The Story Behind the Eagles’ Tribute to Hollywood Icon “James Dean,” Co-written With Jackson Browne and J.D. Souther

While the Eagles were working on material for what would become their second album, Desperado, Don Henley, Glenn Frey, along with friends and collaborators J.D. Souther, and Jackson Browne had a jam session after seeing folk artist Tim Hardin play at the Troubadour in West Hollywood. “That’s when the idea came together about us doing an album of all the angst-meisters,” said Frey in the liner notes for The Very Best of the Eagles. “It was going to be all of the antiheroes.

The album would scan the stories of 19th-century outlaws Bill Doolin and Bill Dalton on “Doolin’ Dalton” and other fictitious and flawed characters on “Outlaw Man” and “Desperado.” At the time, the band also wrote a tribute to Hollywood icon James Dean, who died in a car accident in 1955 at the age of 24.

Henley said he found himself sitting listening to everyone talk about Dean as they worked through some of the songs. “They had evidently studied him and knew much more about him than I did,” he said. “I had seen most of Dean’s movies, but I somehow missed the whole icon thing. The mythology never quite reached my part of East Texas, but I pitched in and ended up with a writing credit — although the song was mostly Jackson’s, I think.”

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Jackson Browne

By the time the Eagles started recording Desperado in ’73, Browne had already collaborated with the band on their 1972 debut single “Take It Easy.” Brown also wrote one more Eagles track for the band solo, “Nightingale,” which follows the story of a man struggling to find some peace of mind despite all the noise in the world.

After the band finished the title track for Desperado, they continued on an Old West theme for the album and shelved “James Dean” for a while.

“When it came time to do ‘On the Border,’” said Frey, “we got ‘James Dean’ right off the shelf and said, ‘Let’s finish this.’”

J.D. Souther

Along with Brown, Souther also contributed to Dean’s story, along with Henley and Frey, who took on the vocals for the single.

“James Dean was cool—period,” said Souther, who died in 2024 at 78. “I don’t remember any personal nostalgia for the fifties other than the fact that at one time or another Glenn, Jackson, and I all owned ’55 Chevys. Dean was a great actor whose career was cut short by dying in one of the coolest cars ever made — a Porsche Spyder on the way home from a racetrack in an accident that was not his fault. Another irresistible story that needed a song. “

Souther added, “Jackson started it and we all clambered aboard on first hearing.”

Before Frey co-founded the Eagles in ’71, he and Souther started performing as country-folk duo John David & Glenn before changing their name to Longbranch Pennywhistle with the addition of bassist David Jackson and released their self-titled album in 1969.

Along with co-writing “Doolin’ Dalton” and “James Dean” for Desperado and On the Border, respectively, Souther also co-wrote many of the Eagles’ hits including “Heartache Tonight,” “Victim of Love,” “How Long,” “Best of My Love,” and “New Kid in Town.” Souther also continued working with Frey, who died in 2016 at 67, and Henley, who both kicked off their solo careers in 1982.

‘Too Fast to Live, Too Young to Die’ 

The lyrics tell Dean’s story, from the silver screen, and culture of the early ’50s and through his untimely death.

James Dean
James Dean
I know just what you mean
James Dean
You said it all so clean
And I know my life would look all right
If I could see it on the silver screen

You were the low-down rebel if there ever was
Even if you had no cause (James Dean)
You said it all so clean
And I know my life would look all right
If I could see it on the silver screen

We’ll talk about a low-down bad refrigerator
You were just too cool for school
Sock hop, soda pop, basketball and auto shop
The only thing that got you off was breakin’ all the rules

James Dean
James Dean
So hungry and so lean
James Dean
You said it all so clean
And I know my life would look all right
If I could see it on the silver screen

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At its end, the song wraps around the ’50s saying linked to Dean’s fate: Too fast to live, too young to die.

You were too fast to live
Too young to die, bye-bye
You were too fast to live
Too young to die, bye-bye 

Photo: RB/Redferns