Vince Gill will be ‘up there with my heroes’ playing Rupp ‘Goodbye’ with Eagles
One of the keenest compliments afforded Vince Gill since joining the ranks of the Eagles in 2017 came when band chieftain Don Henley fielded a question about his recruitment. At the time, the juggernaut ensemble, one the most influential and lucrative bands of any musical genre to emerge in the 1970s, was still reeling from the death a year earlier of co-founder Glenn Frey.
“They asked Don, ‘Why the country guy?’ The query referenced Gill’s own hit-making career as a country vocalist, guitarist, producer and songwriter. “He smiled and said, ‘Vince knows how to be in a band.’ That was high praise for me. I was really grateful to hear that. The truth is I’ve done this too long to not know what the gig is supposed to be.”
The “gig” is this case was serving as one of two artists that signed on to give voice to the Eagles hits that Frey sang lead on. The other was the late Eagle’s son, Deacon Frey. That meant offering interpretations of such band classics as “Tequila Sunrise,” “New Kid in Town” and “Lyin’ Eyes” that were faithful to their recorded versions from the early and mid ’70s.
“There are a lot of people out there that enjoy the fact that I’m in this band and like what I do,” Gill said. “There are also people who want to hear the music the way they know it. I’m kind of the same. I’ve had 48 years of hearing Glenn sing certain songs, but you have to look at this a little realistically.
Major lineup change for sold-out Rupp Arena ‘Goodbye’ Eagles concert
“The guys could just play these songs and the crowd would sing them — every friggin’ word, you know? So that’s a testament to what great songs they are. I don’t sound like Glenn, but that’s really not the point. It’s just been a pretty remarkable thing to get to say I was someone they reached out to help continue this legacy.”
Gill returns to Rupp Arena on Nov. 14 for what will be a sold-out performance as well as the venue’s top-grossing concert of 2023. Still, the Oklahoma native and one-time Lexingtonian found some initial aspects of his recruitment to be daunting. Even for a country troubadour responsible for roughly two dozen Top 5 hits, album sales in excess of 26 million and a whopping 22 Grammy Awards, becoming an Eagle was a bold move.
First gig as an Eagle was daunting
“The first gig I did was in 2017 at Dodger Stadium, so I’m already scared,” Gill said. “I mean, L.A. is where the Eagles got their start and here I was at the first gig since Glenn had passed. I could feel the apprehension in the crowd. It was palpable. I could feel it. Then I got through the chorus of ‘Take It to the Limit’ and I felt the whole place just take a deep breath. It was like they were going, ‘We’re going to be okay.’”
Of course, alert Eagles fans will point out the 1975 hit “Take It to the Limit” was a vocal vehicle for another co-founding Eagle, bassist Randy Meisner. Frey, however, took over vocal duties following Meisner’s departure from the band in 1977. Meisner died in July, adding another layer of poignancy to the song when Gill sings it today.
“I really don’t try to make these songs my own. I try to honor how the guys did them in the first place. My voice sounds different enough anyways, so to play more licks or sing anything different would be a disservice to the song. On ‘Hotel California,’ if Joe (Walsh, the celebrated guitar and rock hitmaker who joined the Eagles in 1975) didn’t play the solos like you’ve heard them for all these years, you would kind of go, ‘Well, that doesn’t feel right.’ The iconic-ness of these songs makes it obvious that they should be done as they were done because they were such astounding examples of how to arrange and record. I mean, these guys are the furthest thing from a jam band. But it’s really fun to do something to the level they expect. I don’t just sing what I want or play what I want. I play what those records require. They deserve that.
“But that Dodger Stadium show ... I remember that was the only time I ever met Randy. It was at that gig. Our paths never crossed through all the years I lived in L.A. earlier in the ’70s. But I felt like in getting to visit with him, he gave me his blessing to sing his songs.”
Playing with his heroes
Of course, being new to the Eagles’ ranks didn’t mean Gill was new to their music. From his early career days as a bluegrass stylist, which landed him in Lexington in 1975 alongside Ricky Skaggs and Jerry Douglas in Boone Creek, Gill was drawn to the harmonies, lyricism and overall song construction of the Eagles’ songs.
“I’ve been listening to them for 51 years, however long they’ve been going. I’ve got cassette tapes of me singing these songs when I was 15 years old. They’re awful. But, hey. I had to learn somewhere.
“Joe was a big hero for me also growing up. I was playing ‘Rocky Mountain Way’ (a major rock radio hit for Walsh in 1973) in all my garage bands when I was in high school. It just takes me under when I look across the stage and I’m up there with one of my heroes.”
Working with heroes has also meant working overtime this fall. The Eagles’ current “Long Goodbye” tour, its final concert trek, was to feature another fabled ’70s troupe, Steely Dan, as show opener. When illness sidelined vocalist and group leader Donald Fagen, a revolving door line-up of A-list artists came in to fill the gap. Among them: The Steve Miller Band, Sheryl Crow and Tedeschi-Trucks Band.
The Doobie Brothers will complete the bill for the Rupp concert. At a mid-October performance in Pittsburgh, even Gill was called upon. He found himself doing double duty by serving as the support act as a solo artist for the very band he was now a full-time member of.
“Yeah, they got all the way down to the ’V’s before they called me,” he said with a laugh. “I walked out onstage and told everyone, ‘Hey, quick heads up for you. I’m not Steely Dan.’ And somebody yelled out, ‘Yeah, and we’re disappointed.’ It was a great experience, but a bit humbling.”
Gill familiar face in Lexington
Gill’s Lexington return also serves as something of a homecoming. Though he lived here for only brief period during the mid ’70s, Gill has played venues of every size in the city, from college dorms and bars with Boone Creek to his own headlining shows at Rupp in the 1990s as one of country music’s most popular acts.
“It feels a lot like coming home. There is a real tenderness in my heart for Kentucky. I lived in Louisville for a while and Lexington for a while. I love driving over there, going over by Calumet Farm and Keeneland. I’ve never seen anything that beautiful. Where I’m from in Oklahoma, we don’t have any hills. There’s not much there that’s green. Coming to Kentucky was life-changing. That area remains a very dear and deep and part of who I am.”
Eagles: The Long Goodbye tour
Opening act: The Doobie Brothers
When: 7:30 p.m. Nov. 14
Where: Rupp Arena, 430 W. Vine
Tickets: Sold Out
Online: eagles.com, rupparena.com
