Talk:Don Felder

Official MySpace link

Don Felder has an official MySpace where he posts information about his activities and charity work. I think it would be valuable to add this link to the page. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.98.79.85 (talk) 08:21, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

Firing

What was he fired for? 75pickup (talk · contribs)

I think it was over ownership percentage in the band and his inquiry to such. He explains it all in his book. 2602:306:320A:AF0:E19E:769A:797A:8126 (talk) 20:19, 20 June 2016 (UTC)

He was challenging the new profit sharing numbers demanded by Henley and Frey. Felder kept challenging what they wanted to do through lawyers. Frey claimed that he called Felder's lawyer and told him that Felder needed to sign the agreement "by sundown" or he would be terminated. Felder signed. It's a little vague, even in his book, but it sounds as if he continued to complain about the agreement and perhaps other things even after signing. Frey and Henley got mad and finally fired him. Again, it's not clear if they fired him for continued issues or because they were still upset over the earlier arguments.Bob Caldwell CSL (talk) 15:43, 21 June 2016 (UTC)

Trivia - Becoming Superstars

The last line of the article appears heavily biased:

"The Eagles, at that time, were still relatively unknown but after Felder joined in 1974, they became superstars."

It implies that Felder's joining the band was the catalyst for their success. That should probably be changed, or at least stated differently. Sure, Felder co-wrote Hotel California, their biggest hit. But there are a lot of factors (some understood, many not) that contribute to a band's success or lack thereof. If the sentence is purely chronological, it should be restated to avoid the appearance of bias. Agershon (talk) 15:58, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

I have to disagree, Felder was a large part their success and not some lucky author of one of the most significant songs in the last 35 years. Up until his arrival the Eagles were primarily an easy-listening county band and this is due the the heavy influence of Don Felder's childhood friend Bernie Leadon who is a master of the stringed insturments. Indeed the first two records, while excellent, were primarily pure country and it comes as no surprise that the Eagles are taking Bernie along on their 2013/2014 tour since Felder is now a persona non grata.

Upon Felder's entry--whose accolades include having taught Tom Petty, studied slide-guitar from Duanne Almann, grew-up with and sat in for Steven Stills with Crosby an Nash--the rock edge that compleed the California sound was created and refined and finally culminated into the release of Hotel California. Indeed up until Hotel California the Eagles were still working very hard at becoming a supergroup. There are numerous articles by Joe Walsh in which he touts the presence of Don Felder in the Eagles as invaluable.

This man is a giant among musical giants and not a side-man for a pair of egomaniacs. His modesty and decency as a human being is the only reason why people dismiss his greatness. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.127.181.211 (talk) 15:54, 5 November 2013 (UTC)

Nice try, Don Felder. --Spike Wilbury (talk) 21:56, 5 November 2013 (UTC)

I am a big Don Felder fan, but he had scant contributions to the On The Border album and it was this album and subsequent tour that really pushed them to superstardom. He had a significant contribution to their developing sound and success, but it should not be overstated.Bob Caldwell CSL (talk) 15:46, 21 June 2016 (UTC)

"DonFelderFan"'s Work on this page

Way too much opinionated entries for an encyclopedia - maintain your fansite and stop saying things like "Felder's contributions to the band was second to none. His guitar work was the key to the band's success."!! This is a ridiculously biased, false, and unprovable statement, and you have no business putting this up here. Getting tired of watching your very poorly-written, fanatical entries getting put up , and erased. Put up, and erased. Ad nauseum. Again, maintain your little fansite and stop wasting our time!! You continue to make the introduction of this article a mess - embarrassing. This is about facts, not opinionDoc9871 (talk) 07:04, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

How do you factualize art when it is subjective? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.127.181.211 (talk) 16:02, 5 November 2013 (UTC)

Felder's book and interviews

It is well-known that Felder was fired from The Eagles, sued for wrongful termination and wrote that book, but would it be worth having a section to focus on the controversy surrounding his book and interview formula? From what I've observed and seen, namely the comments on YouTube and other forums, a lot of Felder's misguided fans automatically assume that he is the nice guy and that Henley and Frey were mean and nasty, likely as a result of being oblivious to Felder's flaws and faults.

