WCSX Classic Cuts : Hotel California

WCSX Classic Cuts

Eagles: "Hotel California"

The Hook: The words were inspired by Steely Dan and The Twilight Zone. Really.

Album: Hotel California

Year: 1977

Writers: Don Felder, Glenn Frey and Don Henley

Stats: Topped the Billboard Hot 100.

Background: An instrumental by Eagles lead guitarist Don Felder was the hopping-off point for a song about the dark underbelly of California. When Felder had trouble coming up with lyrics, the band's main songwriters, Don Henley and Glenn Frey, were called in to finish them. Frey recalls the inspirations for what he and Henley came up with.

Eagles guitarist Glenn Frey on what inspired him and Don Henley when they added lyrics to Don Felder’s music for “Hotel California.” OC:...in California. :30

“We had been discussing two things, one was the courage Steely Dan had to say anything in a song and the other was wanting to write something sort of like a scene from The Twilight Zone, where every two line couplet was a different picture and you would cut from one shot to the next and let people think what they wanted. Not necessarily having to mean anything, just sort of a buffet of images that were things we saw in California.”