Flamenco Version of Hotel California?

[Dan0]

What is the story behind the Spanish Guitar version of Hotel California (from Hell Freezes Over)? Who said... let's do it this way! And what inspired that version?

I didn't even care for that song until then. That was perfect... the best version by far! Felder and Walsh... fantastic!!!

Thanks!

[Funk 50]

One of MTV's major successes was their MTV Unplugged, which featured artists performing a selection of their biggest hits live acoustically. I've heard that Don Henley was the first, non-obscure, artist to sign up for it. Rod Stewart, Nirvana, R.E.M. and Eric Clapton were all major stars who got a career boost by taking part in it.

I guess the Eagles Hell Freezes Over show was initially planned to be an MTV Unplugged concert but, knowing the Eagles quality control, meticulousness, and slowness, they probably would have required, at least, another 12 months to work up satisfactory acoustic arrangements for all their hits.

As it was the mighty Eagles, and their first live concert after splitting in 1981, I guess MTV cut them some slack and allowed them to play a partial acoustic concert.

The bootleg version of the show has the band performing 8 songs acoustically:

1 Peaceful Easy Feeling
2 Best Of My Love
3 Tequila Sunrise
4 Help Me Through The Night
5 The Heart Of The Matter
6 Love Will Keep Us Alive
7 Learn To Be Still
8 Hotel California

Don Henley felt that the acoustic version of Hotel California needed more of an intro so Don Felder provided a few extra bars of an acoustic, nylon strings, noodling before the recognisable descending chord progression began.

The band went back to the plugged in version for the subsequent tour.

That's what I think anyway

[sodascouts]

Felder says in his book that apparently Glenn Frey thought the song needed a new intro and told him to come up with one without much warning (the day of the taping, I believe). As Funk 50 recounts, Felder wrote the acoustic intro. As for reason behind the acoustic version, I think Funk 50's speculation is probably correct.

[chaim]

Don Felder is great in that version. I'm not huge fan of what Joe's doing, but Felder said in his book that Joe had trouble playing at that point.

[NightMistBlue]

I wondered if the Gypsy Kings' flamenco version of HC inspired Felder's arrangement, but apparently the Kings' version came out several years after HFO. The Kings' version was featured in "The Big Lebowski." Oh the irony.

[Dan0]

Thanks for the replies!

[Jonny Come Lately]

In a funny coincidence, I was actually playing this version of the song to my family the other day. Interestingly, my mother and sister absolutely love this version of HC and both have told me they prefer it to the electric album version (my sister especially). I love it too, although I think the original is hard to beat.

One thing I really like is the moment when the crowd cheers as everyone starts to recognise the song. Felder's intro to the song is absolutely great, although I do think it's a bit of a shame that the famous outro was shortened somewhat. I can understand why they did this though with the extended opening.

[Funk 50]

One thing I really like is the moment when the crowd cheers as everyone starts to recognise the song.

Are you really from England JCL, that kind of audible outburst really bugs me. You can show your appreciation when the song is over!
It's even worse when the muppets start cheering when the singer sings the opening line.

Take It Easy on the Eagles Live album has a huge cheer when Glenn sings "Southern California" rather than "Winslow Arizona". I didn't know the original lyric was "Winslow Arizona" so the cheer baffled me.

I still can't believe it caused an audible cheer at the concert. I'm sure it was enhanced, if not entirely dubbed on, in post production

Actually, in the age of selfies, cell phones, snapchat etc it's nice to know some people, in the audience are actually paying close attention to what's happening on stage.

[Ive always been a dreamer]

Are you really from England JCL, that kind of audible outburst really bugs me. You can show your appreciation when the song is over!
It's even worse when the muppets start cheering when the singer sings the opening line.

Sorry, but this is rather baffling, IMO. It is pretty customary for audiences at live concerts to cheer, shout, or applaud to show their appreciation or pleasure at the beginning of a song. If that annoys you, I can only imagine how you may react if there is a shout out in the middle of a song. If you are going to listen/attend a live show, you probably need to accept that this kind of behavior is the rule, not the exception.

Take It Easy on the Eagles Live album has a huge cheer when Glenn sings "Southern California" rather than "Winslow Arizona". I didn't know the original lyric was "Winslow Arizona" so the cheer baffled me.

I still can't believe it caused an audible cheer at the concert. I'm sure it was enhanced, if not entirely dubbed on, in post production

Really? I've never been to a concert where the audience didn't cheer at the mention of their city, state, or even country. This is especially true when the artist changes the words of songs such as this example you cited. A couple of other Eagles examples: I have a bootleg when they played in Hershey, PA., Glenn changed a line in PEF to "I want to sleep with you in chocolate tonight" - silly as it may have been, the audience went wild - no enhancements or dubbing there; Also, happens every time Joe changes the word in Life's Been Good - "... my fans they can't wait, they send me emails, tell me Glenn's great" (or similar variations).

[WS82Classics]

This was the first version I ever heard. The 'Lite FM' station I grew up with was more apt to play this version as opposed to the hard rockin' original. It adds some interesting flavours to the song, and fits perfectly in the acoustic, stripped-down setting perfectly.

Of course, I'm admittedly partial to both the original intro and the electric guitar intro to the "Eagles Live" version of the song--If you're going to play that song in a 4-5 piece band setting with a keyboardist/pianist in the mix, the latter version provides a template for the best way to go about approaching the song(duo guitar solos and all).