On Wednesday, John Oates, the other half of the duo “Hall and Oates” of the 1970s hit, appeared on the “Behind the Velvet Rope” podcast hosted by David Yontef. During his appearance on the podcast, Oates shared his emotions and thoughts on his partnership with Daryl Hall.
According to Oates, he has moved on from whatever happened in the past, as he believes it happened in the past, and remains there. Now, he is in the present and lives in the present, not the past. Even though he believes that Hall and Oates have given a series of hits for the 1970s and 1980s and he embraces that time of the past, now he’s looking forward to performing solo.
John Oates opens up about his partnership with Daryl Hall
The case was filed in November 2023 by Hall, the other half of the duo, but the legal battle still continues with different court hearings. Regarding this partnership with Daryl Hall, Oates opened up on the “Behind the Velvet Rope” podcast on Wednesday.
According to Otis, he has moved on from that time when he was a part of the beloved 70s and 80s rock duo ‘Hall and Oates, and now he prefers to live in the present. Though he embraces the music they had made together and is really proud of it, it will remain a thing of the past for him.
Oates had said on the podcast that one can’t ignore the fact that the Hall & Oates catalog of hits and the 50-year career will always trump anything that Daryl or he does on his own, and he is actually OK with it. Oates, the other half of the duo also said, “I’m very proud of that music. I think we made music that will stand the test of time.”
Further in the podcast, Oates said, “But at the same time, I am very nostalgic. Later on, he compared the band of the duo with a ‘great museum’ in which he said, “You are really excited to go and see all the beautiful paintings, all the exhibits, or whatever it might be, and then near the end, your feet start to hurt, and you say, ‘You know what?, ‘I can’t wait to get out of here’. That’s kind of how I feel about it.”
This shows that no matter how much he loves those hit songs and how much he is proud of what they created together, he still doesn’t feel like looking forward to making it happen again in the future.
When asked about a song, he’d be happy to never perform it again. Oates said, honestly, he’s not really touring with Daryl these days, and he’s doing solo shows, so he’s moved on. He said, “It’s a matter of living in the present.”
During the podcast, other than about partnerships, Oates spoke about his solo career and about his time on the TV show “The Masked Singer.” Also, I asked about his plan to release an EDM version of Marc Cohn’s “Walking in Memphis.”
The Dispute of Hall & Oates
The two musicians, John Oates and Daryl Hall formed the massively successful pop-rock duo band ‘Hall and Oates” in 1972, which was a hit in the 70s and 80s. The pop rock group duo had given well-known hits like ‘Rich Girl’ and ‘Private Eyes.’
Unfortunately, the duo went through a more massive breakdown when Hall sued Oates, saying that he had tried to sell his share of Whole Oats Enterprises LLP to music publisher Primary Wave, which was in violation of the terms of the business agreement the “Hall and Oates duo’ had forged. Whereas Oates’ in his own filing against Hall’s statement had said that they were “inflammatory, outlandish, and inaccurate.”
On November 16, 2023, a Nashville Chancery Court judge restrained the sale of Oates or his other trustee’s shares of the Whole Oates Enterprise LLP to Primary Wave IP Investment Management LLC for a certain period of 15 days. There was never an official breakup of the duo; the most recent performance they gave as a duo was in October 2022.
