 1976, with the release of Hotel California, a devastating critique of the band’s own life-style. L.A. scenestress Loree Rodkin, who was dating Henley at the time, recalls “the dynamics of people making so much money at such young ages: affording private planes and wanting to go to Paris for dinner. That was the fast lane to me."