AP Wire Story

RENO, Nev. (AP) - From the first unaccompanied notes of "Seven Bridges Road" to the final phrase of "Desperado" more than three hours later, it was clear the Eagles were back and sounding as sweet as ever.

It hardly seemed they had even been away.

The quartet opened its first North American tour in seven years Friday, playing to a sold out crowd of more than 11,000 at Lawlor Events Center.

The Eagles will visit 29 venues in the United States and three in Canada over the next seven weeks, generally opting for small- to middle-sized markets.

Their show wastes no time on chitchat. Except for a brief greeting from Glenn Frey and band introductions, the concert is spent revisiting the group's many hits and a few of the members' solo successes — 30 songs in all.

Frey and Don Henley anchor most of the vocals with bassist Timothy B. Schmit taking the mike for "Love Will Keep Us Alive."

Audience members, many of whom weren't born when the group's first album was released 30 years ago Saturday, alternately sat and stood during the first set, all Eagles standards except for Henley's "The Boys of Summer" from his "Building the Perfect Beast" album.

By the second set, Joe Walsh had the crowd on its feet for good with "Walk Away" and "Funk 49" from his James Gang days. His "Life's Been Good" had some in the crowd folding up their chair seats to dance in the aisles.

"Life in the Fast Lane" and "Hotel California" late in the set were singalongs.

From the Reno arena that typically houses basketball and boxing, the tour was scheduled to move to its most intimate — and most expensive — venue Saturday night, The Joint at Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas, where tickets to the sold-out concert cost up to $500 to sit and $300 to stand.

Prices ranged from $55 to $150 in Reno, which a Ticketmaster spokeswoman said was standard for the tour.

Friday's concert was technically solid, with four veterans backed up by a proficient band of a half dozen musicians on drums, keyboards, saxophones, fiddle and trumpet.

The familiar voices were as good as ever, keeping the crowd happy. Whether the guys on stage were having fun was harder to tell.

With a few exceptions when one of the Eagles actually reacted to another, they could have been performing in four different time zones. However affected the interplay may be among, say, the Rolling Stones, the Eagles didn't even try.

The band had a rancorous breakup in 1980 and went 14 years before reuniting in 1995 for the "Hell Freezes Over" tour, named for their 1994 album and one member's estimate of when the Eagles would work together again.

The group's four Grammys (news - web sites) include record of the year for 1976's "Hotel California."

They were inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1998, and "Their Greatest Hits 1971-75" is the biggest selling album in the United States. Its 27 million copies puts it 1 million ahead of Michael Jackson's "Thriller," according to the Recording Industry Association of America (news - web sites).

All 10 songs on the album are included in the tour.

NVBobSegerFan

I live in Carson City 30 miles south of Reno and was lucky enough to buy great seats to The Eagles opening concert in Reno online at Yahoo.com 4 days before they went on sale, so didn't have to stand in line. But I gotta tell you, now that the concert is over, my recommendation is ANYONE who lives ANYWHERE NEAR where they are going to be playing owes it to themselves to GET TICKETS. This was absolutely the Best Concert I have ever seen. I used to live in the San Francisco Bay Area in the 60's and 70's and 80's and have seen some great performers: The Stones, Rod Stewart, The Who, The Grateful Dead, Billy Joel, Rick Derringer, Montrose, Todd Rundgren, the list goes on, but for sure this concert was The Best (Stones in '81 at Candlestick Park comes close). Well worth the $331 I paid for 2 tickets. In fact, $500 would still have been worth it. They played absolutely everything everyone wanted to hear. Joe Walsh still kicks ass. Glenn Frey, Don Henley, Timothy Schmit were awesome. Reno truly showed them their appreciation for coming here (we usually don't get a lot of HUGE acts)- I heard lots of people talking on the way out about how they had never heard such loud cheers.

Some details: Joe Walsh wore these really funky Halloween-colored orange and black baggy pants. Glenn Frey wore a light blue suit that looked too baggy on him. Don Henley wore black, and alternated between playing drums and standing up front with the rest of them. Tim still has the awesome long hair and wore black jeans, black shirt and a "duster" style long black coat which he took off during intermission and had on a long-sleeved black shirt during the second half. The back-up musicians varied, but, depending on the song, there were as many as 13 people on stage. All of them changed instruments several times, with Joe Walsh sticking mainly to a green glittered guitar.

As you saw, from Jim in Reno they played EVERYTHING. It was so totally cool.
 

