Caught the Eagles at Continental Arena in swampy, er, lovely East Rutherford, NJ last eve. This is the famous Farewell I Tour thats been going on since '01 (according to Glenn Frey). I caught them previously (on the same tour) in '03 at Atlantic City when they only played a string of 12 small venues. Now they're doing the saturation bombing of the NYC Metro-area mega-arenas. Ticket prices are very high as well (Frey says they all have young wives that like to Take It To The Limit with their credit cards more than one last time, LOL!): $175+services charges=$193 per ticket for one level up (regular Ticket Master prices, D'uoh!)!!! Madison Square Garden prices were even higher! I could have sold these tix on Stub Hub and made a fortune! Who knew?, LOL!
Regardless, it was once again great show. These guys still got it. Vocally and musically they are in fine form. Henley and Schmitt, in particular, can stop time with those voices. Frey and Walsh, while never having operatic vocal talents, got by OK...not too worse for the wear, LOL!
For an arena, the sound was excellent. Last time, in a much smaller hall (AC Convention Center, on the boardwalk), they had this custom multi-million dollar Infinity computerized sound system and it sounded incredible! They showed a video about the thing, as well as the de rigeur behind-the-scenes making of the yeah, really, I swear this IS our last tour tour, LOL! They didn't show the vid this time, although they still had multi-media screens everywhere. I didn't see an Infinity banner anywhere, but the stage set-up still looked the same, and the sound was excellent, even with the added liveness an arena always contributes.
No warm-up bands, and lots of Eagles-members solo tunes thrown in amongst the standard AOR radio Eagles fare:
Walsh - James Gang's Funk #49, Rocky Mountain Way, Walk Away, Life's Been Good (He put on a hard-hat cam on for this one, but despite his encouragement of flashing, the audience was so mature [e.g., OLD], not one woman did, LOL!)
Henley - Dirty Laundry, Boys Of Summer, Sunset Grill, All She Wants To Do Is Dance.
Frey did his ubiquitous Miami Vice-era You Belong To The City ditty.
I guess Timothy B., who never seems to age, is no longer endorsing Carvin. Nary a sign of his Signature one-knob Carvins, he was strictly a Jazz Bass player last night (excepting two Henley songs, where he played a Pedulla Buzz Fretless).
Don Felder's replacement, Steuart Smith, was amazing as ever with his Nashville-style chickin' pickin'. The guy can play just about anything with incredible finess, and his Arlen Roth-esque pedal steel-style licks were awesome! Personally, while he plays the Hell out of 'em, I don't care for the Music Man guitars he uses. He's either an endorser for Ernie Ball, or it's a Nashville thang, take your pick, LOL! Yeah, I still miss Felder, a highly underrated guitarist who was was certainly the best player in the band (even better than Bernie Leydon, IMHO), but Steuart is a worthy substitute.
Highly Recommended. Borrow Paul TBO's (Palembic's) stocking and rob a bank near you so you can catch the Eagles before they retire again, LOL!
