Music legend John Oates has admitted that he made the decision to try and sell his half of the music catalog he shares with Daryl Hall because their fallout was ‘kind of ruining’ his life.
Oates, 76, is embroiled in a bitter legal battle with Hall, 77, who filed a lawsuit after his musical partner apparently attempted to sell his share of the duo’s Whole Oats Enterprises to music publisher Primary Wave Music without his bandmate’s permission.
Speaking exclusively to Good Morning America’s Michael Strahan, Oates defended his decision to try and part ways with Hall and explained: ‘When this whole situation got mired in legality and really complex legal wrangles, I got frustrated.’
The father-of-one claimed that Hall had ‘always wanted to be his own man’ and he was simply trying to ‘give him the opportunity to do that’, as he continued: ‘I said, “If I sell my half, he can do what he wants”, it was kind of ruining my life to be honest with you, I wasn’t happy.
John Oates has admitted that he made the decision to try and sell his half of the music catalog he shares with Daryl Hall because their fallout was ‘kind of ruining’ his life
Oates sat down for an exclusive interview with Good Morning America to share his side of the story
‘I said, “I’ll just step aside”. People do it all the time, look at all the artists selling their catalogs, it’s not that big a deal. Darryl didn’t like the idea that I would sell to a certain third party,’ he alleged.
When Michael told Oates that Hall has alleged that his planned sale was ‘a completely clandestine and bad faith move’ and ‘the ultimate partnership betrayal,’ Oates replied that he really doesn’t see it that way.
‘We’ve always looked at ourselves as individuals working together and I felt like I had the right to do that,’ he said, before confirming that they haven’t made music for the past two decades – they’ve only performed their hits live together.
Asked if they’d ever fallen out before the legal feud, Oates revealed: ‘No, not really. We never really had a lot of disagreements, but then again we never really talked to each other very much.
‘For the past 20 years, we’d show up at a show individually, walk on stage, play and then we’d go our separate ways. It really wasn’t as tight as people might… would like to imagine in their fantasy imagination of our relationship.’
