Randy Meisner, an American bassist, and singer who co-founded the rock band Eagles, passed away at the age of 77. Meisner helped the band start in 1971 and sang lead vocals on the song Take It To The Limit, which he also co-wrote.
The megahits Hotel California and The Best of My Love by the California band received lavish high harmonies from him.
The Eagles’ official website announced his demise on Thursday and referred to him as “integral” and “instrumental” to their early success.
Chronic obstructive lung disease complications led to Meisner’s demise. Eagles was one of the most well-known bands of all time, selling over 150 million albums worldwide, and they were inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1998.
The melodic basslines and falsetto vocals on the band’s first five albums, Eagles, Desperado, On The Border, One Of These Days, and Hotel California, were all performed by Meisner.
His vocal range was astonishing, as his classic ballad Take It to the Limit demonstrated, according to the statement.
Randy Bachman of the Bachman-Turner Overdrive paid respect to Randy Meisner by saying,
“I’m sorry to hear that Eagles guitarist Randy Meisner passed away.”
He was a superb bass player, songwriter, and vocalist. May his loved ones and friends find peace.
Jim Messina, a different bassist for Buffalo Springfield, stated: “I’m really appreciative of the time we spent together in the 1960s and again in the late 1980s.
She responded,
“I am so glad I got to see him one more time.
Meisner, who was raised in a farming family in Nebraska and was born in 1946, traveled to California and performed with Rick Nelson’s Stone Canyon Band and Poco before co-founding the Eagles with Don Henley, Glenn Frey, and Bernie Leadon in 1971.
Later, before transitioning to hard rock, they contributed to the development of the country-tinged, laid-back West Coast pop-rock sound that dominated American radio in the early 1970s.
‘Out of the spotlight’
However, he was never quite at ease with the limelight that the success of his band brought him. In a 2013 interview with Rolling Stone, he admitted that he was “always a bit shy” and preferred to avoid being the center of attention.
Former bandmate Don Felder purportedly referred to Randy Meisner as “the sweetest man in the music business.” With the melancholy, lovelorn waltz-time ballad Take It to the Limit, Meisner came out of the shadows. Etta James, Willie Nelson, and Waylon Jennings also recorded the song.
Meisner left the Eagles after six years, citing tiredness, following a conflict over his unwillingness to sing the song live during a lengthy encore at a Knoxville show. He was sick with the illness at the time. Tim B. Schmit assumed command. “And that was all there was to it.”
He was not invited to participate in the group’s reunion tour in 1994, but he did re-join the group in 1998 for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame ceremony in New York City.
Due to his declining health at the time, he declined the opportunity to rejoin the group for a global tour in 2013. His family issues, mental illness, and addiction marred his final years.
Meisner enjoyed success as a solo performer with songs like “Hearts on Fire” and “Deep Inside My Heart,” and he contributed to albums by James Taylor, Dan Fogelberg, and Joe Walsh, another Eagles member.
Few musicians have ever come close to matching his achievements with the Eagles, who during his stay recorded two of the best-selling albums of all time: Hotel California and Their Greatest Hits.
Meisner once said in an interview that the Eagles’ combination and synchronicity, which made every harmony seem immaculate, was their raison d’être.
“The weird thing is that I never listened to those CDs after we finished them. I don’t really know these recordings are fantastic until someone comes over or I’m at someone’s place.
Glenn Frey passed away in 2016, and Henley announced that the Eagles will no longer tour. But they’re supposed to start their last tour in New York in September.
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