Don Henley's Still-Relevant "Dirty Laundry"

I was seven years old in the passenger seat of my dad’s green Chevy pickup truck when I heard the song “Dirty Laundry” for the first time. Unlike my mother’s 1968 Mustang, the Chevy’s radio was rarely on - but when it was, each song I heard was undiscovered dad-lore, similar to him telling a story about something from thirty years ago, then never mentioning it again.

This is how I was introduced to groups like Def Leppard, Van Halen, Bon Jovi–a different perspective from what the Mustang introduced me to (Metallica, Tesla, The Rolling Stones).

At seven years old, I didn’t remember the song by its title, but rather by its entrancing synth-bass introduction that could even make anxious little me shimmy my shoulders. By 2010, the only other song that had made me feel the way "Dirty Laundry" had was “Poker Face” by Lady Gaga - their massive sonic productions and clever mixing of instrumentation moved me in a way I didn't know was possible. That is when I discovered the supernaturality of music, the magical intersection of sound waves and human imagination.

When the green Chevy got traded in, "Dirty Laundry" no longer frequented my dad’s radio like before but I made sure to seek it out after getting my first iPod. I remember trying to recall the lyrics in an effort to find the song, which, to my fortune, proved rather easy. Since the days of that first iPod, "Dirty Laundry" has stayed in my musical rotation.

Now, as a 22-year-old journalism student, "Dirty Laundry" has come to mean something entirely different to me than it did in 2010.

Before “Dirty Laundry” could change my seven year old life, several things had to be set into motion.

In 1971 Los Angeles, a group of four musicians came together to form one of the most legendary rock groups in history, the Eagles. Throughout the band’s lifetime, they created five number-one singles and six number-one albums, became six-time Grammy Award winners and five-time American Music Award winners. The Eagles’ most recognizable album is Hotel California, the title track of which is also their best known song. This album has since been ranked one of the Top 100 Best Albums by Apple Music, and songs like “Witchy Woman” and “Take It Easy” always resurface across the internet around Halloween and springtime, respectively. 

Like Led Zeppelin, the Eagles burned bright for about ten years before falling apart. By 1980, the Eagles broke up and all five members headed into their solo careers. Even after breaking up, their influence remained strong. Of their individual careers, Don Henley’s was the most successful. The Eagles’ former drummer and co-lead vocalist released his debut solo album, I Can’t Stand Still, in August of 1982. “Dirty Laundry,” the sixth track on the record, skyrocketed to the number three spot on the Billboard Hot 100 just a few months later, at the beginning of 1983. The single was nominated for a Grammy and remains Henley’s most successful solo single.

In 1983, my dad was about 15 years old, a Don Henley listener even if he didn’t really pay attention to the message behind the music. The Vietnam War had finally ended but the Cold War was still raging; nuclear destruction loomed over the globe. The 80s were also famously the final decade before the entire world became irreversibly connected via the World Wide Web. 

No one in 1983 could’ve predicted the state news media would be in by 2025, but everyone had their theories. There was an increased accessibility in media for the masses, and decreased regulation allowed for more available channels and less content restrictions. This dysregulation led to the creation of more businesses, and with all these new mega media companies cropping up, their interests rested primarily on profit. 

Because of this, news media shifted from prioritizing public interest to competition: who can get the story out the fastest, which story can draw in the most viewers, and which story can hold viewers’ attention the longest. Henley recognized this, and thus, “Dirty Laundry” was born.The song’s primary message lies within its first verse:

“I make my livin’ off the evenin’ news
Just give me somethin’, somethin’ I can use
People love it when you lose
They love dirty laundry…”

Henley wrote the lyrics from the perspective of a journalist, someone in the business of news rather than music. Everyone working in that brand-new news station needs to get paid somehow; how else to bring in revenue than to provide all the juiciest, foulest stories? Forget the consequences of broadcasting tragedy all 24 hours of the day!

