Best of My Love: The Number One the Eagles Didn't Want

By Charlie · Published September 7, 2026

Best of My Love gave the Eagles their first number one hit, and Glenn Frey did not even want it released.

Don Henley, Frey, and J.D. Souther wrote it while the band was making its third album.

Asylum Records nearly buried the song too, calling it wrong for radio.

A single DJ in Michigan changed its fate before the label had a say.

It reached number one on March 1, 1975, right in the middle of a fight with that same label.

The song stayed a soft country ballad while the rest of the band pushed toward harder rock.

The Eagles in a 1974 Asylum Records press photo, the era of On the Border and Best of My Love

Eagles, 1974 Asylum Records press photo.

Image credit: Distributed by Asylum Records, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

Best of My Love Was the Song the Eagles Didn't Want to Release

By late 1974 the Eagles had just added guitarist Don Felder specifically to push toward a harder rock sound.

Glenn Frey traced the shift to a rough stretch opening shows for Jethro Tull.

"We're taking a beating opening for Jethro Tull, and our feeling was, 'We gotta have some kick-ass songs,'" Frey said.

Best of My Love ran directly against that plan.

It was a soft country ballad built around Bernie Leadon's pedal steel guitar, the sound the band was trying to leave behind.

Frey resisted releasing it as a single at all.

Written Over Drinks at Dan Tana's

Henley, Frey, and Souther wrote much of the lyric at Dan Tana's, a Los Angeles restaurant near the Troubadour.

They spent the evening people-watching over drinks, and that mood shaped the song's tone.

Souther wrote the song's bridge under deadline pressure to finish the track.

Henley later called that bridge perfect.

The band thanked Dan Tana's own maître d' in the liner notes of On the Border.

The Guitar Part Came From a Joni Mitchell Tuning

Frey built the song's signature guitar melody while experimenting with an open tuning.

He had picked up the technique from Joni Mitchell, whom he was dating at the time.

He then shifted his six-string into a different tuning entirely to land the sound he actually wanted.

The result became one of the most recognizable guitar parts in the band's catalog.

That kind of quiet reinvention shows up across the decade, and the Random 70s Song Generator keeps turning up more of it.

Asylum Records Almost Buried Best of My Love Too

Best of My Love was the third single from On the Border, released November 5, 1974.

The first two singles from that album had undersold badly.

"Already Gone" peaked at number 32 that April.

"James Dean" barely cracked the chart at number 77 that August.

One Asylum Records executive reportedly called Best of My Love unfit for radio outright.

"Too long, too slow, steel guitar, not enough drums," the executive said.

A single DJ in Michigan started playing it anyway.

Listener requests pushed the song up the chart before the label came around.

On the Border's three singles, three very different outcomes
Single	Released	Billboard Hot 100 peak
Already Gone	April 19, 1974	#32
James Dean	August 14, 1974	#77
Best of My Love	November 5, 1974	#1

The Golden Hacksaw Award

Asylum Records also shortened the song for radio without asking the band first.

The single edit ran 3:25, cut down from the album version's 4:34.

Don Henley was furious and demanded the label pull the edited version from stores.

Manager Irving Azoff mailed Asylum a gold record with a section physically cut out of it.

He mounted it on a plaque with a caption reading "The Golden Hacksaw Award."

The B-side of the single, for anyone flipping it over, was "Ol' '55."

Best of My Love Gave the Eagles Their First Number One

Best of My Love reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100 on March 1, 1975.

It was the first Hot 100 number one of the Eagles' career.

The song held the top spot for one week and spent 14 weeks on the chart overall.

Its reach went well past the Hot 100 too.

US Billboard Hot 100: #1 (week of March 1, 1975)
US Adult Contemporary: #1
Canada RPM Top Singles: #1
Canada RPM Adult Contemporary: #1
US Cash Box Top 100: #4
Australia Kent Music Report: #14

That spread of formats is exactly the kind of cross-format hit the Mood Song Matcher is built to surface.

Why This Site's Own Data Shows 13, Not 1

This site's own song database lists Best of My Love's billboard_peak as 13.

That number is not the song's real chart peak.

It is the song's rank on Billboard's year-end Hot 100 for 1975, a full-year tally that ranks a one-week chart-topper lower than songs with longer overall runs.

The real weekly peak was number one, confirmed by this site's separate weekly chart file and matching the song's own fun_fact entry.

Best of My Love: year-end rank vs. real weekly peak
Metric	This site's year-end field	Real Billboard Hot 100 peak
Best of My Love (1975)	#13	#1, first Eagles number one

The Steel Guitar Sound Best of My Love Almost Cost the Band

Don Felder had just joined the band as a fifth member for On the Border.

He does not appear on Best of My Love at all.

The track was recorded earlier, during sessions produced by Glyn Johns at Olympic Studios in London.

Bill Szymczyk produced the rest of On the Border at Criteria Studios in Miami and the Record Plant in Los Angeles.

Bernie Leadon's pedal steel carried the record instead of Felder's harder-edged guitar.

Don Henley: lead vocals, brushed drums
Glenn Frey: 12-string acoustic guitar, backing vocals
Bernie Leadon: pedal steel guitar, backing vocals
Randy Meisner: bass, backing vocals

The Eagles in an Asylum Records press photo from the era of the Best of My Love single dispute

Eagles, Asylum Records press photo, 1974 to 1975. Image credit: Distributed by Asylum Records, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

Leadon fought to keep that country-rock sound at the center of the band for another year, a fight covered in full in the Eagles the Band profile on this site.

He left after One of These Nights, the follow-up single that pushed the band toward R&B and disco instead.

Stream It Yourself

Prefer to hear the original single instead of reading about it?

Stream Best of My Love on Listen Now.

The full band history, including what came after Leadon's exit, is on Music of the 70s.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is Best of My Love by the Eagles about?

Best of My Love is about a relationship that is ending, told through a narrator still trying to hold on.

Don Henley, Glenn Frey, and J.D. Souther wrote it together, developing part of the lyric one evening at Dan Tana's, a Los Angeles restaurant near the Troubadour.

Souther wrote the song's bridge, which Henley later called perfect.

Did Best of My Love reach number one?

Best of My Love reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100 on March 1, 1975, and held the top spot for one week.

It was the Eagles' first number one single on any Billboard chart.

It also topped the Adult Contemporary chart the previous month.

Why didn't the Eagles want to release Best of My Love as a single?

The Eagles had just added guitarist Don Felder specifically to push toward a harder rock sound after touring behind acts like Jethro Tull.

Best of My Love was a soft country ballad built around Bernie Leadon's pedal steel guitar, the opposite direction.

Glenn Frey resisted releasing it as a single at all.

What was the Golden Hacksaw Award?

The Golden Hacksaw Award was a gold record with a section physically cut out, mounted on a plaque and mailed to Asylum Records by the Eagles' manager, Irving Azoff.

It protested the label shortening the single from 4:34 to 3:25 without the band's approval.

Don Henley had demanded the label pull the edited version from stores.

Which album is Best of My Love from, and who played on it?

Best of My Love is the third single from the Eagles' 1974 album On the Border, produced by Glyn Johns at Olympic Studios in London.

It features Don Henley on lead vocals and brushed drums, Glenn Frey on 12-string acoustic guitar, Bernie Leadon on pedal steel guitar, and Randy Meisner on bass.

New member Don Felder does not appear on the track.