Hall & Oates are officially out of touch.
After years of tension between the Philadelphia musical duo, the animosity between the two former friends has escalated into a legal battle. As first reported by journalist Nate Rau, Daryl Hall has filed a “mysterious” lawsuit against John Oates in Nashville Chancery Court.
The reason as to why Hall is suing his bandmate is currently under wraps. As reported by Philadelphia Magazine, court documents categorized the lawsuit as over a “contract/debt” dispute. So far, neither party has made a public statement as to what the tension actually is.
Their rocky partnership
Like Simon & Garfunkel and Lennon/McCartney, Hall & Oates have a history of a tumultuous partnership. Speaking on Bill Maher’s Club Random podcast last year, Daryl Hall hinted that the pair are not friends – at least, in the traditional way, and have some very different musical ideas:
“John and I are brothers, but we are not creative brothers. We are business partners. We made records called Hall & Oates together, but we’ve always been very separate, and that’s a really important thing for me.”
This animosity seems to have hit a breaking point in recent weeks, as Philadelphia Magazine reports that Hall filed a complaint against Oates for undisclosed reasons on November 16th, and that has now been bumped up to a full-blown restraining order.
A restraining order is a formal court order, preventing one party from contacting the other, often having to stay approximately 500 feet from the protected person, their home, or their family. According to the City of Philadelphia, a restraining order, known as a Protection from Abuse Order (PFA) can be set in motion if one party has harassed, threatened, stalked, or inflicted violence upon the other.
As the majority of the legal filings between Hall & Oates have been hidden from public access, we cannot know for sure what kind of harassment or abuse Oates inflicted against Hall. We do know, however, that there was sufficient enough evidence for the court to grant Hall the restraining order against Oates.
However, Daryl Hall did state on Club Random that some of the band’s songwriting credits are inaccurate, meaning he could be entitled to some (very expensive) royalties. Using the song “Kiss on My List”, a song credited as written by Oates only, Hall said, “I did all those [harmonies], that’s all me.”
While this interview took place last year, it is highly possible that the duo’s musical dispute could be over misleading songwriting credits, which could be very costly for Oates, as this would fit under the “contract/debt” category. More information will be revealed as the lawsuit continues, and the restraining order is put in motion.
Published: Nov 23, 2023 04:04 am