The Eagles hadn’t put out a new studio album in nearly 30 years when they released Long Road Out of Eden in 2007, but they proved their staying power when the album soared to the top of the charts and scored multiple hits.
Why Did the Eagles Break Up?
Both Don Henley and Glenn Frey had long stated that the Eagles could never reunite after the long and terribly contentious recording sessions for The Long Run in 1979. That album and its subsequent tour drove the band to one of the most bitter breakups in rock music history.
When Did the Eagles Reunite?
The Eagles stunned fans when they reunited in 1994 for a live set of their old hits, appropriately titled Hell Freezes Over.
That led to a massively successful tour, and that in turn led to the group touring regularly together, but there was still little in the way of new music from the group aside from a smattering of songs, as Henley and Frey still weren’t sure they could co-exist in the recording studio.
That turned out to be partly true, as recording Long Road Out of Eden wasn’t an easy process. Though the group had jokingly dubbed their last album The Long One due to its lengthy recording time of nearly two years, it paled in comparison to Long Road Out of Eden, which took almost six years to record as the band worked on it on-and-off between touring.
The project turned into a double album comprising 20 tracks, with Henley and Frey as the principal songwriters. Joe Walsh and Timothy B. Schmit also contributed songs, as did longtime Eagles collaborators J.D. Souther and Jack Tempchin and several other outside writers.
When Did the Eagles Release Their Last Studio Album?
Long Road Out of Eden was a massive success upon its release on Oct. 30, 2007, both commercially and critically. The album reached No. 1 on Billboard‘s Top Country Albums chart on Nov. 17, 2007, and it also led the Top Rock Albums chart, as well as the all-genre Billboard 200.
The project also charted in countries all over the world, and it spawned no fewer than five hit singles with “No More Cloudy Days,” “How Long,” “Busy Being Fabulous,” “What Do I Do With My Heart” and “I Don’t Want to Hear Anymore.”
Long Road Out of Eden was the top-selling album of the year, ultimately selling 7 million copies worldwide, and it won Grammy Awards for Best Country Performance by a Duo or Group With Vocals for “How Long” and Best Pop Instrumental Performance for “I Dreamed There Was No War.”
Will the Eagles Release Another New Album?
Despite the album’s stellar performance, Long Road Out of Eden will almost certainly stand as the Eagles’ final studio album. The band members showed no appetite for repeating the difficult recording experience in the years following the project, and Glenn Frey’s death in 2016 makes moving forward with new music even less likely.
The Eagles continue to tour and perform their classic hits to this day, with Vince Gill filling in on many of Frey’s older songs, but in an interview in 2021, Gill himself said that a new Eagles album was an unlikely proposition.
“I don’t think so,” Gill he told Cleveland.com. “There doesn’t seem to be any kind of attempt at that, and I think that’s pretty healthy.”
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Gallery Credit: Corey Irwin
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Gallery Credit: Sterling Whitaker
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Gallery Credit: Sterling Whitaker
Sterling Whitaker is a Senior Writer and Senior Editor for Taste of Country. He focuses on celebrity real estate, as well as coverage of Yellowstone and related shows like 1883 and 1923. He’s interviewed cast members including Cole Hauser, Kelly Reilly, Sam Elliott and Harrison Ford, and Whitaker is also known for his in-depth interviews with country legends including Don Henley, Rodney Crowell, Trace Adkins, Ronnie Milsap, Ricky Skaggs and more.