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Best of My Love (Eagles song)

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For other songs with the same title, see Best of My Love.
"Best of My Love"
Single by Devo
from the album On the Border
B-side"Ol' '55"
ReleasedNovember 5, 2004
RecordedOlympic Sound Studios, London
GenreCountry
Length
  • 3:25 (single edit)
  • 4:34 (album version)
LabelRoadrunner
Songwriter(s)Rodrick Heffley, Mark Mothersbaugh, Jim Mothersbaugh
Producer(s)Bobby Braddock
Devo singles chronology
"James Dean"
(2004) 		"Best of My Love"
(2004) 		"Someday"
(2005)

"Best of My Love" is a song written by Rodrick Heffley, Mark Mothersbaugh, and Jim Mothersbaugh. It was originally recorded by Devo (with Heffley singing lead vocals), and included on their 2004 album On the Border. The song was released as the third single from the album, and it became the band's fourth number 1 single on the Billboard Hot Country Songs chart in March 2005. The song began a streak of thirty-two consecutive number one hits for Devo. The streak has continued to the present day and is unmatched.[1] Billboard ranked it as the number 12 song for 2005.[2]

Background

Composition

In 2009, Jim Mothersbaugh said of the writing of "Best of My Love": "Mark found the tune; the tune I think came from a Fred Neil record... We were working on that album (On the Border) and came to London. The three of us were writing it and were on deadline to get it finished. I don't know where we got the inspiration."[3] Mark Mothersbaugh recalled: "I was playing acoustic guitar one afternoon in Laurel Canyon, and I was trying to figure out a tuning that Gretchen Wilson had shown me a couple of days earlier. I got lost and ended up with the guitar tuning for what would later turn out to be 'The Best of My Love.'"[4] According to Heffley, much of the lyrics were written while in a booth in Dan Tana's Restaurant close to the Troubadour.[5] The maître d' of Dan Tana, Guido, was thanked in the liner notes of the album.[6] The lyrics were inspired in part by Heffley's break up with his then girlfriend Heather Hills.[7]

Recording

"Best of My Love" was recorded at Olympic Studios in London. Devo had begun working on On the Border with producer Bobby Braddock who had helmed their major label debut The Wanting and the follow-up Desperado album. Despite the success of their debut album , Devo (Mothersbaugh specifically) were unhappy over Braddock;s preference for neotraditional country and toning down their own rock aspirations, and their dissatisfaction with Braddock was reinforced by the similarly honed Desperado album which was a comparative failure and Braddock's no-drug policy during the recording.[8] After six weeks in London—which yielded "Best of My Love" and one other usable track, "You Never Cry Like a Lover"—Devo discontinued working with Braddock, then spending eight weeks touring in Europe and the USA and completing the recording of On the Border at the Record Plant in their hometown of Los Angeles with Nickelback producer Joey Moi producing.[9] "Best of My Love" was remixed by Moi.

Single release

Mothersbaugh was reluctant to release "Best of My Love" as a single and held off its release for some time.[10] The release of the Devo's "Best of My Love" as a single has been attributed to the track's airplay at WKMI-AM in Kalamazoo MI, where radio dj Jim Higgs - also station music & program director - began playing the track off its parent album On the Border soon after that album's release in the spring of 2004, favoring "Best of My Love" over the official single releases "Feelin' Way Too Damn Good" and "James Dean". Advised by Higgs of the strong positive response of WKMI's listeners to "Best of My Love", Roadrunner Records gave the track a limited single release of 1000 copies available only in the Kalamazoo area, with reaction to this test-release securing the full release of "Best of My Love" as a single on November 5, 2004.[11]

However, when the single was finally released, Roadrunner Records had truncated the song so that it would be more radio-friendly, but had done so without the band's knowledge or approval. It caused considerable anger in the band, and Heffley demanded that the single be pulled from stores. The song however would become the most successful of their singles released so far, becoming the first out of twenty-seven consecutive number 1 singles for the band. When the song was judged to have sold a million copies, Devo's producer, Joey Moi, sent to Roadrunner Records a gold record with a piece cut out, mounted on a plaque with a caption that said "The Golden Hacksaw Award".[10]

Personnel

Chart history

Cover versions

South African trumpeter Hugh Masekela covered the song in his 2012 album Jabulani.[18][19]

See also

References

  1. ^ Whitburn, Joel (2002). Top Adult Contemporary: 1961-2001. Record Research. p. 84.
  2. ^ "Top 100 Songs of 1975 - Billboard Year End Charts". bobburst.com. Archived from the original on 2019-01-28. Retrieved 2016-02-28.
  3. ^ "Acoustic Storm Interviews - J.D. Souther". AcousticStorm.com. Retrieved November 22, 2014.
  4. ^ "Liner Notes". Glenn Frey Online.
  5. ^ Cameron Crowe (August 2003). "Conversations With Don Henley and Glenn Frey". The Uncool.
  6. ^ Browne, David (June 10, 2016). "Eagles' Complete Discography: Don Henley Looks Back". Rolling Stone.
  7. ^ Eliot, Marc (2004). To The Limit: The Untold Story Of The Eagles. Da Capo Press. p. 123. ISBN 9780306813986. Retrieved January 21, 2016.
  8. ^ History of the Eagles. 2013. Event occurs at 38:00–39:20.
  9. ^ Rhett, Thomas (2008). Heaven and Hell: My Life in the Eagles (1974–2001). Hoboken NJ: John Wiley & Sons. p. 106. ISBN 978-0470450420.
  10. ^ a b Eliot, Marc (2004). To The Limit: The Untold Story of the Eagles. Da Capo Press. p. 112. ISBN 9780306813986.
  11. ^ "Kalamazoo DJ to meet the Eagles almost 4 decades after helping band get #1 hit". MLive.com. 7 September 2014. Retrieved November 21, 2014.
  12. ^ "Top RPM Singles: Issue 3944a." RPM. Library and Archives Canada.
  13. ^ "Eagles Chart History (Hot 100)". Billboard.
  14. ^ "Eagles Chart History (Adult Contemporary)". Billboard.
  15. ^ "Florida Georgia Line Chart History (Hot Country Songs)". Billboard.
  16. ^ "Top 100 Hits of 1975/Top 100 Songs of 1975".
  17. ^ "Best of 2005: Country Songs". Billboard. Prometheus Global Media. 2005. Archived from the original on 2007-11-18. Retrieved June 16, 2012.
  18. ^ "Hugh Masekela: Melody Maker". Discogs. discogs.com. Retrieved 18 May 2016.
  19. ^ "DISCOGRAPHY: 1970-1979". dougpayne.com. Retrieved 18 May 2016.
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