CoronaVinyl Day 385 (E): Desperado by Eagles

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Today's CoronaVinyl category is "E," and I don't have any albums by any "E" artists I haven't already featured, so I went with The Eagles' second studio album, 1973's Desperado.

The band and its songwriting collaborators Jackson Browne and J.D. Souther decided to make a concept album about cowboys and outlaws.  The front of the album cover shows the band dressed as cowboys, and the back of the album has a black and white photo recreation of the 1892 death of four members of the Dalton gang, following a gunfight in Coffeyville, Kansas after they tried to rob the town's two banks.  The band, Browne, and Souther are shown lying bound and dead on the ground, as a posse stands over them.  In the posse are the album's producer Glyn Johns, the band's manager, road manager, album artists, and roadies.  The first song on the album, "Doolin-Dalton," is also about the Doolin-Dalton Gang, which was the successor gang to the Dalton gang, since most of the Daltons were killed.

The album went to #41 on the Billboard album chart, making it the band's lowest-charting studio or live album they ever released -- though it has since gone double platinum in the U.S., so you can't feel too bad.  The title track, which became one of the band's signature songs, wasn't released as a single.  "Tequila Sunrise" and "Outlaw Man" were the two singles from the album, but neither fared very well on the Billboard Hot 100, reaching only #64 and #59, respectively.

Favorite Song on Side 1:  "Out of Control"
This is probably the hardest-rocking song on the album.  It has almost a glam rock feel to it, and if you didn't know it was an Eagles song, you probably would think it was maybe a Foghat song (yes, I know they're not glam).

Favorite Song on Side 2:  "Outlaw Man"
The highest-charting song on the album is another one that rocks a little harder than, say, "Desperado" or "Tequila Sunrise."  While the band is known for popularizing the country rock genre, this one seems more Southern rock, including a solid boogying jam in the middle to the end.