2004-04-17
http://www.smoothjazzcanada.com/interview_randy_meisner.htm
Even though he left the Eagles after the Hotel California tour in 1977 Randy
Meisner will always be remembered as the voice of 'Take it to the Limit' . He
still sings those Eagles hits live in his latest band, but mostly he lives the
simple life in his house in the hills of Studio City Los Angeles. We talked to
Randy by phone.

John Beaudin - Hi Randy, it's nice to talk to you.

John - Where are you by the way?

Randy - Studio City Los Angeles. It's right across from Universal City.

John - What are you up to these days?

Randy - I'm working with a group, we've been together for a while now maybe four
to five years. We do mostly corporate dates.

John - When you say corporate dates, do you mean for major companies?

Randy - Yes, like Nortel and different corporations. The great thing is with
this band every song is a hit. With corporate people they might hire a band and
they may have three hits and maybe their other songs might not be as good as
their hits but this thing just keeps growing and it is so good. We have had a
great response from everyone we have played for.

Randy - I live in the hills in Studio City and my wife and I feed deer every
night. There are two little fawns up here and they are spotted and they are
twins. We have been feeding them for 14 years, since we moved up here. It is
just so neat I just had to say that. We feed them and they come up every night
and they trust us. You have to build trust in animals.

John - You know it is interesting that you should say that because if you look
at a stereotypical view I think of anybody that is looking at some one who was
with Poco and The Eagles they probably think he is sitting on his porch feeding
deer and now you are doing it!

John - Look at The Eagles greatest hits, it is the biggest selling album of all
time in North America and that says a lot.

Randy - I know and I finally received that award. When they originally presented
it Bernie Leadon and I weren't even notified so we had to call and we finally
received it. When I quit it was like Timothy Schmit joined the group and it was
like Timothy was the guy now and I can't blame them for that. All that stuff and
all the arguing amongst The Eagles is over now. Well at least for me.

John - When you were starting out was Poco your first big gig?

Randy - I did that first album with them 'Picking Up the Pieces' and then there
was a thing where Richie Furay and I we made the album and then I called in and
said, "I want to come down and listen to the mixes." Richie for some reason
thought he and Jimmy Messina should just do it alone. I said, "If that is the
way it is going to be then I don't feel like a member of the band," and Richie
said, "Okay, and you quit kind of thing." So then I left. (Laughing) It was just
as simple as that. Then I went back to Nebraska and worked with a friend of mine
who owned a John Deer dealership. I was like a parts man for eight months and
then Ricky Nelson called me and I played with him for a while. They were doing
Rudy the Fifth and I was playing from nine to one in the morning and then
getting to work at John Deer later and later every day. Pretty soon Ricky called
and asked if I could come out and do a few songs and he said, "We want to hear
your bass playing." So I came out and then it started all over again. Then I
started playing with Linda Ronstadt and Glen Frey and Don Henley that was after
Poco.

John - So at that point you were finished with Ricky Nelson?

Randy - Well, I didn't want to let Ricky down so I got a friend of mine Steve
Love who was also in my band. I told Rick that he was a great singer, he could
sing the high parts and he is a great guitarist and he can play bass anytime he
wants. Steve got that job so I didn't let Rick down. Then I went on with Don
(Henley) and Glen (Frey).

John - Bernie came from the Burrito Brother's right?

Randy - Yeah, he did and it was around that time too.

John - Do you remember the first gig you played with the other guys in the
Eagle's?

Randy - Yeah, it was the first time I played with Linda Ronstadt in San Jose,
California and it was so much fun playing with Don and Glen. (Laughing) That was
when it all started. Don and Glen knew me from Poco and Glen came from a group
called Longbranch Pennywhistle with J.D. Souther. Henley came from a group out
of Texas called Shiloh. So, that is how we all met and for me it all started
with them noticing me in Poco. Then David Geffen got involved once we were
already together.


John - Were you involved in the reunion album with Poco?

Randy - Yes, I was.

John - Was that fun for you?

