The fifth solo album by Don Henley, Cass County, was a delightfully country-flavored return by a figurehead of recent American music. It’s the most recent entry in a catalog of releases in his personal identify that dates again to 1982. On June 27, 1989, that sequence introduced Henley’s largest album exterior of the Eagles. The admirable The Finish Of The Innocence went on to promote six million copies in America alone.
Innocence was the third solo album by the artist from Gilmer, Texas. It arrived some 5 years after Constructing The Good Beast, which was itself an enormous success, turning triple platinum within the US. The follow-up featured a stellar visitor listing of contributors, with Bruce Hornsby an impressed option to play his ever-distinctive keyboards on the stirring title observe, which he and Henley co-wrote.
The distinguished singer-songwriter J.D. Souther appeared each on background vocals and as co-writer, with Henley, on “Little Tin God” and on “The Heart of the Matter.” The latter track additionally had a writing credit score for the much-travelled Mike Campbell, from Tom Petty’s Heartbreakers, who co-produced the entire album.
A surprising solid listing
Longtime James Taylor collaborator Danny “Kootch” Kortchmar had six co-writes, together with the very good “New York Minute.” There have been backing vocals, too, by Edie Brickell, Sheryl Crow, Melissa Etheridge, Ivan Neville, vocal group Take 6, and Axl Rose of Weapons N’ Roses. Different contributors embrace such esteemed gamers as Stanley Jordan, Steve Jordan, Wayne Shorter, Waddy Wachtel, David Paich, Jeff Porcaro, and Pino Palladino.
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It was a surprising solid listing on a very effective album that additionally included a great deal of social commentary. “I haven’t slowed down, but I’ve gotten much better at coping with things,” stated Henley on the time. “I’m nonetheless very offended in regards to the world scenario as I see it in authorities and so far as the way in which we’re treating the planet, however I’m perhaps mellowing somewhat extra so far as love and romance are involved. Besides that I don’t significantly just like the phrase ‘mellowing.’
“I would rather think that I’m maturing,” he went on. “I’m still angry and I’m still dissatisfied, but I’m not an ‘angry young man’ anymore.”
Purchase or stream The Finish Of The Innocence.
