Dallas, TX 9-13-08
The Eagles test fans with classic hits, new tunes in 30-song show Saturday
Sun, Sep 14, 2008/By THOR CHRISTENSEN / Dallas Morning News
The Eagles are responsible for more hits than the Gambino crime family. But instead of just doling them out, one by one, they took a big risk Saturday night at American Airlines Center by playing nine songs from their latest album, Long Road Out of Eden.
Most boomer bands wouldn't dare test fans with that much new material. But the wily old Eagles pulled it off, thanks to their sterling harmonies and top-notch songwriting. Eden's title track – an angry Don Henley rant against big wigs "bloated on entitlement and loaded on propaganda" – held its own with such classics as "Hotel California." "Busy Being Fabulous" was cut from the same caustic cloth as "Life In the Fast Lane."
Looking like four CEOs in their matching suits and ties, the Eagles opened the show with four new tunes in a row. But as patient as the near-capacity crowd was, fans didn't really cut loose until the parade of hits began. In a 30-song show that clocked in at three-and-a-half hours (including a brief intermission), the band covered every base from "Take it Easy" and "Desperado" to a half-dozen solo hits by Mr. Henley and Joe Walsh.
The Eagles are famous, some say infamous, for replicating their hits note-for-note onstage. But they ad-libbed more than usual Saturday, slowing down tempos and funking things up with a four-man horn section. It didn't always work, but when it did (like in "Heartache Tonight"), it made for a much livelier show than the band's AAC concerts in 2001 and 2003.
The band rehashed several jokes from past tours. Glenn Frey's quip about "Take It to the Limit" being his wife's credit card motto is getting old, as is Mr. Walsh's "helmet camera" during "Life's Been Good." But Mr. Frey did come up with a few good new ones. He said "Lyin' Eyes" "has a lot of meaning in D-FW" – a jab, perhaps, at ex-Carrolton mayor Becky Miller, who got in hot water this year for claiming she was once engaged to Mr. Henley (she wasn't).
And he dubbed the show part of "The Eagles' Assisted Living Tour," saying "We are the Eagles, the band that wouldn't die." Like cockroaches and Keith Richards, the Eagles are apparently on this earth for the long run.
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While I hope the guys are indeed on this earth for the long run, surely the writer could've come up with a better analogy than likening them to cockroaches & Keith Richards!
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Originally Posted by DonFan
We had FRONT ROW MIDDLE seats on the Sunday night(how cool is that). I will write more about my concert experiences soon. I have photo's from Houston, but was told off for using my camera at the Dallas show, so I only got 2 or 3 from there.
I'm still getting over seeing him! 
