Jackson Browne fondly remembered Eagles co-founder Glenn Frey and his influence on music before performing “Take It Easy,” the hit song they wrote together.
Frey died Monday at age 67 of complications from rheumatoid arthritis, colitis and pneumonia. According to a YouTube post of Browne’s performance, he honored Frey in Clearwater, Florida, on Tuesday.
Browne prefaced the song with a description of the song’s origin, and Frey’s contribution to it.
“I wrote this song with Glenn Frey,” Browne said. “It’s a song that I started, but I didn’t finish it. Even if I did finish it by myself, it wouldn’t be the song that it is and it wouldn’t be the song that we all love.”
Browne began writing the song but got stuck on the second verse, stalling out after the line, “Well I’m-a standing on a corner in Winslow, Arizona/And such a fine sight to see.”
As Browne has stated in the past, Frey re-ignited the song, coming up with the next line, “It’s a girl, my Lord, in a flatbed Ford/Slowing down to take a look at me.”
The lyrical moment is memorialized by a statue in Winslow, Arizona, depicting a man with a guitar standing on a corner. A mural behind the statue depicts a woman in a pickup truck, looking in the statue’s direction.
The song would become The Eagles’ first single, released in 1973 and peaking on the Billboard Hot 100 chart at Number 12.
Watch Browne pay tribute to Frey in the video.