Occasional Albums Thing 005 - Eagles “One Of These Nights”

I’ve mentioned my friend Rob in here before. It was Rob that first recommended Bruce Springsteen to me, a gift for which I shall be forever in his debt. But The Boss (he apparently hates being called that) isn’t the only thing that Rob is responsible for introducing me to. 

We worked together at a rather old fashioned, musty old company called Cine Equipments Ltd. in Dale End in Brum, opposite what was then the Top Rank but became better known as The Hummingbird, next door to Woodrofe’s musical instrument shop and a few doors down the street from both Inferno Records and legendary Brummie (cheap) fashion emporium Nelson House from where you could buy anything from bondage trousers to a Tonic suit to a full set of Army fatigues. For a 17 year old in his first job this was pretty much the centre of the Universe (or was that the Galaxy ?) ! Cine Equipments sold camera accessories and supplied schools throughout Birmingham with overhead projectors and Coomber audio equipment. If you were ever played records at school in the 70’s and 80’s, in music lessons or assembly, on an old fashioned record player housed in a wooden box it was most likely a Coomber supplied by Cine Equipments Ltd. 

One dull afternoon in Dale End Rob must have talked about and very likely played me a little bit of the BBC Radio comedy series “The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy”, written by Douglas Adams, which I instantly fell in love with and became somewhat obsessed with (if I’m honest, I still am). The Radio series, the books, the TV series and the film (which in all honesty was a huge disappointment) were all devoured, re-listened to, re-read and re-watched (except the movie, once was enough for that). 

For those of you that are asking “what the bloody hell is he talking about ?” THHGTTG is the story of how the Earth is demolished by a Vogon constructor fleet to make way for a new hyperspace bypass and how an earthling, Arthur Dent, is rescued from the destruction by his friend Ford Prefect who it turns out is not an an out-of-work actor from Guildford as he had previously claimed but is in actuality a roving reporter for the Guide and is really from a small planet somewhere in the vicinity of Betelgeuse. Ford introduces Arthur to the wonders of the Galaxy via “The Hitchhiker’s Guide…” and to characters like Zaphod Beeblebrox, Trillian, Slartibartfast, Marvin the Paranoid Android (yes, we see you Radiohead) and the greatest drink in the Galaxy, the Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster, the effects of which are as outlined above when talking about lemons and gold bricks.

Now, those people that were asking “what the bloody hell is he talking about ?” earlier are likely by now asking “what does all this have to do with the Eagles ?” and it’s not an unreasonable question. Well, there are two reasons I own this album, one is that I like unusual records and this copy of “One Of These Nights” hails from India ! The second , and most important, reason is that the fourth and last track on Side 1 is Bernie Leadon’s hippy-bluegrass 7 minute instrumental “Journey Of The Sorcerer”, aka the theme tune to “The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy” which sounds absolutely nothing like anything the Eagles had produced before nor did they ever do anything vaguely similar afterwards.

I have little to no interest in the Eagles but for those who do this album also contains the title track (obviously), “Lyin’ Eyes” and “Take It To The Limit” alongside some other half-arsed attempts at trying to sound like Gram Parsons while being much more interested in making bucketloads of cash rather than creating anything of musical worth.

The last word however should go to Douglas Adams, creator of “The Hitchhiker’s Guide…” and who wrote in that very tome “Space is big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it's a long way down the road to the chemist's, but that's just peanuts to space”…and always remember, as it helpfully reminds you on the cover of “The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy"...“Don’t Panic”…

Journey Of The Sorcerer - https://youtu.be/wZdZKolMIl0?si=AZysom48xVRCG_wT