But in reality, when individually interviewed, Henley and Frey didn't fixate or dwell on grievances, bickering, egos, drugs, power struggles, mistakes or behaviour back in the 1970's, let alone diss fellow co-founders Randy Meisner or Bernie Leadon or downplay their contributions, nor did they ever bring up past grievances on social media with former band members whereas Felder makes it all about him and says things in a way to make his fans take his side and eat it up and unfairly demonize Henley and Frey; TBH, I'm just so sick to death of seeing these people badmouth and virtually defame Henley and Frey online by calling them offensive and vulgar names, because it upsets not just me, but the Eagles' fans as well, and it's unfair to Glenn's widow Cindy and children Deacon, Taylor and Otis, given that he has been dead for almost two years. Remember: we must never call people names, regardless of how irritated we are with them.

In his interviews, Felder won't admit to being at fault or acknowledge contributing to the discord that led to the breakup in 1980, let alone being too nosy about finances, but rather he almost always tirelessly answers the same questions in interviews, and one thing he has never acknowledged in interviews is that "New Kid in Town" was the first single to be extracted from the "Hotel California" album and not only did it go to number 1 on the Billboard Top 100 singles charts, but it also won a Grammy® Award, but in his book and interviews, he wants it to appear that the title track was the lead single, because it went to number one and won the Grammy® for Record of the Year - that is not true at all. I don't care how dismissive he is of "New Kid in Town", because I actually like that song.

According to my observations of his interviews and press articles, he talks about how he only wanted to play the music, but that is very dishonest to say, because he was so obsessed with money and equal shares and then he goes onto talk about he wanted to be friends with his former bandmates, but oh no - he still trash-talks them in interviews - not to mention that he has reached out to them like a million times, only to hear back from their attorneys. He should just leave The Eagles alone and not harass them to reconcile with them as if he did nothing wrong when he published that book and never stopped badmouthing them.

My own theories are that Felder created his own situation in terms of his estrangement from the other Eagles - after all, he sued them, published that book and constantly badmouthed them in interviews - and also I do believe that if he hadn't sued them in the first place after getting sacked, let alone published the book or said horrible things about his bandmates to make them look bad, he might be able to talk directly to them again instead of just through their lawyers.

61.69.217.3 (talk) 07:22, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

Tom Petty sources, etc.

@Raymond3023 and FlightTime: I believe that he is having trouble with uploading a new photo and he is adding a couple of non-controversial things that look easy to source. Take your pick on these three sources for him giving Tom Petty lessons...

• 1, 2, 3
• ...and being in The Continentals with Stephen Stills, 4

• Granted, he should probably be making these edits in text here on the talk page but we should help him with forming references (like we would with any new editor) and the image upload if there isn't anything controversial. These things look easy to support. I'll let you chose your preference of sources. Please cite his additions. The ref for the section that he was editing is a 404 and might need replaced. Sorry, it is linked to archive.org and is alright.
   — Berean Hunter (talk) 21:20, 18 March 2019 (UTC)

@Berean Hunter: My preference is for him not to edit anything about himself or the Eagles and make edit requests like anyone else would be required to, outside of that Raymond3023 can handle your concerns here. - FlightTime (open channel) 21:30, 18 March 2019 (UTC)

The bit about teenaged Felder giving guitar lessons to younger teen Tom Petty is sourced to Billboard[2], the Gibson Guitar website,[3] Musicians Hall of Fame,[4] etc. I think we can safely tell the reader a bit about this aspect, even a bit more than just name dropping, more about the various Gainesville bands, and the music climate that Felder took part in.

And yes, it would be nice to see Donfelder suggesting changes here on the talk page. Binksternet (talk) 23:29, 18 March 2019 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion

The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion:

• Don Felder.png

Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 18:21, 10 April 2019 (UTC)

"A Walk in the Garden"

I can't find any reference to or source for "A Walk in the Garden" from the film Nice Dreams. I took it off but if someone knows if this was a song recorded by Felder, and released independent of the film, let us know. YouCanDoBetter (talk) 00:59, 24 April 2023 (UTC)