10 Even More Perfect 1970s Rock Albums With No Bad Songs

3. Hotel California - The Eagles

While the track is clearly their defining moment, The Eagles are far, far more than merely the Hotel California song.

That tune is revered as one of the absolute best in rock history, earned the band a Grammy Award, has been voted the greatest guitar solo of all time in various polls, and has been played live by the band comfortably over 1,000 times by this point in time.

Much like the title track itself, though, The Eagles' Hotel California album is perfection.

This record captures the band at a majestic crossroads, with it the first album to feature Joe Walsh on guitars and also the last album for bassist Randy Meisner. Musically, The Eagles had always been good, but there was more substance to their songs this time out in a lyrical sense.

Turning a magnifying glass on the heady excess of the California lifestyle with the likes of New Kid in Town, Wasted Time, and Life in the Fast Lane, there was also a sense that the band couldn't have pieced together such songs without Don Henley and Glenn Frey actually enjoying certain elements of what they were damning with their words.

Senior Writer
Senior Writer

Once described as the Swiss Army Knife of WhatCulture, Andrew can usually be found writing, editing, or presenting on a wide range of topics. As a lifelong wrestling fan, horror obsessive, and comic book nerd, he's been covering those topics professionally as far back as 2010. In addition to his current WhatCulture role of Senior Content Producer, Andrew previously spent nearly a decade as Online Editor and Lead Writer for the world's longest-running genre publication, Starburst Magazine, and his work has also been featured on BBC, TechRadar, Tom's Guide, WhatToWatch, Sportkskeeda, and various other outlets, in addition to being a Rotten Tomatoes-approved film critic. Between his main dayjob, his role as the lead panel host of Wales Comic Con, and his gig as a pre-match host for Wrexham AFC games, Andrew has also carried out a hugely varied amount of interviews, from the likes of Robert Englund, Kane Hodder, Adrienne Barbeau, Rob Zombie, Katharine Isabelle, Leigh Whannell, Bruce Campbell, and Tony Todd, to Kevin Smith, Ron Perlman, Elijah Wood, Giancarlo Esposito, Simon Pegg, Charlie Cox, the Russo Brothers, and Brian Blessed, to Kevin Conroy, Paul Dini, Tara Strong, Will Friedle, Burt Ward, Andrea Romano, Frank Miller, and Rob Liefeld, to Bret Hart, Sting, Mick Foley, Ricky Starks, Jamie Hayer, Britt Baker, Eric Bischoff, and William Regal, to Mickey Thomas, Joey Jones, Phil Parkinson, Brian Flynn, Denis Smith, Gary Bennett, Karl Connolly, and Bryan Robson - and that's just the tip of an ever-expanding iceberg.