Peaceful Easy Feeling - Stereophile Obit - Glenn Frey - Lacking Class?

[Sal1950]

Butch, Thanks for your words and support.

Also thanks to all who have involved themselves in voicing their displeasure.

The arrogance the staff of Stereophile shows as they close ranks over this issue is very revealing of their attitude towards the readership.

[baddog]

Agree with the above, and in keeping in the spirit of sharing some stories, here is another one courtesy of Bob Lefsetz ( letters to him ).

 

 

 

Hi Bob,

 

It's my first time writing you, although I read and absorb all of your work. Thank you for being so thought provoking. There are times I want to jump on a plane and fly out to LA and kick your ass and other times when I want to give you a high-five, or in the case of your Glenn Frey piece, a man-hug.

 

Pardon in advance my, what I am sure will be, rambling. I'm doing this more for the cathartic aspect than anything else. Feel free to paraphrase and publish what you'd like, or just read and hopefully enjoy by yourself without publishing. Like I said, this will be cathartic and I need that right now.

 

I do indie promotion for Top 40 and Hot AC and have been doing so since the mid-80's. I have never promoted an Eagles single, although I have worked several solo records by Glenn, Henley and Timothy.

 

I first met Glenn at a TJ Martell golf tourney in LA in 1992 around the time that MCA released his "Strange Weather" album. We hit it off immediately and I asked him if he'd consider coming to Chicago to play in the Martell golf event that I was chairing in conjunction with the old Hitmakers conventions. He said "I'll do almost anything if it involves golf, but I'll only fly to Chicago if you come to lunch with me and my wife Cindy." I said "Anytime" and he said, "Right now." We jumped in his minivan and went to Dr. Hogly Woglys BBQ, somewhere in the LA Valley. The three of us and their infant daughter, Taylor.

 

We became fast friends. Like super-fast. So fast that it was kind of a "why me?" moment in my life that I'll never forget.

 

I was honest with Glenn when I told him that I wasn't a huge Eagles fan. In what I would learn would be Glenn's great sense of humor, he replied, "Me either" and laughed that unforgettable laugh/cough of his. But I had seen (The) Eagles in concert twice and certainly respected them...and of course both times were on dates with babes that wanted to see the shows more than me. But what really hit me immediately was how fucking cool Glenn was. Here I am sitting in a dingy BBQ joint and this guy just wreaked of cool. Even driving a minivan. He defined cool.

 

Although I had Glenn's contact info I felt it would be more appropriate to ask Bruce Tennenbaum and Mark Gorlick at MCA to help facilitate Glenn's participation in the Chicago Martell event. I can still remember Tennenbaum..."Are you fickin' crazy? He's an Eagle. There's no way he's gonna fly to Chicago." I asked Bruce to at least make the effort. He called me back the next day and in disbelief said that Glenn was looking forward to being our celebrity host. And he did it two years in a row!

 

Timing was everything, as far as my luck was concerned. Glenn was touring in support of the "Strange Weather" album and I took advantage of our friendship and visited radio almost everywhere the tour played...and of course had PD's ecstatic about meeting Glenn and getting a picture with him. Often he'd say, "I'm gonna make you look good tonight Cooper," and he'd dedicate my favorite song on the new album to "My buddy Cooper and his radio pals here tonight." The song was "River of Dreams." Never a hit. But a song I loved as my friendship with Glenn continued to grow and I learned what had inspired him to write it.

 

Glenn was in Chicago doing a corporate gig for GD Searle (big pharma company) on a polar-cold Saturday night in late '93 or early '94 when he told me, "Hell's freezing over on Monday." What? He said there would be a press conference and that the Eagles were getting back together. He told me it was going to be a drug and alcohol free tour in respect to Walsh and said, in his own inimitable way, "Cooper. I have no idea how long this tour will go or when and where it'll end. But whenever it does, I want to walk off the stage and see you standing in the wings with a bottle of 1976 Chateau Lafitte Rothschild in one hand a big fat doobie in the other." I complied.

 

"It's gonna be huge! Irving's got a 727 that seats 210-people that’s being reconfigured to seat 51. And we're gonna have police escorts to and from every venue. If you think we've been having fun the last couple of years, wait 'til you fly on EAGLE ONE." The first time I did, I was blown away! Wide-eyed and amazed at the precision of the police motorcade, motorcycles blocking entrances to the interstate and then passing our van, sirens wailing, leapfrogging with each other to get to an entrance ramp a few miles up and block it for us. And when we got to the airport, Glenn turned to me and said, "Cooper. Watch what we do when we pull up to the jet." The line of vans made three complete circles around the big 727 before pulling up under the tail where we boarded the plane. I asked Glenn why they did that, and his response..."Because we can." Typical cool!

 

I couldn't be at the last show of Hell Freezes Over, but on the next to last show in Little Rock I did when Glenn had asked me to do. It blew his mind! "You didn't," he said with the biggest smile you can imagine. He then asked Cindy to make sure there were wineglasses in their compartment the next night for their flight back to LA. Whether or not he ever fired up that joint on the plane, I may never know. But I do know that he loved that bottle of wine.