Randy - It wasn't very good. (Laughing) I had done some recording with Richard
Marx and he wrote a song for me. Then we all got back together and it was really
fun actually. Let me tell you what really happened. This was going down around
the time of the Persian Gulf War and our management had arranged all these
things on military bases. We had all this merchandising to sell and when we got
to all these army bases we were playing to empty crowds because all the troops
were in the Persian Gulf. After that we played a few more things but I ended up
paying all this money for merchandising rather than making money on it. We did
make a record and I thought it was good. Richie Furay is a minister in Boulder,
Colorado. So, when we went out we had to change our lyrics like on the song
"Hearts on Fire" we had to change the line "I had myself a tall one waiting in
the bar I didn't want to leave here until I had her in the car" it got to
Richie. I had to respect Richie but one night we were playing in Toronto and the
crowd was really good and I sang the original lyric and Richie got kind of upset
about that. Also, Jimmy Messina couldn't sing "I had her in the backseat" on his
song. I really got frustrated with that because we weren't singing the original
lyrics of these songs so I left. We did finish the tour but I didn't make a
penny. We did travel all over and we went to Europe for a month to promote this
whole album. Out of a month we played twenty four days and we would get up at
five in the morning, go to every radio station in Europe and plug this album. It
didn't do a darn bit of good. So, I have had my road work, you know? (Laughing)

John - (laughing) Paul McCartney has said that about the Beatles and he is
always saying that he hears the band in the background and before his brain
reminds him that he was in that band there is another part of him that just
says, "Man, that band was good." To him these songs were recorded so long ago
that he is far removed enough to listen to the songs with fresh ears.

Randy - Yeah that is the same thing with me. Once you are in the studio you've
heard that album so many times you have heard it to death. When you are done
with it its like you are really done.

John - The Eagles especially on "The Long Run" were kind of accused of doing the
Steely Dan thing over producing. I really think it worked with Steely Dan but
sometimes an album can be over produced.

Randy - There is something to be said for that. You can be too much of a
perfectionist and then you lose the real feel for the album. Henley always does
a pretty damn good job though.

John - You know Randy we used to say that Poco was the farm team for The Eagles.
It's interesting how Timothy (Schmit) replaced you in both Poco and the Eagles.

Randy - (laughing) Yeah, I guess they were. Poco kinda started the whole thing
along with the Byrds and Bernie Leadon in the Burrito Brothers and stuff. We
were all kind of the front runners in the country rock thing.

Randy - Well, he wanted to make me more of a hard rocker. It was okay and it was
fun. It was at that point that I realized that I didn't want to be a solo
artist.

John - Well, there really is comfort in a group setting isn't there?

Randy - Oh yeah! After that I worked with Rick Roberts of Firefall.

John - Firefall was one of my favorite bands in the seventies.

Randy - Yeah he's a great guy. We played together for maybe three or four years
doing mostly small clubs.

John - Rick Roberts is officially out of Firefall right?

Randy - Yeah, he's out and living in Boulder Colorado. I talk to him every once
in a while. He's a great writer and he's been working on some new stuff.

John - You and him together as a duo again would be great! Your voices would
work together really well.

Randy - Oh yeah, (laughing) it works. As for getting together it's a matter of
my life now is me and my wife and this house and my little dog and my tomatoes.

John - Who am I to get between you and your tomatoes. (laughing)

Randy - (laughing) I know it sounds stupid but it really means a lot. I really
love fresh tomatoes.

John - (laughing) Okay, that part we will not believe. Tell me what do you think
of this whole piracy thing. I know napster is long dead but what are your
thoughts on it.

Randy - Well, I've always thought of it as everyone just making a cassette. It's
just the same but the problem is it's not a cassette its digital and it sounds
just like the original. When you make a cassette for someone there's white noise
on it. I just don't want it to screw up my royalties. What do you think about
it?

John - First hand I don't buy albums. I get everything free from the record
companies anyway. I get at least one hundred CD's in the mail every month so I
get music in a different way than most people. I think the record companies
cannot really beat this thing without joining in this and beating the piracy at
their own game and many are doing that now.

Randy - Sure there are many ways to look at it. If the music gets out there more
than maybe someone who downloads one song will want to buy the whole album.
Maybe they'll want the whole original thing with jewel box and liner notes. For
me personally, I just don't want to be cheated out of my royalties and I'm okay.

John - Do you have your own outtake stuff that you recorded with the Eagles?

