The Back Rows

California roots, desert dreams, and the music of freedom.

There’s a corner in Winslow, Arizona where a bronze statue stands with a guitar in hand, in honour of a single line from the Eagles’ first hit Take It Easy: 

“Well, I’m a-standin’ on a corner in Winslow, Arizona and such a fine sight to see.” 

Few bands have ever so deeply tied themselves to a landscape like the Eagles. Formed in Los Angeles in 1971 and firmly rooted in the Laurel Canyon folk-rock scene, the imagery and mood of their songs often drifts far beyond California hillsides. They evoke the desert highways, neon motels, and endless horizons of the American Southwest–a point in geography they render at once real and mythic. 

But why did this sound, a polished blend of country, folk, and rock, resonate so well when other American roots music had previously struggled for mainstream attention? I’ve been listening to the Eagles since I was 15 years old, I’ve been playing them throughout this whole summer, and I wondered the very same thing. 

The Eagles slipped into a very special opening, which made them more than just another band from California, but architects of a soundscape–both a product of cultural shifts that were happening at the time, and creators of a new myth, in a way. Their music didn’t just reference the desert; it gave the Southwest an image of freedom, solitude and mirage all at once. 

So, stay with me here for a bit, let’s dive a little deeper into this, and you’ll know what I mean by that.

The Crossroads of Folk, Country, and Rock 

The Eagles’ story begins not in the desert, but in Los Angeles, where Glenn Frey (vocals, guitar, keyboards), Don Henley (vocals, drums), Bernie Leadon (guitar, banjo, mandolin, vocals), and Randy Meisner (bass guitar, vocals) first played together as Linda Ronstadt’s backing band. The band we also know well was later joined by Don Felder (guitar, vocals) in 1974, and Joe Walsh and Timothy B. Schmit replaced Bernie Leadon and Randy Meisner respectively.

The band’s decision to take off on their own in 1971 placed them in the heart of the Laurel Canyon (neighborhood in LA) scene–where folk, country, and rock collided. It was the blend of acoustic intimacy and electric drive that defined Southern California in the early ’70s, alongside artists like Joni Mitchell and Crosby, Stills & Nash among others. 

Even at this stage, the Eagles had already distinguished themselves. As opposed to fellow Laurel Canyon artists who were singing about introspection and political commentary, the Eagles leaned more towards something broader, more accessible, and most importantly, more radio-ready. Their sound fused the relaxed riff of country with rock’s steady backbeat and folk’s storytelling, but wrapped it in harmonies as glossy as the California sun. Further than giving them mass appeal, this positioned them to channel something larger than their immediate surroundings. 

To understand why their sound resonated so widely and so well, it helps to take a look at the context of rock in America leading up to the early ’70s:

By the late 1950s, rock and roll’s first wave had largely fizzled: Elvis Presley was in the Army, Buddy Holly had died, and Little Richard had turned to gospel. Teen idols and lightweight pop music dominated the charts, leaving little room for rooted in country or in folk. These last two genres remained very niche – regionally or politically popular, but not in any way considered mainstream rock.

By the late 1950s, rock and roll’s first wave had largely fizzled: Elvis Presley was in the Army, Buddy Holly had died, and Little Richard had turned to gospel. Teen idols and lightweight pop music dominated the charts, leaving little room for rooted in country or in folk. These last two genres remained very niche – regionally or politically popular, but not in any way considered mainstream rock.

Then came the British Invasion, with The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, and The Who completely reshaping what rock could be. They reintroduced energy, attitude, and the idea that bands could write their own material (something that was never really the case in America before then), and ironically–intentionally or unintentionally–repackaging American blues, country, and early rock for a new audience. I’ve seen countless interviews of Paul McCartney listing his influences, which were mostly early American rock and roll, for example. It’s very interesting that it took foreign bands to re-introduce the genre to a country where it was once deeply rooted.

Then came the British Invasion, with The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, and The Who completely reshaping what rock could be. They reintroduced energy, attitude, and the idea that bands could write their own material (something that was never really the case in America before then), and ironically–intentionally or unintentionally–repackaging American blues, country, and early rock for a new audience. I’ve seen countless interviews of Paul McCartney listing his influences, which were mostly early American rock and roll, for example. It’s very interesting that it took foreign bands to re-introduce the genre to a country where it was once deeply rooted.

This fusion of influence gave listeners a fresh lens to hear their OWN musical roots, and that’s how, by the early ’70s, American audiences were ready to embrace a band like the Eagles. 

And the band stepped into this opening at the perfect time. Not only did their polished California production make them instantly radio-friendly, but their harmonies and slightly country-tinged vocals gave their lyrics a relaxed, Southwestern open-road feel. In their songs, the wide-open landscapes of Arizona and New Mexico became more than scenery — they became symbols of freedom, exile, and the mirage-like quality of the American dream. Hence why they are altogether always tied to the mythic terrain of the American Southwest. 

The Mythic Southwest in the Eagles’ Music

We’ve talked about the Eagles’ evocation of the Southwest in their lyrics and imagery, but they are also recognized for their instrumentation and sonic choices in that department.

