Eagles Guitars (and a whole lotta info!)

[Jonny Come Lately]

Thanks for the responses - better late than never!

It's funny because I always felt the YNCLAL guitars and the solo in particular sounded a bit different from Bernie's usual style (I've always thought it sounds much more rock than country IMO). Given that Glenn almost certainly played the piano parts on this song, it would make sense for Bernie to play lead guitar on this track, and therefore I think you're probably right about it being a Telecaster. When it comes to guitar sounds I have a decent chance of spotting a Stratocaster - two of my absolute favourite players (Gilmour and Knopfler) favour Strats, with Felder and Walsh using them a fair bit too of course, and there is also the distinctive sound when the tremolo arm is used - elsewhere though I struggle to distinguish between models.

[NightMistBlue]

I think most listeners would be challenged in distinguishing the sound of different models. That's why the attribution in the HC credits of Joe playing the Gretsch on "Try and Love Again" is not particularly helpful, IMO!

Did we ever figure out who plays what, guitar-wise, on that song? I'm guessing that's Joe playing the solo, maybe Felder playing the chimey bits (such as the intro figure), Glenn on the acoustic.

[scottside]

I think most listeners would be challenged in distinguishing the sound of different models. That's why the attribution in the HC credits of Joe playing the Gretsch on "Try and Love Again" is not particularly helpful, IMO!

Did we ever figure out who plays what, guitar-wise, on that song? I'm guessing that's Joe playing the solo, maybe Felder playing the chimey bits (such as the intro figure), Glenn on the acoustic.

On the record, Glenn plays the solo, but the one time I saw them do it love (early 1977), he played acoustic and Joe did the solo.

[Jonny Come Lately]

I'm pretty sure the HC liner notes credit Glenn with the guitar solo on Try and Love Again. It seems like the old rule of thumb 'Glenn plays on the bassist's songs' comes into play once again! That really surprised me when I first found about it, more so than ICTYW funnily enough, which doesn't sound like something Felder or Walsh would play. I agree with you about the infamous 'Gretsch guitar' credit... I'm just listening to it right now and to me on the record it sounds like there are two electric guitars and one acoustic guitar, so I guess it was probably an electric, although the emphasis is very much on the word 'guess'!

There's quite a lot of information about TALA in this topic from a couple of years ago, although I'm afraid it doesn't definitively answer the Gretsch question! It does however reveal that in live performances Glenn handed lead guitar duties to Felder, with Walsh playing electric guitar.

https://eaglesonlinecentral.com/foru...ead.php?t=4526

[NightMistBlue]

Thank you very much. Once again, it seems I've underestimated Glenn as a lead guitarist - that is a wonderful solo on TALA.

Scottside, you are so lucky (I'm sure you already know) to have seen the Eagles perform TALA live. What was the audience reaction, do you remember?

Re: that older thread - anyone know what YT stands for? The original poster (who no longer frequents this site I don't believe) says that Randy performed the song live on the audio of YT.

[chaim]

Glenn probably played the acoustic on Try And Love Again and later overdubbed the solo. There are several guitars harmonizing on the main "riff", and some of those were probably performed on the same takes as the (electric) rhythm parts. I considered them part of the rhythm tracks, not just overdubbed lead bits.

[scottside]

Thank you very much. Once again, it seems I've underestimated Glenn as a lead guitarist - that is a wonderful solo on TALA.

Scottside, you are so lucky (I'm sure you already know) to have seen the Eagles perform TALA live. What was the audience reaction, do you remember?

Re: that older thread - anyone know what YT stands for? The original poster (who no longer frequents this site I don't believe) says that Randy performed the song live on the audio of YT.

The audience went wild for TALA, but then the album HC had only been out for a few months and had hit the top of the charts so all of the songs they played from that were well received.

[WalshFan88]

I think most listeners would be challenged in distinguishing the sound of different models. That's why the attribution in the HC credits of Joe playing the Gretsch on "Try and Love Again" is not particularly helpful, IMO!

Agreed.

But once you know what each guitar sounds like it becomes a lot easier. Each guitar has a definitive sound. Even from the same manufacturer, a Les Paul is different than an SG in sound which is different than a 335, and a Tele is certainly different than a Strat.

[travlnman2]

@WalshFan88 maybe you can help with this. On Farewell 1 and the Rock and Roll hall of fame video Glenn play's the intro with Felder/Smith but he has a capo on the second fret but is he using a different tuning? Because it sounds god awful in Standard tuning. I am recording for a demo tape and Glenn is giving me a hard time with his part lol.

[WalshFan88]

Walsh fan maybe you can help with this. On Farwell 1 and the Rock and Roll hall of fame video Glenn play's the intro with Felder/Smith but he has a capo on the second fret but is he using a different tuning? Because it sounds god awful in Standard tuning. I am recording for a demo tape and Glenn is giving me a hard time with his part lol.

The "studio" version of HC (forgetting the original demo in Em, and Felder's lowered version in Am) was in the key of Bm.

To do this, Felder (and then Steuart) would play with a capo on a 12-string on the 7th fret and play an Em shape that makes Bm.

Glenn would play capo 2 with an Am shape, which makes it Bm.

All guitars in standard tuning, just with capos.

One trick is that in the Eagles, Glenn does not pick the strings individually, he strums them in time with stops in between each passage. Walsh plays traditional full barre chords without a capo.

The picking arpeggio is coming from Felder/Stu and them only. The other two strum off of those chords.

So the picking the individual strings is solely coming from Felder, and in later years Smith. Glenn is just strumming lightly in time with the song.

Now Glenn solo with his son, I've seen him try to pick the notes with a 2nd fret capo but it DOES sound funny when done this way but it is ok. But that is not what he is playing with the band. He only did that when there wasnt a guitar playing to play the picked intro.