Hotel California

I once lent a friend of mine Richard Fleischer’s autobiography. I found his tales of life as a major Hollywood film director fascinating. She didn’t. Reading about the dreadful behaviour of some of her favourite movie stars just depressed her.

If that was her reaction to some only mildly scurrilous memoirs, I hate to think what she’d make of this book, with its tales of greed, cocaine abuse, arguments, fist fights and rampant alcoholism in the country rock scene of the late 60s/early 70s. Reading it, you wonder how any of the musicians involved managed to write a single lyric, let alone hold a guitar long enough to strum a chord.

It’s a glum tale. Depressing even. Focusing mainly on the Eagles, Joni Mitchell, Jackson Browne and CSNY, it charts the birth of country rock and its carefully managed growth to levels of success none of the individuals involved could have dreamed of. It’s also the story of how management took over creativity and stifled it, softening the blow with another bump of coke or a trip in a Lear jet. What starts out as people just wanting to play music together ends in death or stoned, drunken, abusive disillusion. Albeit with several million dollars in the bank.

It’s a grim, fascinating read. The only thing I miss is a little more celebration of the music that was produced. But then, I have the albums for that. And no matter how badly some of the people involved in its creation may have behaved, that music still shines through: diamonds cut in murk, chaos and excess.