Terry and Robin

THE EAGLES PUT ON A FANTASTIC SHOW, SOUNDED BETTER THAN EVER, THE CROWD RESPONDED TO EACH AND EVERY SONG WITH GREAT EXCITEMENT. IT WAS THE FIRST TIME IN RENO AND EVERYONE HOPES THEY MIGHT SOMEDAY RETURN TO RENO, THEY ARE EACH SO TALENTED AND AS A GROUP WERE AWESOME. THANK YOU EAGLES FOR COMING TO RENO, BIG FANS!

C & C Painting's Review

I attended the concert in Reno with my wife and two friends.  It was my 3rd Eagle's concert and by far the best.  Musically I felt the guys were inspired, particularly Glen Frey and Joe Walsh.  The backup musicians were exceptionally, particularly the guitarist who played most of Don Felder's leads.  The sound system was great.  I have attended dozens of concerts over the years and this one was by far the best

Jeff E.

The Reno show was nothing short of incredible. The sound was awesome, the light show was great. The Crowd was on fire for these guys. Joe Walsh was unstoppable, vocally amazing. At one point he broke 2 strings at the end of a solo part, switched guitars midstream, and picked up the next solo effortlessly. His mic stand was loose at one point and the mic was swiveling away from him and he kept whacking it back into place with the neck of his guitar while singing. Don's voice was near perfect with tons of presence, he spent a lot of time in the drum cage or playing percussion next to Scott. Glenn's vocals started out a little weak I thought, but he turned out a great performance of "Take it to the Limit" and a super-driving jazzy version of "You Belong to the City" with Joe shredding away at the end with an entropic wah pedal. Stuart Smith covered every lick, nothing seemed to be missing. He has a snappier, less fluid style than Felder, but he rocked on several of Henley's solo tunes (played an awesome slide solo on "All She wants to do is Dance"). Tim was rock steady, bopping around the stage like a tomcat, vocally perfect. My wife was in tears several times during the performance, it was that good. Eagles are definitely as good or better as they've ever been. Do not miss this show!
 

Linda's Review

It was a very special night in Reno last  night.  What a magnificent evening with the Eagles.  Everyone looked great, sounded as good as ever or maybe even better and even in Lawlor at that!  And - what a great place to start their tour - our little town!!  I was on such a high that I just came down a little while ago. They couldn't have done a better show and all of us attending proved it by standing most of the time and during the last 45 minutes - I wish they would have sang all night.  It was great to see our older crowd and everybody had a stunning evening.  Hope the paper comes out with an excellent review and wish I was in Vegas right now during their second night of the tour.

Jeff and Jill's Review

The evening started with a Taxi Cab ride to the Lawler Center from the house where we were staying with local relatives. In speaking with different locals, all had the same complaint. Those who stood in line overnight and for hours on end did not get a shot at the good seats. Between the Casino’s “special guests”, who were more than catered to all night and people like us who jumped on the internet and were lucky enough to get floor seats (which weren’t that great on the very back row – row 31) many locals didn’t get the seats they wanted. My wife and I wish to extend our personal apologies to those who stood in line and didn’t get the seats they wanted.

Jill and I were the youngest in our group of six adults. I’m 31 and Jill is 34. Jill’s mom and her two aunts and her husband were all with us. We wish that we had bought lower concourse seating because we wouldn’t have had to stand on chairs all night along the back row (we were right next to the cameraman). Those who have bought lower concourse seating, be at ease that those are not bad seats at all. You will enjoy them That said I would like to say that the show was damn good. I haven’t read any other reviews as of yet, as I didn’t want it to influence my thinking.

It looks like they got the memo to finish Seven Bridges Road this time. I didn’t see the point in them stopping the song right in the middle in Denver last year. It was good to hear the whole thing. Of course they played all the hits as is displayed in the play list that has been included in this website and each of them sounded fantastic. There were a few moments of noticeable trouble. The Boys of Summer intro was just fine but the first chord played was obviously wrong. Then Glenn Frey broke a string or something and had to change guitars in the middle of the song. The second set started out with a problem on stage, although no one could tell what it was as the lights were still out. We couldn’t tell anyway. Those up against the stage might have been able to tell. Other than those few things the show was awesome.

I want to say that I am very disappointed in those who boo’ed when Glenn Frey introduced Stuart Smith (who is the replacement for Don Felder while on tour). I have enjoyed listening to Don Felder over the years but Stuart has done a great job stepping up to the plate. He did extremely well the entire night and was integral to the overall sound of the concert. He doesn’t falter on stage and he did a fantastic job, especially with the double guitar on Hotel California. I am glad that Glenn introduced the members of the band, because they work just as hard as the rest, maybe even more so that they can fill the shoes they are wearing. My hat is off to Stuart – keep up the good work. You sound great – and don’t listen to the heartless Felder fans.

Overall, the show was fantastic. I am looking forward to the show in Salt Lake City on Thursday a bit closer this time