Review: Eagles still flying high with new DVD release
Posted Tuesday, July 5, 2005 at 1:57 PM Central
by Tim Briscoe
Can you believe the the Eagles have the best-selling album of all-time? "Eagles: Their Greatest Hits 1971-1975" is the single best-selling album of all-time at 28 million copies. That's more than anything from Michael Jackson. More than the Beatles. More than Elvis.
Twenty-eight million copies is a lot for a very acoustic-based band with very little flash. But that's exactly why the Eagles are so great. For them, it's more about substance than style. As they describe themselves, they are simply "the Eagles from Los Angeles."
Their latest is a DVD entitled Eagles: Farewell Tour I - Live from Melbourne. That lengthy description presents a couple of head-scratchers. First, why would such an All-American band release a DVD concert recorded in Australia? No offense to the Aussies but a hometown crowd would've been better, I think.
And, why oh way would do they call it "Farewell Tour ONE?" Farewell tour reprises are pretty much standard fare for aging rockers -- hell, The Who and Ozzy Osbourne are both on their umpteenth finale. But even as inevitable as the second (or third or fourth...) farewell trek is, you never refer to the first as number one. Don Henley may think of "Farewell One" as his tongue-in-cheek joke but the ticket-buying fans aren't in on it.
The DVD packaging is that annoying paperboard digipack with plastic disc trays and an outer sleeve. You know, the kind that gets beat up way too quickly. A more durable plastic case would have been much preferred.
As for the DVD itself, this release had some high expectations for me after the superb Hell Freezes Over release in 1994. That concert's picture was amazing and the sound even better.
While the new offering weighs in at 30 songs on two discs, it just doesn't match the quality and magic of HFO standard. It's nice to see Don Henley, Glenn Frey, Timothy B. Schmitt, and Joe Walsh in 16:9 widescreen but the set design and camera work is nothing fancy.
Sometimes it's just entertaining just watching the antics of court jester Joe Walsh. At the same, it's great watching the often overlooked musical mastery of bassist Schmitt and unofficial Don Felder fill-in Steuart Smith. The vocal melodies, like with "Take It Easy", are always a highlight.
The bonus feature of interview snippets are an interesting insight into the band. The interview outtakes during the end credits are even better.
The set list and audio content (in Dolby 5.1 Surround) is great. The remarkable Eagles' classics and a spattering of solo hits, most from Joe Walsh's career surprisingly, really show the greatness of this super group. There's even a couple of new tracks like Walsh's rehab ditty "One Day At A Time" and the post-9/11 ballad from Henley, "Hole in the World". The back-to-back rockers "Heartache Tonight" and "Life in the Fast Lane" prove these old dudes can still do more than just sit down and play acoustically.
In a nutshell, this two-disc set from one of America's greatest rock bands is a fine evening's -- or at nearly three hours, a couple of evening's -- entertainment. However, there's just not enough to make it worth revisiting.
