10 Sophomore Slump Albums By Amazing Bands

As the early ‘70s seemed to be on fire, The Eagles were one of the few bands that felt like a little bit of relief from all of the carnage. Amid all of the reports coming out revolving around the Vietnam War, a song like Take it Easy made it feel like everything was going to be okay as you drove down the highway looking for trouble. Just when the Eagles seemed to be setting up shop in the sunshine, the next record that they cooked up was…a cowboy record?

For all of the great songs that might turn up on Desperado, this was a much more acoustically driven album than most folks were willing to stomach, trading in some of their electric guitars for mandolins on some tracks. While the Eagles were never that far away from country, some of the banjo led songs did nothing to endear them to their rock leaning fans, wanting to hear the same band that pumped out tracks like Witchy Woman.

The electric guitars do turn up on songs like Out of Control and Outlaw Man, but this whole thing is going for something a little more mellow, from the harmonica solos on Doolin Dalton to the kind of troubadour mentality behind the title track. Even though the band were proud of the record, the label was not, not really wanting to promote it that much and being unsure of the new band that they had just hired. Time can put things in perspective though, and Desperado is actually a lot better than its colder reception.