(Credits: Far Out / The Eagles)
Sat 7 March 2026 20:30, UK
The oddity of the Eagles never ceases to amaze.
When the world can’t even agree on whether one of the best-selling bands in history is called The Eagles or simply Eagles, it is little wonder that the members themselves rarely saw eye to eye. Beyond internal feuds, the individual members even seem to directly contradict themselves. This is most patently apparent when they are faced with mulling over the conundrum of whether they’re a political band.
“We let the music do the talking,” Don Henley once said in response to the subject of statesmanship, apparently declaring an apolitical approach. But by the same token, he has often been at pains to explain that “on just about every album we made, there was some kind of commentary on the music business, and on American culture in general.”
When it comes to their biggest song, in fact, ‘Hotel California’, he has explained that it is about “the dark underbelly of the American dream”. It just so happens that this scathing attack on the sham of ‘Hope and Glory’ is also cryptically woven within the walls of an allegorical hotel, allowing Henley the wiggle room to still sneakily abide by the epigram that the Eagles “let the music do the talking”.
However, not every song in their arsenal can hide behind poetic obfuscation. It is clear as day that ‘The Last Resort’ is about Manifest Destiny – the belief that the United States was divinely ordained to expand westward across North America, at all costs. It was the journalist John L O’Sullivan who popularised this phrase in 1845, when he first wrote, “Our manifest destiny is to overspread the continent allotted by Providence for the free development of our yearly multiplying millions.”
Over a century later, on their 1976 album, Hotel California, the Eagles provided a verse cut through what came from Sullivan’s high and mighty words when they sang, “We satisfy our endless needs / And justify our bloody deeds / In the name of destiny / And in the name of God.”
At the time when Henley wrote those lyrics, Manifest Destiny might have been a bygone term, but the desire to ‘overspread’ was still a strong tenet of the American spirit. “It was the first time that Don, on his own, took it upon himself to write an epic story,” Glenn Frey explained on In The Studio with Redbeard.
(Credits: Showtime / The Eagles)
“We were very much at that time, concerned about the environment and doing anti-nuclear benefit (concerts),” he continued. “It seemed the perfect way to wrap up all of the different topics we had explored on the Hotel California album.” Those themes could be summarised as wanton greed in disguise, sending America awry.
So, ‘The Last Resort’ looked to launch a scathing attack on the underbelly of that frontier spirit, as Frey explained, “We’re constantly screwing up paradise, and that was the point of the song and that at some point there is going to be no more new frontiers.” Henley’s song questioned the constant need to ‘overspread’, bringing into sharp focus the plight of Native Americans, the ugliness of the concrete sprawl, and the “hungry for power” need to erect capitalist “neon” in every corner.
It is a great and meaningful song, with Frey rightly adding, “Don found himself as a lyricist with that song, kind of outdid himself.” But there is a sting in the tale that has led many naysayers to point out the dark side of the contradictions within the Eagles.
If there is one fair criticism of the country-rock pioneers, then it is that they could be accused of greed in disguise, sending America awry. Or at least that’s certainly what T Bone Burnett accused them of when he was working on the music for The Big Lebowski. In an interview with Rolling Stone, he explained, “[The Eagles] sort of single-handedly destroyed that whole scene [West Coast counterculture] that was brewing back then.”
As it happens, a few years prior to the release of the movie, the Eagles hit headlines as the first rock band to charge over $100 for tickets. That’s certainly not a move that aligns perfectly with the politics of ‘The Last Resort’. And in a bid to keep their commercialism afloat in all major touring markets, they often censored themselves when it came to their setlists.
As Henley even admitted, “It goes over like gangbusters in some parts of the country, because it really is a song about Manifest Destiny. But we pick and choose where to do it. We have too many ballads in the set anyway.” The suffix to that statement of ‘too many ballads’ feels an awfully timid, throwaway excuse to himself, more so than anyone else.
(Credits: Far Out / Showtime / The Eagles)
This was in 2017, and in all the years prior, the Eagles (and Henley on his solo tours) had been notably picky about what venues they chose to perform the song at. “We don’t speak about politics onstage,” the drumming singer decreed. “We let the music do the talking. People have their own interpretations of these songs.”
And it seems, based on the setlist history of ‘The Last Resort’ to that point, the fear was that the “interpretation” could prove unsettling. In sunbelt real-estate expansion areas, patches of boomtown America, and places where oil and gas exploration is the lifeblood of many, the track could be seen as a night-souring affront on their prospector way of life.
So, as Henley admits, they retired it from several places across the States, fearing it would upset those where the westward will of expansion and flag-planting patriotism still abounds. To some, that might be seen as an amiable move that ensures everyone has a good time, but to others, it is cowardice that belies the spirit of rock ‘n’ roll, open discourse, and the proud point of ‘The Last Resort’ in the first place.
It seems that since the Eagles reunited and started touring again, they have even come around to the latter argument. On their lengthy touring stint from 2021 to 2023, the song was pretty much a permanent fixture no matter where they played, contradicting Henley’s decree from only four years earlier.
But Henley has also been clear that time changes songs and their role within culture. He said that audiences may “connect them to current events”. It seems he has reverted to actively encouraging that with ‘The Last Resort’, no matter what the audience might think. It seems his view is that the language of Manifest Destiny has, once again, gone too far, commenting in regards to Donald Trump, “I think there’s a fine line between pride and arrogance. A little pride is a good thing, but when it gets over into hubris and arrogance, then you’re in trouble.”
He even summed it up in a lyric back in 2015 that could read like a sequel to ‘The Last Resort, when he wrote, “Now listen, Mister Trump: Empires rise, empires fall. You stick around here long enough, you see it all. Now it looks like it’s gone nationwide… too much pride.”