In verse two, Henley’s journalist-character claims he “could’ve been an actor,” that he “just has to look good, I don’t have to be clear,” openly acknowledging and telling the listener that the goal is not even to tell them the truth, but rather to be the shiniest, most attractive attention-grabber on screen. He invites anyone listening to whisper in his ear, to share some of that dirty laundry so that his news station can be the first to blast it. This is followed by a killer chorus, most memorable for its brevity and repetition: “Kick ’em when they’re down / Kick ’em when they’re up / Kick ’em all around.”

Regardless of what the story is (uplifting, devastating, useless), sensationalizing it will always lead to profit. To me, the chorus has a similar beat to the hyenas in The Lion King performing, “Be Prepared,” after Scar rallies them together: powerful, synchronized and threatening, just like a march.

Verse three maintains the song’s satirical edge, with Henley sharing that they’ve got a “bobble-headed bleach blonde” on staff, here to tell you “about a plane crash with a gleam in her eye.” Henley paints an apathetic news-landscape, full of white-toothed actors with infallible smiles and unwrinkled faces. There is no devastation for the victims of the plane crash; only excitement, because the news station finally has a story to tell. The “gleam in her eye” that Henley talks about cannot be anything other than nefarious.

Verse four throws ethics to the wind without shame, Henley singing in his charming voice, “can we film the operation? Is the head dead yet?” because he understands that the more gruesome and jarring a story is, the more viewers it will draw in. In that same verse, Henley states that the boys in the newsroom all have a “running bet,” as if the victims of such horrors aren’t real to them, but rather subjects of fantasy with something to profit off. After all, it’s easy to be detached when telling a story rather than living it. 

The only break in character lies in verse five, in which Henley demands that the viewer “just leave well enough alone,” because “you don’t really wanna know just how far it’s gone.” 

When reporters desensitize themselves from reality, they encourage viewers to do the same, even if unintentionally. The constant stream of news demands that the viewer walk away or get used to it, and news media makes tragedy look so attractive that it is often impossible to achieve the former. People adjusted to calamity, and then began to crave more of it–a symptom still present today.

Media gives society never-ending anxiety, and even after recognizing that, we proceed to feed it all day long. We demand catastrophe as something to talk about. Verse six emphasizes this with the line, “We got our dirty little finger’s in everybody’s pie.” Suddenly, the whole world’s business became your business and my business too–and by making it yours and my business, media companies can maintain an influx of profit. 

Perhaps the most crucial (and alarming) part of the song lies in its final verse: “...we can dance and sing / When it’s said and done, we haven’t told you a thing.” Making a performance of tragedy is still present in our news media today, four decades later. 

Even as a famous musician with likely no experience in the world of journalism, Henley adds one final scathing lyric before the instrumental outro, leaning ever further into his satirical yet critical attitude: “We all know that craft is king, give us dirty laundry.” Saying that “craft is king” above all else–including content or context–is admitting that the sharing of information and how it will be received depends on the way that message is crafted. Give us your dirty laundry and we’ll dress it up real nice, Henley is saying. We’ll twist it whichever way necessary to make it more entertaining - or polarizing, or rage-inducing, or anxiety-inducing, or whatever specific emotion they’re trying to invoke among viewers and listeners. 

“Dirty Laundry” to Don Henley and my dad’s generation is not unlike the song “Hey Ya!” to my generation - and when I hear the former’s minute-and-a-half long guitar outro, backed by a chorus chanting, “kick ‘em when they’re up, kick ‘em when they’re down,” I can also hear OutKast saying, “y’all don’t want to hear me, you just want to dance.”

Even back in 1982, people could see what was happening to the news media, a shift impactful and obvious enough to create a song as groovy and merciless as “Dirty Laundry.” The song also indicates that those working for the news media make no efforts to hide their collective apathy, but wear it plainly. 

Henley has painted a vacuous image, depicting news media as a hungry being that can never be satisfied. And while the message still feels like a threat and emotes a sense of dread, I can’t help but turn it up every time it comes on shuffle; I can’t help but dance to the groove of the keys, the bass, the guitars. I’ll be chanting right alongside Henley, kickin’ ‘em when they’re stiff, kickin’ ‘em all around. 

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