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Classic rock groups were often more interconnected than they seemed on the surface. For example, The Eagles indirectly caused Poco’s “Crazy Love” to become a hit single. Here is a look at why Poco was able to take over the pop charts late into their career.

A member of Poco joined The Eagles before ‘Crazy Love’

Firstly, some background. Poco’s first ten albums were not exactly winners on the pop charts. Things changed with their eleventh album, Legend. The record included “Crazy Love” and “Heart of the Night.” If you are familiar with Poco, it’s almost certain you know those two songs.

During a 2014 interview with Goldmine, Poco’s Rusty Young was asked if Poco decided to reinvent themselves as a radio-friendly band. “No, I’ve just always written songs,” he replied. “What happened, in 1978 — actually the end of ’77 — Timothy [B. Schmit] left the band to join The Eagles, and of course that was a really cool thing, because how many times do you get to join a band like The Eagles? 

“So that left me and Paul [Cotton], and the record company was going to drop us,” he added. “So we had written some songs — I had written ‘Crazy Love’ and Paul had written ‘Heart of the Night’ — and our management decided to invite the people from our label down to a rehearsal studio and we played those songs for them. We said, ‘These are the songs we want to record, and we think we will do well with them.’ And they agreed, so we went into the studio and recorded them, and ‘Crazy Love’ became No. 1 in Billboard for six weeks.”

The connections between The Eagles and Poco

In a way, it’s fitting that The Eagles unintentionally led Poco to a new level of success. The Eagles were one of the first country rock groups to break into the mainstream. Meanwhile, Poco was making country rock music before The Eagles existed and it’s clear that Poco had some influence on The Eagles’ sound.

The fact that The Eagles opened the door for Poco to have pop hits feels like country rock was coming full circle. The two bands will forever be part of the same part of rock history.

Why ‘Crazy Love’ and ‘Heart of the Night’ were hits

So why did “Crazy Love” and “Heart of the Night” do so well? Both songs came out at the right time. “Crazy in Love” became a hit at a time when soft rock was huge. The tune blurs the line between country rock and soft rock, so it had a cross-genre appeal.

Meanwhile, “Heart of the Night” combines the sounds of soft rock with the slick grooves of disco. It came out around the same time as the Bee Gees’ “How Deep Is Your Love,” the disco group’s most famous foray into soft rock. The world just wanted dance music and easy listening to co-exist and “Heart of the Night” accomplished that. “Heart of the Night” occupies a place in Poco’s discography similar to the place “One of These Nights” occupies in The Eagles’ discography. Both songs saw a country rock group take some ideas from disco for a commercially potent genre fusion.

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