 

I have dozens of stories about how cool Glenn was. Dozens! But as Andrew Kastner wrote to you yesterday, Glenn's generosity was unequaled by anyone that I've known. It went far beyond gifts, expensive wine and dinners, always footing the tab for golf, etc. Not even watching him give every single employee in a big Emeril-owned restaurant in New Orleans a fifty and wishing them a merry Christmas surprised me. Every worker from the servers to the dishwashers to the valet parker...and we didn't even drive to the restaurant! That was Glenn. He was charitable beyond his generosity. He asked me several times over the years which charity meant a lot to me at given points in time and he'd make a donation, in my honor, to that charity...as long as it benefitted kids. He was a mensch!

 

Glenn loved to visit Chicago and when he was here, Gibson's, a well-known, see-and-be-seen, celebrity hangout was where you could find him along with his sidekicks I'd affectionately refer to Tom & Jerry (Nixon & Vaccarino). He loved their steaks. During Eagles tours he would intentionally base the band in Chicago for up to a week at a time and they'd fly out to shows in the Midwest, usually about an hour's flight away. I'd rarely dine at Gibson's unless Glenn was in town. Dining there without him will be strange, to say the least.

 

Up until just the past year and a half or so, Glenn rarely texted me. He had on old flip-phone and I guess it was cumbersome. But when he finally caught up with technology, it was always great to hear from him. He'd end each text session with me with "Pax, Elvis" (sometimes even "Elvoid").

 

When my mom passed away in August '14, Elvis texted me, "Heard about your mom. Lost mine last Sept 9. It's a tough one. On tour but will get to Chicago in the next week or two so we can grab dinner and toast to the fine ladies that brought us into this world. Pax, Elvis" A week later he texted me to pick a restaurant for dinner..."Just the two of us. Maybe not Gibson's. Too loud. Somewhere we can talk. Elvoid."

 

As always, Glenn controlled the conversation and had me laughing. When the conversation shifted to my mom's passing, I realized that while Glenn had come to Chicago to help comfort me, he was also trying to comfort himself, since the one-year anniversary of his mom's passing was just a few weeks away. I saw a side of Glenn that I had never seen. Vulnerability. It was telling. My rock star friend and I alternated attention drawing laughs, but also needed to have our napkins replaced so we could wipe our tears away. He gave me great advice on how to help me help my dad deal with losing his wife. It was truly the most precious couple of hours I had ever spent with him. And he still wreaked of cool all the while.

 

I sent Glenn an "inside joke" via text about an unnamed rocker back in early October. His reply was typical Elvis.."Goofball in any medium. Definitely a red state guy." I replied with the pre-pubescent "LOL" and told him I'd be in NY in November to see Hamilton and asked if he and Cindy wanted to join for the play or an early dinner. His reply cut right through me. He said he'd been in LA for two months and that he was "very sick" and described his illness. He said it was not life threatening, but demanded, "Tell no one" and even said "I repeat, tell no one." I texted him on his birthday a month later and never heard back. I knew it was more serious than he had thought.

 

I know how many millions of lives Glenn touched through his music. But he touched mine in a way that only a certain kind of man could. While we would only see each other occasionally, our genuine friendship never waned. My life has been enriched because my friendship with Glenn Frey. And not because he was so fucking cool. Because he was truly a great man.

 

Rick Cooper

[baddog]

Yes it is true, I am done with them, but gee whiz John, this is your opinion of the whole matter? As they say, over and out.

 

 

What cover? The Eagles piece that has gotten everyone's panties in a wad

was published on the Stereophile website.

[REShaman]

Yes it is true, I am done with them, but gee whiz John, this is your opinion of the whole matter? As they say, over and out.

 

 

What cover? The Eagles piece that has gotten everyone's panties in a wad

was published on the Stereophile website.

 

Hello Rick,

 

Me too.

 

And you're story serves me as a fitting obit and testimonial to Glenn Frey who I now know about personally besides his music/lyrics through your relationship. Baird? Baird who?

 

Gratefully,

Richard

[Paul R]

Stephen Mejias (former Stereophile employee and current advertiser via Audioquest) posted a comment referring to the article as "art" and "inspiring".

 

Up until I saw that the other day, I was willing to grant that I might be interpreting the whole thing wrong, in the worst possible manner, and that it may not have been as bad as it looked.

 

That ridiculous assertion disturbed me and made me actually post on Stereophile's forum, something I very rarely do.

 

I think it is time for something new to enter the audiophile journalism world. Something has to replace that kind of arrogant journalism with more mature, well thought out reasoning.

 

-Paul

[Sal1950]

Yes it is true, I am done with them, but gee whiz John, this is your opinion of the whole matter? As they say, over and out.

 

 

What cover? The Eagles piece that has gotten everyone's panties in a wad

was published on the Stereophile website.

 

Hello Rick,

 

Me too.

 

And you're story serves me as a fitting obit and testimonial to Glenn Frey who I now know about personally besides his music/lyrics through your relationship. Baird? Baird who?

 

Gratefully,

Richard

 

Up until I saw that the other day, I was willing to grant that I might be interpreting the whole thing wrong, in the worst possible manner, and that it may not have been as bad as it looked.

 

That ridiculous assertion disturbed me and made me actually post on Stereophile's forum, something I very rarely do.

 

I think it is time for something new to enter the audiophile journalism world. Something has to replace that kind of arrogant journalism with more mature, well thought out reasoning.

 

-Paul

 

Agreed and thank you gentleman for your support.