| Music

McClatchy Newspapers (MCT) - If most bands were to go nearly 30 years between albums, they might agonize over the direction and tenor their new music should take, how time has changed them individually and collectively, and whether they will still be considered relevant.

For "Long Road Out of Eden," the Eagles' first studio effort since "The Long Run" in 1979, the reverse held true. All it took was a chance encounter on YouTube to inspire the group and guide it in the right direction.

"There was some brief discussion about returning to our early style, but not for the entire album," writes co-founder Don Henley via e-mail. "'How Long,' the first single from the album, was definitely a nod to our beginnings, but even that came about somewhat by accident.

"Glenn (Frey)'s kids were surfing around on YouTube and found an old clip of us doing 'How Long' on a Dutch TV show in 1973. ... We'd forgotten that we used to sometimes include it in our set. Glenn thought it would be a good idea to record it for the 'Long Road Out of Eden' album, so we did."

This was a surprisingly spontaneous decision on which to begin a new body of work, especially given that Henley told interviewer Charlie Rose in 2001 that "rock bands work best as a benevolent dictatorship," and that most, if not all, of the Eagles' catalog stands as a testament to carefully and precisely blending ramshackle country colors with edgy rock flash.

Perhaps the Eagles are softening in their advancing years and letting some aspects of their music fall to chance. But then again, given the spiky nature of "Long Road Out of Eden," perhaps the inspiration is not as random as it seems.

"Eden," a double-disc that neatly splits the difference between the Eagles' country and rock impulses, manages to update the quartet's signature sound (Henley and Frey, guitarist Joe Walsh and bassist Timothy B. Schmit remain on board) while subtly pushing it into the 21st century.

The second disc, in particular, where you'll find the blistering title track alongside pointed tunes like "I Dreamed There Was No War" and "Frail Grasp on the Big Picture," unveils a more spirited side of the famously laconic group, although long-time fans will recognize Henley's fingerprints. The native of Linden, Texas, long known for championing a variety of causes, including music artists' rights and the environment, is in exceptionally acidic form throughout these nine tracks.

Henley's songwriting, particularly later in the '70s and during his very successful solo career in the '80s and '90s _ "Dirty Laundry" remains a prescient swipe at tabloid TV _ does not shy away from uncomfortable narratives but embraces them with a passion typically reserved for artists far removed from the glare of the mainstream spotlight.

(EDITORS: BEGIN OPTIONAL TRIM)

Nor is this politically charged brand of songwriting anything new: On 1976's landmark "Hotel California," Henley penned "The Last Resort," a scathing, seven-minute condemnation of westward expansion, Manifest Destiny and urban sprawl that still has tremendous emotional resonance more than three decades later.

Yet Henley's reputation as a plain-spoken and politically inclined provocateur does not mean that the potentially divisive subject matter, be it social or political, is entirely antagonistic or that his bandmates plead with him to tamp down his opinions.

"I think the other guys expect me to make occasional forays into territory that might be controversial," Henley writes. "They're fine with it as long as it doesn't get too polemical. It adds another color to the work."

Indeed, the 61-year-old singer/songwriter speaks of a "longing for community," another impulse fueling his creative drive.

"That may sound sentimental or mawkishly idealistic, but I believe that a great many artists come from that same place, whether consciously or subconsciously," Henley writes. "Creating, for me, is therapeutic. It's a way of trying to make sense of a world that often doesn't make any sense at all. ... It keeps me off the shrink's couch, keeps me from climbing a tower with a rifle. Creating is a spiritual act, as well a kind of meditation."

(END OPTIONAL TRIM)

Aside from indulging in more political songwriting, the Eagles charted an unconventional (although increasingly familiar) course in releasing "Eden." Having fulfilled their major label contract with 1980's "Eagles Live," the group and its longtime manager Irving Azoff bypassed the big-name labels and released "Eden" themselves, through an exclusive deal with Wal-Mart, which, improbably, anticipated the paradigm-shifting, Internet-embracing likes of Radiohead and Nine Inch Nails.

"The music industry as we have known it is almost extinct," Henley writes. "The digital revolution changed everything and not all for the better. Of course, some parts of the business needed to change. I don't think too many of us mourn the collapse of the major record labels. They did help to build the careers of many artists, including us, but they also took advantage of us in the process. ...

"The music business is complex, and it takes a number of ...