Whew!Odd
'Hotel California' trial abruptly ends after prosecutors drop case over handwritten Eagles lyrics
Prosecutors who accused three men of having stolen hand-drafted lyrics to the Eagles' "Hotel California" have abruptly dropped their case.www.usatoday.com
I first learned of this trial last week, and I was thinking to myself this could be heaven or this could be hell. Something didn't add up. Where was the guy (a biographer) who Henley "loaned" the handwritten lyrics to? Why hadn't he been subpoenaed to testify? What took Henley so long (decades) to discover that the draft lyrics were missing? How credible was his testimony, and how reliable is his memory, as he's acknowledged he had a serious substance abuse problem back in the day?Odd
'Hotel California' trial abruptly ends after prosecutors drop case over handwritten Eagles lyrics
Prosecutors who accused three men of having stolen hand-drafted lyrics to the Eagles' "Hotel California" have abruptly dropped their case.www.usatoday.com
Have not had a chance to fully dive into this today but, at first glance, it looks like Henley withheld a ton of evidence, some of it potentially exculpatory, including emails that cast doubt on Henley's claim that the handwritten lyrics had been stolen. The judge said that Henley and his counsel tried to weaponize their attorney-client privilege "to hide information that they believed would be damaging [to the prosecution]."
Agreed. Can't imagine they have a peaceful easy feeling about this.
Great job with the clever song references. I can almost see a way that every song off of Desperado could be applied to this dispute...
The album is excellent and the title track is a masterpiece, but Henley wasn't satisfied with his vocals on the song and I'm not sure the Eagles even released it as a single. Linda Ronstadt's cover was great and a huge commercial success, but the Eagles' version is the gold standard.
I don't know much about his personal life other than the fact that he had a serious drug problem when he was young, and he knocked up Stevie Nicks. What makes him a prick?
I’ve heard him speak on other topics and he comes off as an asshole. He played hardball with the band on money for a long time, and has a hard ass position on fair use of his music on YouTube (Rick Beado has a video about him on his channel). Add in this case, and he comes off as a dick to me. It’s too bad. I’m a huge fan of his voice and some of his songs are in my all time favorites.
once they saw his lyin' eyes they decided it was just wasted time
That's the consensus from anyone that's met him... he also abused, filmed and most likely raped a lot of underage groupies. A complete POS ..
felder's book is very revealing
I agree that he looks bad in this case and, yeah, he's extremely aggressive when it comes to his IP. I know he spent serious coin in a trademark infringement case going after a hotel in Mexico several years ago. The hotel had opened as the Hotel California years before Henley composed the song and album, but then was sold and rebranded under a different name. It was subsequently sold again, after Henley wrote the song, and the new owners went back to the original name. They went further, though, playing Hotel California music throughout the property, selling Hotel California-branded merch, and claiming they were the inspiration for the song. Case settled with an NDA.
I guess you can check out any time you like, but you can never leave.