Randy - Well I lost a tape of the second album we made "Desperado." Everyday I
would go in the studio when the Eagles would rehearse and I had one of those
early first Sony stereo's that came in a little bag and it had two little
speakers with it. I went to Radio Shack and bought this little cheap mic and
before we would rehearse I'd have this little mixer and I would set up all the
mics on all the amps and the drums and everything and when they came in I
recorded it. I ended up with a pretty good recording as cheap as it was. I had
"Doolin' Dalton" and "Desperado" and all that stuff. So we went to Hawaii to
play and I must have been dreaming or something and I left that thing laying in
the airport and so someone got that cassette player and the tape. Someday that
thing is going to show up and I can't wait.

John - What a collector's item. If someone has it out there please contact us
and we'll get you a copy of it Randy.

Randy - Yeah, that would be great. I was so mad that I lost it. I'll bet that
it'll show up some day unless somebody didn't know what it was and threw it out.

John - Yeah the Eagles only had one actual album out at that point. You weren't
really that well known yet and the stuff on the tape hadn't been released so to
an unfamiliar person it sounded like a demo from just a band.

Randy - Yeah that true. I think a lot of these specialty in-studio CD's that get
circulated are put together obviously by people who work in the studio. They
have their private little cassette recording on the side. In some ways I think
its fun. It's all kind of fun unless it's detrimental to you. (Laughing)

John - I'll just ask a few more here. I know you have to go but at what point
with the Eagles did you know that this band was going to be a great financial
thing.

Randy - I'd say that happened when "One of These Nights" came out. We were doing
a lot of gigs before that opening up for Jethro Tull and Joe Cocker but then
everything changed. I looked at Irving Azoff one day and said, "Boy, this is big
time now." I could tell it was really working and all of a sudden we got hit
with all this stuff. It became huge.

John - And that was before "Hotel California." It must have gone really nuts
after that?

Randy - Oh, Yeah really nuts and that's when I left. I did the tour for "Hotel
California."

John - Did the other guys know you were going to leave?

Randy - No, not really. Glen (Frey) and I got into a little fight but it's
something that just happened and we kind of got mad at each other and took a
swing at each other in Knoxville Tennessee. (Laughing) At the time to me it was
just like two guys fighting but it got really bad so at that point I just
decided to leave because I just didn't like what I was doing anymore.

John - Any regrets about leaving the Eagles?

Randy - Not really but I wish I could of left in a different way though. I mean
how are you going to be nice when you leave.

John - I read a bit of "Take it to the Limit."

Randy - Yeah, there were a couple of them. It's like catching someone at a wrong
time when everyone was kind of angry at everyone else. You say things that you
really don't mean. These people want the dirt and they forget that most of the
time there was not any dirt. Most of the time we got along really well. Years
later you read it and its dirt and you think why in the hell did I say that
about him whether it's Glen or Henley. For God sakes were just people. It was a
time where there was a little resentment.

John - It changes doesn't it?

Randy - Yeah, when you get older you think why think about that stuff, it's not
worth it.

John - It's easy for folks out there to judge these days. There you guys were
bigger than world but what you went through was appropriate for the
circumstances.

Randy - Exactly and there's a time when you say enough is enough. I don't hold
any grudges or hatred. Let's get on with life and have some fun. You know with
the Eagles I was on my own all the time. All I saw were airports, the hotel room
and the hall. Now when I do shows and my wife comes along we go to antique shows
and we go shopping and we actually get the feel for the city that makes it
great.

John - In those days you guys did hang out together, right?

Randy - Oh God, we did a lot of that but by "Hotel California" it was like
separate limo's and everybody had their own thing going and it was just getting
kind of tiring.

John - Do you have any plans of quitting music?

Randy - Totally quitting? No, I don't think I'll ever do that.

John - We got sidetracked a while ago talking about the Poco/Eagles farm team
thing. Well, it's kind of wacky that you were replaced in Poco by Timothy B.
Schmit and when you left the Eagles in 1977 he was the guy who replaced you
there.

Randy - Yeah, he's following me around. (Laughing) He's a really nice guy. When
we were inducted in the Rock n Roll Hall of Fame he made such a nice remark
giving me all the best and saying, "Remember that Randy did most of this work
with the Eagles not me." It was so honest and so nice.

J



inteL8er,

RDB
http://blomstedt.jwdx.com
"Everything under the Sun is in tune, but the sun is eclipsed by the moon"