Don Henley got his legendary hoarse voice in his early band The Speeds, in which he had to bark one blues and soul hit after the other at college concerts in Texas: “The boys in the audience just wanted James Brown, Wilson Pickett, Otis Redding; those were the things I had to learn,” Henley said. “But four hours of songs like that every night made me hoarse. I tried to sound raspy until my voice was gone.”
Years later, that rasping gave his lithe tenor a certain touch of weltweh that informed Eagles classics like 1976’s “Hotel California” as well as his solo hits, like 1984’s “The Boys Of Summer”. is a mystery to everyone,” said JD Souther, who wrote or co-wrote many Eagles hits. “For me he is one of the great blues singers of our generation.”
- BORN: July 22, 1947
- MAIN SONGS: “Hotel California”, “Desperado” (Eagles), “The Boys Of Summer” (solo)
- INSPIRED FOR: Bruce Hornsby, Sheryl Crow, Garth Brooks