Sunday, August 24, 2008

The Secret History of Hall and Oates

Daryl Hall (no tache) and John Oates (tache) met in primary school and were drawn together through their shared passion for Top Trumps. The duo cemented this bond by playing music, starting a group in their early teens called The Unidentical Twins which evolved into The Schrodinger's Hepcats, then Weak At Denise and then Oates and Hall, before finally settling on Hall and Oates. An early sitpulation in their first contract with Sony/BMG was that Hall would always stand to the right of Oates, and must enter every room first. John Oates bitterly contested this obligation and finally won the right to position himself wherever he felt comfortable but only after after a long court battle. This was not before he was left to endure an arduous twelve day wait outside the pair's bungalow mansion as Hall had gone on holidays. The strain of the court battle took it's toll on the duo who split arcimoniously. Daryl Hall retained the rights to the full band name Hall and Oates and continued to record and perform under that moniker. As a result John Oates was forced to drop his own surname and simply called himself 'John'.

This video for their breakout hit 'I Can't Go For That' was acclaimed in its day for its high-tech special effects. The duo, and their sax man, were replaced with animatronic droids made entirely from tinfoil. The shininess on their tinfoil skin and hair can be noticed throughout the vid.


silver medalist

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Well said.