Templates of Love

from "Those Shoes" by The Eagles

They’re lookin’ at you, leanin’ on you
Tell you anything you want to hear
They give you templates of love

The Long Run is The Eagles' most fully realized album, lyrically and musically. Henley, Frey et al. seem to have shed the country-tinged fakery of previous efforts and have embraced their own smooth hyper-commercial sound.

But they're not sleek to the point of omitting the obligatory tale of a sexy young woman headed down a perilous path. In "Those Shoes," the act from which she can't return is the slipping on of the sexy shoes. Soon, people in the drinking establishment are flattering her...but to what end?

The above lyrics sheet says that these sleazeballs offer her "tablets of love," which is clever: a small, easily dispensed dose of attention, which may actually be a drug that will get her hooked.

But I swear that it sounds like Don Henley sings "templates of love," which for some reason seems far richer in its ambiguity. The woman only receives the same formulas that everyone gets, instead of honest connection.

When the song later claims that "you can't believe your reviews," it becomes clear that the Eagles are not just officiating some woman's Friday night. They are analyzing the sycophantic and hype-driven corporate music world that they had just conquered.