The interplay of acoustic and electric guitars creates a warm, open texture that mirrors the vastness of the desert. Banjo, mandolin, and pedal steel add that subtle country sound, grounding the music in Americana roots. They also use a lot of layered vocal harmonies, often stacked in thirds and fifths even, which stretches across the stereo field and is the aspect that makes the most out of the effect of vast, open horizons.

What I’ve also noticed is that their rhythms are always so steady and unhurried–they’re not really those rollercoasters of a sound but more of a slow, expansive passage of time across a sunny landscape. They make great use of space too with the reverb on guitars and sparse drum fills that are subtle but make that landscape I was just talking about feel both physical and psychological. The Southwest functions as an additional instrument here–shaping the tone, mood and emotional depth.

Some key tracks that illustrate this vividly:

• Take It Easy (1972) – perhaps the most iconic evocation of a place, and one of my favorite songs from them, its carefree rhythm and open harmonies convey perfectly the freedom of driving across endless desert highways. 
• Witchy Woman (1972) – a mystical dimension of the Southwest, and my favorite Eagles song. It really stands out to me because of its sultry undertone, haunting vocals and imagery that evokes desert night skies, folklore and mystery. It’s a song that feels almost supernatural, and its instrumentation is fabulous. 
• Desperado (1973) – the lonely outlaw that echoes frontier myths, with the desert serving as both stage and metaphor for isolation, longing, and the search for redemption. Sounds like a great film, doesn’t it? You don’t need to go too far, that picture will just come up if you listen to this song. 
• Tequila Sunrise (1973) – with its mellow instrumentation, this is another great song for a roadtrip. It sort of gives the vibe of a borderlands vignette, combining small-town melancholy with a touch of romantic yearning, and I like that we don’t really know for what, yet somehow we feel it alongside the song. 
• Hotel California (1976) – of course, I can’t not talk about the most famous Eagles song. Even though we hear it on their previous records, Hotel California is the perfect culmination of the band’s sound. It’s a complex song, blending allure and entrapment. I think it does a great job in capturing both the beauty and the illusion of the Southwestern dream, especially since its lyrics are extremely peculiar and quite different from other things they’ve written.

I always get these really vivid images in my head of the Southwest–a place I’ve never even been to–because of the Eagles’ songs. They’ve transformed it into a musical and cultural touchstone, and maybe for them, it felt like a new American dream back then, but I still think it’s the case today, at least for me it is. The desert, the highways, the small towns… they all take on a life of their own in their music, and it gives us both a tangible sense of place and even an emotional experience. 

The Myth and Mirage of the Sunbelt

By the mid-1970s, as the United States was undergoing a demographic and cultural shift, the so-called “Sunbelt” – region stretching from California through Arizona, Nevada and Texas – was booming. Populations were growing as new highways, suburban developments, and industries expanded into what was considered remote or marginal landscapes. Kind of the perfect backdrop for the Eagles’ music that found not just listeners but a cultural home, unlocking a new part of “fandom” for the first time back then. 

If you listen to their lyrics, polished yet infused with desert imagery, they mirrored the optimism and contradictions of this growth. 

“You can check out any time you like, but you can never leave.” – from Hotel California

I think about this lyric a lot, and something about it scares me a little. On the surface, we can all agree it’s about a hotel, but symbolically it’s a desert mirage: the promise of escape that becomes a trap. It’s the perfect crystallization of the Southwest as both alluring and suffocating — the wide-open dream that folds in on itself.

To compare, we can think of how Bruce Springsteen was capturing the grit of the East Coast factory towns or Bob Seger singing about the heartland’s working-class struggles, for example. The Eagles were on a totally different track: mobility, leisure, the romance of the open road… Theirs was the soundtrack of highway travel, motels, and border towns, with harmonies that seemed to stretch as wide as the new suburbs and freeways themselves. So, in many ways, they became the musical emblem of the Sunbelt era, embodying its expansiveness and sense of possibility, while also hinting at the illusions that underlay its promise. Eventually, they helped shape the region’s identity in the cultural imagination. 

Thus, the Eagles’s Southwest was never purely geographic. It sort of became a state of mind, almost a character of its own, but further than that, it was a complete metaphorical space where freedom, solitude, and illusion collided. It was the ideal way to shove a mirror in people’s face–reflecting both the dream and allure of escape and boundless horizons, as well as the danger of losing oneself in illusion. 

---

The Eagles’ ability to weave the Southwest into both music and myth left a lasting impact on American culture. They didn’t just create hits; they built a sonic map that future artists would navigate. Country-rock, Americana, and even modern indie-folk owe part of their vocabulary to the Eagles’ blend of polish and desert atmosphere. Their songs also cemented real places — Winslow, Arizona, or the highways of Hotel California — into popular memory, where geography became inseparable from sound. Just as importantly, they captured an American tension that still resonates: the dream of boundless freedom set against the risk of disillusion. That duality has given their music unusual longevity, allowing it to feel both nostalgic and contemporary, mythic yet personal–and I would just tell you to go play their Best Of right off the bat and you’ll see how catchy it will become.

To listen to the Eagles today is to hear more than just classic rock radio staples. Their legacy endures not only in record sales or accolades but in the way their music reshaped how we imagine a place itself, a beautiful and powerful aspect about music that also reminds us not to get lost in that double mirage here — to appreciate the dream without mistaking it for escape.