MC: Speaking of vocals, you have one of the most distinctive voices in popular music. Any tips you could pass along? Every singer has a little regimen to keep their voice in shape.
Henley: There are three main things I need to do when I’m on tour. When I’m in between shows I have to remain quiet. I can’t do interviews when I’m on tour, I can’t go out to dinner. Because when I talk, especially when I have to talk above the din and ambient noise in a restaurant, I lose my voice. I usually lead a monk-like existence when I’m on the road and on my computer or reading or something.
The second thing is no alcohol. I love a good glass of wine as much as anybody in the world, but when I’m on tour I don’t touch the stuff because it does something to my vocal cords.
And the third thing is sleep. I’ve tried doing vocal exercises but that just doesn’t work with me. So what I do is carry a fitness trainer with me. I have a recumbent bike that they set up in my dressing room and I ride it 30 minutes before every show, which is the equivalent of about nine miles. And then when I’m soaking wet with sweat my trainer comes in and kicks my ass for another hour.
MC: I’m impressed!
Henley: Well, that’s the only way I can keep doing this. In the corporate world they call it customer satisfaction. But it’s really important to me that I do the best I can for the people who paid for seats to come and see me. My voice is my instrument, so if I don’t do well, it’s the worst feeling in the world. So, I do everything I can to make it the best performance it can be.
MC: You’ve worked with Stan Lynch as your co-producer and writer for years now. Is there a special bond that you have, being that you’re both drummer/percussionists?
Henley: There is that, but we actually have a lot of other things in common. We both grew up in the south. He was raised in Gainesville, Florida. My mother was a school teacher and his father was a college professor. We both have been drummers in big famous bands and know what that’s like. We both have a really strong work ethic. He’s got a wonderful sense of humor and fun to write songs with. We can get in a room together and are comfortable enough to throw out ideas—even if they’re bad ones—and feel okay about it. We both are into books and poetry and we each have a philosophical side. We’re both do-it-yourself kinda guys. He’s got a farm in Florida; I’ve got a farm in Texas. So we have a lot in common.
MC: That’s a real blessing when you can work with someone like that.
Henley: Yeah. Someone else I have to give credit to is Steuart Smith. Steuart co-wrote, I think, three of the songs on this album and he is one of the best guitar players in the world. I don’t think there would’ve been an Eagles reunion if I hadn’t found that guy. I just happened to see him at a concert backing up Shawn Colvin and I said, “Wow, that guy is something else!” So he was a big part of the making of my current album and is also part of my solo band.
MC: On Cass County you solely focused on doing lead vocals and left the instrumentation to Stan and the other players. Why did you make that decision?
Henley: I wanted to stay in the booth and focus on producing. There are so many drummers who are much better than me, younger and more energetic. I have no ego about that. We used a drummer in Dallas who is my son’s drum teacher. My son played on one track. The rest were Nashville and L.A. guys. I just wanted to concentrate on melody and lyric writing.
MC: There’s a verse in the song “Praying for Rain“ where you wrote “I ain’t no wise man, but I ain’t no fool. And I believe that Mother Nature is takin’ us to school. Maybe we just took too much and put too little back. It isn’t knowledge, it’s humility we lack.” Please tell me about the background behind that song?
Henley: That’s a song about mankind being a little too arrogant when it comes to living under Mother Nature’s laws. I think we’ve overstepped our bounds in some places. And I know that climate change is a real controversial subject. I know that there’s a lot of denial out there—even at the highest levels of government. There’s actually a lot of songs about humility on this album, like the song “Too Much Pride.” That was my pitiful white boy attempt to do my Ray Charles thing (laughs).
MC: You conclude the album with a song called “Where I Am Now.” How much is that auto-biographical and how much a composite of people you’ve known?
Henley: That one’s pretty auto-biographical. I do like where I am now. When you’re in your 20s looking forward, the 60s look really old to you from that standpoint. My peers and I, band mates and people like Jackson Browne, Linda Ronstadt, have been through a lot. And we’ve lost a lot of people along the way. So that song is about just feeling a great sense of gratitude.
One thing about getting to be this age is you get this great thing called perspective—which is hard to get and even harder to keep—especially when you’re on tour. You wake up some days and you go, “Oh God, I’ve got to do this again?” And then you stop and you go, “I’m really lucky that there are thousands of people coming to see us tonight who are still interested in hearing these songs.” You’ve really got to stay in touch with your gratitude and perspective, and then everything works out okay.
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