(Credits: Far Out / Don Henley)
Tue 6 January 2026 18:30, UK
Being a great songwriter wasn’t something that came naturally to Don Henley.
He had a knack for writing fantastic lyrics after a while, but he and Glenn Frey made sure that they put in the work and meticulously crafted every one of their songs until they sounded as perfect as they were ever going to be before the fans heard them. And even up to the present day, Henley was always the one person looking out for what people could do with a guitar in their hands and a song in their heart.
After all, that was how the Eagles managed to get the job done back in the day. Those nights at the Troubadour bar were never going to go well unless you had someone that was willing to open themselves up in song, and even if they didn’t have a glossy production behind him, the greatest tunes from the likes of Jackson Browne and Randy Newman were bound to shine through every time they played.
So if they were going to make songs of that calibre, they needed a little bit more than a catchy tune. It was going to take them a little while before they were able to make that kind of jump, but they were already working with great material. Despite not getting much airplay, ‘Tequila Sunrise’ and ‘Desperado’ are among the most well-written tunes that they had ever come up with, and by the time they reached tunes like ‘Life in the Fast Lane’ and ‘Hotel California’, they were practically living legends in the genre.
But looking at the modern age, Henley was probably looking around at a lot of the pop charts and wondering where all the songwriters went. Every now and again, there will be critical darlings that can write songs that his generation would have approved of like Brandi Carlile, but if Henley wants to hear great tunes, he feels like the only outlet that he has left goes back to country music.
Compared to the flavours of the day, Henley felt that country still fosters all the values the great songwriters of his generation did, saying, “It’s hard enough just to write songs, and they come out in various ways. We’ve always done that. ‘Hotel California’ had a lot of different material, and so did ‘One of These Nights.’ Country music is now akin to what my generation was listening to in the ’60s and ’70s. Certainly, country is one of the last bastions of good songwriting — and of singing in tune.”
That said, it’s not like Henley is following everything coming out of Nashville. He would be the first to say that he isn’t a fan of the more manufactured country acts, but for those knowing where to look, it’s easy to see the likes of everyone from Tyler Childers to Kacey Musgraves to Jason Isbell as the ones flying the flag for all the singer-songwriters that had come before like Henley, Springsteen, and even later acts like Lucinda Williams.
Then again, Henley would be leaving a lot of good music on the table if he only listened to country music. He was the first to say that his generation fostered radio stations that had a wide array of different genres, and while not all of the genres of today are focused on writing sophisticated melodies, it’s a lot easier to see people flocking to the biggest names in hip-hop to get another perspective on what life is like.
But looking at where Henley is at this juncture, it makes sense why country has been the genre he calls home more often than not. Travis Tritt helped usher the Eagles into a new generation with his cover of ‘Take it Easy’, and with Cass County being more focused on Americana music, it’s a lot easier for Henley to make that kind of transition.
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