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Eagles · S4 E2
Bill Szymczyk
A new producer who lets the band be loud. The sessions restart at Record Plant in Los Angeles with a different energy
Record Plant Studios, Los Angeles, February 1974. A producer named Bill Szymczyk walks into the control room, listens to the half-finished London tapes, and tells Glenn Frey he can make this louder.
James Gang, Funk #49 (1970). Bill Szymczyk produced this. Before he ever touched an Eagles record, he was making Joe Walsh's band sound like a freight train.
The New Guy
Bill Szymczyk (pronounced "SIM-zik") is not a folk producer. He made his name recording the James Gang, B.B. King, and Joe Walsh's solo records. He knows how to make guitars sound enormous and how to let a rhythm section breathe without suffocating it under studio polish.
“Bill was the opposite of Glyn. Glyn wanted to control the sound. Bill wanted to capture it. He'd say, play it again, but louder. That was his whole philosophy.”
— Glenn Frey, History of the Eagles documentary, 2013
TAP TO REVEAL: How did Irving Azoff connect Eagles with Bill Szymczyk?
The Energy Shifts
The difference is immediate. Where the London sessions felt tense and overthought, the Record Plant sessions have a looseness that the band has never had in a studio. Szymczyk turns the amps up, puts the drums in the center of the mix, and tells the band to stop worrying about perfection.
What was Bill Szymczyk's production background before working with Eagles?
On the Border, Eagles (On the Border, 1974)
The title track of the album, and the sound of a band standing at the edge of who they were and who they are about to become. The arrangement is harder than anything on the first two records, with electric guitars pushing against the harmonies instead of supporting them. This is what Szymczyk gave Eagles: permission to be rough.
The new producer is in place and the sessions are cooking. But Bernie Leadon has an idea that will change Eagles forever: he picks up the phone and calls an old friend from Gainesville, Florida.
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